The Elegance of Swans

 

Having somehow lost this week’s blog which may indeed be lurking somewhere, unacknowledged, in an anonymous file but beyond present recall, I have decided that I won’t re-write it. Too onerous so, apart from mentioning that I attended two concerts on Saturday and Sunday, each totally unlike the other, one of Celtic and Sephardic folk music; the second, for piano and oboe of music by Schumann, Brahms and Poulenc, I shall write no more save to say how differently marvellous each was; how gifted the performers were; and how gratified the audience.

Swanning around at the Beguinage. 

I have instead decided to write about the swans on Brugge’s canals, something I have intended to do for ages. They are one of the impossible-to-miss sights of the town and add greatly to its beauty and appeal. They are irresistibly photogenic and superficially friendly; that is to say, one might assume they are friendly but the best advice is to steer clear of contact and indulge in aesthetic appreciation only! Swans-on-water supply one of the most stereotypical views of Brugge but never fail to charm and delight. I know that I derive an enormous amount of pleasure from just seeing them, sometimes unexpectedly; mostly in the usual places: on the canal at the Ezelpoort and at the Beguinage which is probably the Swan HQ here.

The beheading of Pieter Lanchals in the Markt, Brugge
in 1488.
Copper engraving in 1736 by N.Heylbrouck

I  have tried to find the definitive explanation for their presence here, but the legend has small variations. It is certainly connected to the Emperor Maximilian of Austria who had suzerainty over Brugge in the fifteenth century. His adored wife, Mary of Burgundy, was here in March 1482, to ride and to indulge in her passion for falconry when she fell from her horse, broke her neck, and died. Maximilian did not feel the same about Brugge after that trauma and at some later point, decided to raise the taxes in the town; there may have been a connection between the two events. The townspeople were somewhat intransigent about his demands which were considered excessive, and when they resisted he sent his bailiff and minister, Sir Pieter Lanchals to enforce the new regime; Lanchals and the other noblemen with him were promptly imprisoned and when Maximilian himself came to Brugge, the rebellious citizens imprisoned him too in the Craenenburg in the Markt, [now the site of the Grand Cafe Craenenburg] Maximilian was no doubt permitted to watch the torture and decapitation of Lanchals and his fellow nobles, in the Markt. With ultimate disrespect, Lanchals’ head was put on a spike and displayed at the Gentpoort for communal abuse. Maximilian was forced to restore various privileges and reduce the taxes for the aggrieved citizenry, before fleeing back to Austria, quietly plotting his revenge.


 Mary of Burgundy, remembered in Bruggge

Maximilian returned with a large army which proceeded to plunder the city, and he ordered that swans must be kept on the canals of Brugge in perpetuity, in memory of his good friend and tax collector, Pieter Lanchals, who had had swans pictured on his escutcheon to commemorate his name, Lanchals, which meant Long Neck. The threat from Maximilian for non-compliance was that he would flood the town, letting in the North Sea to drown the place. And so, five hundred plus years later, the swans’ descendants swim serenely on, delighting all who live here and those who visit. Pieter did not die in vain; indeed, his legacy lives on, both on the canals and in commerce.

For the swan theme remains popular in Brugge as in the Bistro 't Zwaantje on Gentpoortvest and the Hotel die Swaene,
Steenhouwersdijk, as well as in motifs on private buildings such as the stately procession of swans swimming across the façade of the house [above] , in Carmersstraat.


Hotel die Swaene