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Valkenswaard (The Netherlands)

Noord-Brabant province

image by Shipmate Flagchart : http://www.flagchart.net
adopted 28 Apr 1959

Valkenswaard municipality
Valkenswaard old flag (c.1935)
Valkenswaard Coat of Arms

Other Valkenswaard pages:

Borkel en Schaft

See also:

Valkenswaard municipality

Population (1 Jan 2003): 31.105; area: 56,50 km². Settlements: Valkenswaard (seat), Borkel en Schaft, Dommelen.
On 1 May 1934 the former municipalities of Borkel en Schaft, Dommelen, and Valkenswaard were merged to form the new municipality of Valkenswaard. Valkenswaard was a popular place to practice falconry, and after the sports to enjoy a good cigar from the Willem II factory (demolished 1998/99).
Flag: two equally wide horizontal stripes of blue and yellow; adopted 28 Apr 1959 by municipal resolution.
The colors are derived from the municipal arms.

In Valkenswaard pre-Roman pottery has been found in large quantities. In the beginning of the 8th century Willibrord preached the Evangelium here. He converted a noble Frankish family, of which two children went to the monastery. The grateful father gave in 704 all land between the Tongelreep and the Dommel to Willibrord, who presented it to the Benedictine Abbey in Echternach (Luxemburg). Until 1800 this abbey was to be consulted when land was sold.
Valkenswaard was named at first "Weedert" (diked piece of land), later "Weert op den Dries" (dries = low land), to distinguish it from Weert in Limburg. Next: "Verkensweert" (pig-weert), because of important pig-markets held here; it finally became Valkenswaard because of falconry (valk = falcon). Unfortunately the last falconer died in 1935.
Valkenswaard was part of the quarter Kempenland of the Meierij van Den Bosch; it became a possession of the States General in 1648. Till 1864 it was an agricultural municipality - then a cigar-factory was founded, followed by a railway, a beerbrewery (Dommelsch), diamonds, leather, car-parts, textiles, washing, metal hardware, glue, transformators and
carpentry ("You name it: we got it"!)
Source: Prisma-toeristengids Zeeland-Brabant-Limburg, by P.G. Bins, 1965.

Nicknames:
"Kalen" - baldies: apparently people working in cigar-factories were above average bald
"Valken" and "Haviken" (hawks) - after the placename, and the old falconers.
Source: Groot Schimpnamenboek van Nederland, by Dirk van der Heide, 1998.
Jarig Bakker, 29 May 2005

Valkenswaard old flag (c.1935)

image by Jarig Bakker, 29 May 2005
Used c. 1935

According to "Wie, Wat, Waar? 1940", an annual published by the Rotterdamsch Nieuwsblad in Nov. 1939, the flag of Oosterhout was: square chequy of red and white; in the canton a blue square, charged with the municipal arms, in which azure is replaced by gules.
This is a parading flag, used in 1935 at the 750th birthday of 's-Hertogenbosch.
Jarig Bakker, 29 May 2005

Valkenswaard Coat of Arms

image by Jarig Bakker, 29 May 2005
Granted 10 februari 1954

Arms: azure St. Nicholas holding in his right hand a crozier, while the left hand is extended over three children standing on the rim of a tub, all placed on a soil, all or.
This refers to a miracle: a landlord had killed and pickled three children, but Sinterklaas resurrected them.
Jarig Bakker, 29 May 2005