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242 the lead in the Hanseatic league. But Ghent soon rose in importance and power, and the twin towns fought side by side the battle of popular freedom against Feudal and Royal authority. Indeed Ghent soon excelled Bruges in power and importance, and in the 13th and 14th centuries the capital of east Flanders wielded a power which many a crowned potentate might have envied. In 1297 the Ghenters repulsed an English army of 24,000 men under the warlike Edward I. and in 1302 they defeated a French army under Count John of Namur in the famous battle of the Spurs. The warlike Edward III. of England was glad to obtain the alliance of the famous Jacques Van Artevelde, Brewer of Ghent, and flattered him by the title of "dear gossip." For a time Artevelde induced his fellow-citizens to remain faithful to Edward against France and the Count of Flanders; but the politic English king sought through his "dear gossip" to obtain a real hold on Ghent. The people of Ghent were too wide awake to allow this, Artevelde's proposal that Edward's son should be elected Count of Flanders was rejected by the Ghenters, and Artevelde was slain in his own house,—a martyr to his friendship to his "dear gossip," Edward III. of England.

His son Philip Van Artevelde was appointed dictator in the civil war against the Count of Flanders, and defeated the Count in a pitched battle at Bruges. But this was only the precursor of ruin. In 1383 Charles VI. of France marched against Ghent, and defeated her army at Rosebek where 20,000 Ghenters are said to have perished on the field. The turbulent city now submitted to