Duchy of Limburg

The duchy was multilingual, being the place where Dutch, French, and German dialects border upon each other and coexist at their geographical extremes, both now and in medieval times.

The state's territory was situated in the Low Countries between the river Meuse (Maas) in the west and the Imperial city of Aachen in the east.

Frederick selected a natural prominence at an important intersection of roads which had probably been called "Heimersberch" or Hèvremont, and built his new comital caput there in about 1030.

While in the northern and eastern districts Limburgish and Ripuarian dialects were spoken, the southwestern part around Herve was dominated by Walloon.

About 1020, Duke Frederick of Lower Lorraine, a descendant of Count Palatine Wigeric of Lotharingia, had Limbourg Castle built on the banks of the Vesdre river.

His estates then comprised the districts of Baelen (with Limbourg), Herve, Montzen (since 1975 part of Plombières), Walhorn, and the southwestern exclave of Sprimont.

As the Lorrainian ducal dignity was contested the title "duke of Limburg" arose, achieving confirmation from Emperor Frederick Barbarossa in 1165.

However, upon the death of Henry's son Waleran IV in 1279, leaving only one heiress Irmgard, who had married Count Reginald I of Guelders but died childless in 1283, the War of the Limburg Succession broke out.

The duke of Brabant won the final Battle of Worringen in 1288, thereby gaining control of the Duchy of Limburg with the consent of King Rudolph I of Germany.

The measures of the Council of Troubles implemented by Philip's stern governor, the duke of Alba, sparked the Eighty Years' War, ended by the 1648 Peace of Westphalia.

Basic administrative parts until the French revolution, including detached Sprimont
This shows the medieval "lands of Overmaas" and the Duchy of Limburg possessed in the Middle Ages by the dukes of Brabant. Together these formed one province in the Seventeen Provinces , sometimes referred to as Limburg. The dark lines are modern borders.
This shows the two modern provinces called Limburg next to the medieval duchy they are both named after. The small overlap is Teuven and Remersdaal, in eastern Voeren , a part of modern Belgian Limburg since 1977.