Royal historical Commission

The third and last volume of the edition of the charters of the counts of Flanders of the House of Alsace (1128-1191) has been published. This volume is dedicated to Adriaan Verhulst, co-editor and driving force behind the project, who passed away on 16^th November 2002. It contains 324 charters issued by Count Philip of Alsace (and his wives Elisabeth of Vermandois and Mathilda of Portugal) during the second half of his reign, namely, the period from October 1178 (his return from the Holy Land) to just before the announcement of his death in Flanders in the summer of 1191. These termini are associated respectively with volumes I (1988) and II (2001) of the edition concerning counts Thierry and Philip of Alsace, and with the edition of the charters of counts Baldwin VIII and Baldwin IX for Flanders by Walter Prevenier (1964). Hence, the hiatus between 1071-1128 (published by F. Vercauteren, 1938) and 1191-1206 (published by W. Prevenier) has now been completely filled.

In addition to the edition of the charters of the counts and countesses during the period 1178-1191, volume III also contains: a list of all the archive sources mentioned in the three parts of the edition; bibliographical references of edited sources and studies that did not appear in the previous parts; a list of presumably promulgated charters (1128-1191); a list of charters from third parties (1128-1191) in which the counts and countesses play a diplomatic role; a list of the addressees of the counts’ charters (1178-1191); a concordance with the “Regestes” by H. Coppieters Stochove; an appendix to the previous volumes: namely a charter by Count Thierry from 1139 and one by Philip from 1176.

The publication of Deel I: Inleiding, which deals with the diplomatic aspects of the counts’ charters for the period 1128-1191 together with the index for the two volumes concerning the reign of Count Philip, is planned for 2011.