of William VI with Margaret of Burgundy, largely helped forward their
projects of aggrandisement. Philip the Good was, however, a much abler
ruler than his father, a far-seeing statesman, who pursued his plans
with a patient and unscrupulous pertinacity, of which a conspicuous
example is to be found in his long protracted struggle with his cousin
Jacoba, the only child and heiress of William of Holland, whose
misfortunes and courage have made her one of the most romantic figures
of history. By a mixture of force and intrigue Philip, in 1433, at last
compelled Jacoba to abdicate, and he became Count of Holland, Zeeland
and Hainault. Nor was this by any means the end of his acquisitions.
Joanna, Duchess of Brabant (1355-1404) in her own right, was aunt on the
mother's side to Margaret of Flanders, wife of Philip the Hardy. Dying
without heirs, she bequeathed Brabant, Limburg and Antwerp to her
great-nephew, Anthony of Burgundy, younger brother of John the Fearless.
Anthony was killed at Agincourt and was succeeded first by his son John
IV, the husband of Jacoba of Holland, and on his death without an heir
in 1427, by his second son, Philip of St Pol, who also died childless in
1430. From him his cousin Philip the Good inherited the duchies of
Brabant and Limburg and the marquisate of Antwerp. Already he had
purchased in 1421 the territory of Namur from the last Count John III,
who had fallen into heavy debt; and in 1443 he likewise purchased the
duchy of Luxemburg from the Duchess Elizabeth of Goerlitz, who had
married in second wedlock Anthony, Duke of Brabant, and afterwards John
of Bavaria, but who had no children by either of her marriages. Thus in
1443 Philip had become by one means or another sovereign under various
titles of the largest and most important part of the Netherlands, and he
increased his influence by securing in 1456 the election of his
illegitimate son David, as Bishop of Utrecht. Thus a great step forward
had been taken for the restoration of the middle kingdom, which had been
the dream of Philip the Hardy, and which now seemed to be well-nigh on
the point of accomplishment.

The year 1433, the date of the incorporation of Holland and Zeeland in
the Burgundian dominion, is therefore a convenient starting-point for a
consideration of the character of the Burgundian rule in the
Netherlands, and of the changes which the concentration of sovereign
power in the hands of a single ruler brought into the re