History, Wonder Tales, Fairy Tales, Myths and Legends The Flemish | Page 9

cultivated new farming lands. Flemings also represented a small proportion of
German-speaking Transylvanian Saxon settlement in the Romanian region of
Transylvania then under Austro-Hungarian rule from the 16th to 18th centuries.
Today, the Flemish diaspora consists of Flemish emigrants and their descendants in
countries such as France, the United States, Britain, Canada, Indonesia, Australia,
South Africa and Latin America.
During the 15th, 16th and 17th centuries, when the territory of present-day Flanders
was the setting for an impressive economic and cultural boom, many artists and
craftsmen sought to introduce their skills elsewhere, particularly in southern Europe.
Flemish settlers introduced the first printing presses into Spain and Portugal. The
Flemish contribution to the developing and populating of the Azores was so
conspicuous that for a long time the archipelago was referred to as the Flemish
Islands.
Following in the wake of the explorers, Flemish missionaries such as Pieter van Gent
(1480-1572) in Mexico, Joos de Rijcke (1498-1578) in Ecuador, Ferdinand Verbiest
(1623-1688) in China, Constant Lievens (1856-1893) in India, Pierre-Jean De Smet
(1801-1873) in the United States, and Jozef de Veuster (1840-1889) in Molokai built a
reputation in various overseas countries that continues even to this day.
A combination of a demographic explosion and inadequate economic growth resulted
in an emigration from Flanders that started in the mid 19th century and continued up to
the First World War. It was something that every family faced sooner or later. Not
only did it involve the so-called lower classes of the population, but also non-lowerclass people, who found a future overseas in teacher-training colleges and colleges of
engineering and agriculture. Louis Cruis, for example, was a Flemish engineer who
led expeditions to lay down the boundaries of Brazil and the city limits of the capital,
Brasilia.
The destination of the majority of Flemish emigrants was France. There are an
estimated 1,250,000 people with a Flemish surname in France. The Nord and Pasde-Calais departments were parts of historic Flanders before France annexed the
region in 1656.

Regions with significant populations
Belgium
Canada
United States
France
South Africa
Australia

6,230,000
12,430 - 168,910
58,545 - 389,171
187,750
55,200
15,130

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