History

Introduction

The history of the town of Veldhoven, the province of Noord-Brabant and The Netherlands, all play an important role in the highlighted points of interest found on this website. However, since it’s impossible to thoroughly illuminate the historical backgrounds, we have provided a summary of the relevant history here, based on the book by Jean Coenen ‘Veldhoven, van Toterfout tot heden’ (Veldhoven from Toterfout to the Present).

Four church settlements 
The current municipality of Veldhoven was established on May 1, 1921, when the three independent municipalities of Veldhoven-Meerveldhoven, Zeelst and Oerle were merged into one new municipality. More precisely, it combined the four original church settlements and their parishes, each of them independent since the 16th century.

The old map at the top of this page shows the four historic church settlements with its fields (white), planted forests (dark green) and grassland (light green) and the moors(light brown), just outside the villages.

Magistrates’ bench of Oerle
In the Middle Ages, these four settlement, in combination with Blaarthem, Vessem, Knegsel and Wintelre, were all part of the schepenenbank (magistrates’ bench) of Oerle. This magistrate, or so socalled magistrates’ bench, was located in the Kempenland’s quarter, one of the districts within the Meierij (territory) of Den Bosch, within the Duchy of Brabant. The history of this district goes back far beyond the Middle Ages, as man had settled here already for ten thousand years. Numerous traces of prehistoric cultures and early civilizations have been found or excavated over the years. If you look carefully, you can still see remains from early history in the modern-day landscape.

Read more in the next chapter Prehistoric times to Roman times