ABSTRACT
Historians of the Low Countries have often maintained that, following the itinerance of the fifteenth-century dukes of Burgundy, Margaret of Austria and Mary of Hungary’s sojourns in Mechelen and Brussels established these as ‘capital cities’. Drawing on analyses of their itineraries, this chapter argues that the governesses travelled to maintain control over the principalities of the Low Countries and actively partook in the construction of the ‘Burgundian territory’. Frequent visits to Burgundian palaces in cities like Brussels and Ghent bolstered the image of continuity from the devout, civic-minded Burgundian dukes to the new Habsburg rulers. Margaret of Austria’s later tendency to remain in Mechelen – a cultural rather than a political centre – thus indicates declining influence over policy and a focus on constructing her own territory.
