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The Sonian Forest or Sonian Wood〔Also known as the forest or wood of Soignies, and if derived from Walloon the forest or wood of Soignes.〕 ((オランダ語:Zoniënwoud), (フランス語:Forêt de Soignes)) is a forest that lies at the south-eastern edge of Brussels, Belgium. The forest lies in the Flemish municipalities of Sint-Genesius-Rode, Hoeilaart, Overijse and Tervuren, in Uccle, Watermael-Boitsfort, Auderghem and Woluwe-Saint-Pierre in the Brussels-Capital Region and in the Walloon towns of La Hulpe and Waterloo. Thus it stretches out over the three Belgian Regions. It is maintained by Flanders (56%), the Brussels-Capital Region (38%) and Wallonia (6%). There are some contiguous tracts of privately held forest and the ''Kapucijnenbos'', the "Capuchin Wood", which belongs to the Royal Trust. ==History== The forest is part of the scattered remains of the ancient ''Silva Carbonaria'' or Charcoal Forest. The first mention of the Sonian Forest (''Soniaca Silva'')〔Also Sonesia, Sungia, or Sonniaca, according to Charles Duvivier, "La forêt charbonnière: Silva Carbonaria", in ''Revue d'histoire et d'archéologie'' 3 (1862:1-26), p 12f.〕 dates from the early Middle Ages. Then the forest south of Brussels was crossed by the river Zenne/Senne and extended as far as Hainaut, covering most of the high ground between the Zenne and the Dijle. The ninth-century ''vita'' of Saint Foillan mentions "the forest, next to the abbey of Saint Gertrude, called the Sonesian"〔"''...in silva cœnobio Sanctæ Gertrudis contigua, quae Sonesia dicitur''", quoted by Duvivier 1862:12.〕 In the sixteenth century it was still seven leagues in circumference. At the start of the 19th century the area of the wood was still about 100 square kilometres, but due to wood cutting its area diminished to its current area of 44.21 km². The Forest extended in the Middle Ages over the southern part of Brabant up to the walls of Brussels and is mentioned, under the name of Ardennes, in Byron's ''Childe Harold''.〔''Childe Harold's Pilgrimage'', canto III, stanza xxvii, beginning "And Ardennes waves above them her green leaves" as the soldiers assemble who are soon to die at Waterloo. Byron was inspired by his visit to the site of the Battle of Waterloo in 1816; his note to this line: "The wood of Soignies is supposed to be a remnant of the forest of Ardennes, famous in Boiardo's Orlando and immortal in Shakespeare's 'As You Like It'.... I have ventured to adopt the name connected with nobler associations than those of mere slaughter."〕 Originally it was part of the Forest of Ardennes, the Romans' ''Arduenna Silva'', and even at the time of the French Revolution it was very extensive. A major blow towards its nineteenth-century contraction was struck when Napoleon Bonaparte ordered 22,000 oaks to be cut down in it to build the Boulogne flotilla intended for the invasion of England. King William I of the Netherlands continued to harvest the woods, and from in 1820 the forest was reduced to 11,200 in 1830. Rights to a considerable portion of the forest in the neighbourhood of Waterloo was assigned in 1815 to the Duke of Wellington, who is Prince of Waterloo in the Dutch nobility, and to the holder of the title as long as it endured; the present duke receives the equivalent of about $140,000 from his Belgian properties.〔"He has the rights to of forest near the battlefield for as long as the dukedom does not become extinct and owns sixty acres outright." (Andre de Vries and Jacques de Decker, ''Brussels: A Cultural and Literary Companion'', 2003:150).〕 This portion of the forest was only converted into farms in the time of the second duke. The Bois de la Cambre (456 acres) on the outskirts of Brussels was formed out of the forest in 1861. In 1911 the forest still stretched to Tervuren, Groenendaal, and Argenteuil close to Mont-Saint-Jean and Waterloo. Formerly the forest held the Abbey of Saint Foillan not far from Nivelles.〔''esse et Coenobium S. Foillani in silva Soniaca parte Carbonariæ non longe a Niviala'', according to Johann Jacob Hofmann, ''Lexicon Universale, Historiam Sacram Et Profanam Omnis aevi...'' (Leiden) 1698. (on-line facsimile text ) (on-line transcript ).〕 The forest served for a long period as an exclusive hunting ground for the nobility, but today is open to the general public. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Sonian Forest」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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