Gebruiker:Wittnn/Kladblok

Geschiedenis

De hofstede en eerste kasteel van Mathias d'Agua

Mathias d'Agua

De vroegste schriftelijke vermelding van de hofstede van Mathias d'Agua (ca. 1540 - 1609) vinden we in de 'Ommeloper van de heerlijkheid Sijsele' gemaakt door landmeter Jacob Lobbrecht in 1670-1671. De eerste cartografische bron dateert uit 1700. Deze kaart werd gemaakt door Joan Lobbrecht op vraag van de toenmalige, de heer van Steelant. Mathias d'Agua wordt hierin vermeld als oorspronkelijke eigenaar van een 'hofstede mette moote sijngelen' (een omwalde hoeve).

De hofstede werd gebouwd ten zuiden van een wegsplitsing plaats waar de Sijseelsestraat zich afsplitst van de Antwerpse Heirweg. In de nok van deze splitsing stond hoeve 'sprietweghe' en de herberg 'de Schroback'. De kaart van Jocob van Deventer (1550-1565) toont de hoeve en enkele gebouwen rond de wegsplitsing. De hofstede is hier nog niet afgebeeld, maar staat wel op de kaart van Pieter Pourbus (1561-1571). De hofstede werd dus in de tweede helft van de 16de eeuw gebouwd.

Opvallend aan de kaart van Pourbus en de kopie van Pieter Claeissens (1597 of 1601) is dat ze een 8-vormige walgracht tonen, met bebouwing in beide leden.

Hoeve 'Sprietweghe' en de herberg 'de Schroback' werden verwoest tijdens de Tachtigjarige Oorlog, maar later heropgebouwd.

Eigenaars na d'Agua

Er bestaat discussie over wie de eigenaars waren tussen Mathias d'Agua (ca. 1540 - 1609) en Jacques-Antoine de Zuylen de Nijevelt de Gaesbeke (1719 - 1779). Kaarten uit 1700 en 1713 vermelden 'Steelant' als eigenaar van het domein. Volgens Martin Verbeke is dit een verwijzing naar Jacques-Antoine's moeder van Marie-Anne van Steelant (1693 - 1722), maar op dat moment is zij nog te jong. De vermeldde heer van Steelant is Antoine-Ignace van Steelant (1650-1722), de vader van Marie-Anne. Dit betekend dat er nog steeds een gat van zo'n 40 jaar zit tussen Mathias d'Agua en de vader van Marie-Anne van Steelant. Marc Roose vermoed dat één van de dochters van Mathias d'Agua trouwde met een telg van het geslacht Stochove. Hun dochter trouwde vervolgens met de vader van Marie-Anne van Steelant.

Jacques-Antoine de Zuylen de Nijevelt de Gaesbeke (1719 - 1779) erfde uiteindelijk het domein. Hij verkoopt het aan Jacques Bossaert.

Volgens een kaart uit 1789 zijn de percelen van de huidige Hoeve Steevens in bezit van François van Hamme, heer van Stampershoeke (1746-1820).

Het tweede kasteel van François Bertram

Hoewel de exacte datum onbekend is, verwierf François Bertram (1793-1826) rond 1800 het domein Veltem. Hij sloopte de bestaande gebouwen en dempte de walgracht, met uitzondering van het zuidelijke deel. Het oude kasteel werd gesloopt en vervangen door een kasteel in empirestijl. Van de vroegere landbouwgronden rond het kasteel maakte hij een bosrijke tuin.

Deze tuin verkreeg een naam tot ver buiten de Brugse regio. In augustus 1817 brengen leden van de Caledonian Horticultural Society een bezoek aan het domein. Men beschrijft het als volgt:

We next bent our steps to the country seat of M. Bertrand, a merchant of Bruges, who, we were told, possessed the best garden in this quarter. We found the grounds extensive and well varied, considering the monotonous flatness of the country. They are laid out in the old Flemish style, with regular serpentine walks, berceaus  of lime-trees  having openings like windows, and with long straight walks, terminating in studied vista views. Where the straight walks cross each other at right angles, the centre of the point of intersection is shaped into an oblong parterre, resembling a basket of flowers, and containing showy geraniums  in pots, and gaudy flowers of a more hardy kind plated in the earth.

Some things are in bad taste. At every resting-place, some kind of conceit is provided for surprising the visitant: if he sit down, it is ten to one but the seat is so contrived as to sink under him; if he enter the grotto, or approach the summerhouse, water is squirted from concealed or disguised fountains, and he does not find it easy to escape a wetting. The dial is provide with several gnomons, calculated to shew the corresponding hour at the chief capital cities of Europe; and also with a lens, so placed, that, during sunshine, the priming of a small cannon falls under its focus just as the sun reaches the meridian, when of course the cannon is discharged.

The principal ornament of the place consists in a piece of water, over which a bridge is thrown. At one end of the bridge is an artificial cave, fitted up like a lion’s den, the head of a lion cut in stone peeping from the entrance. Above the cave is a pagoda, which forms a summerhouse three story’s high. At the top is a cistern, which is filled by means of a force-pump, and which supplies the mischievous fountains already mentioned.

The little lawns near the mansion-house are decorated with many small plants of the double pomegranate , sweet bay , laurustinus , and double myrtle , planted in large ornamented flower-pots and in tubs. These plats are all trained with a stem three or four feet high, and with round bushy heads, after the manner of pollard willows in English meadows. The appearance produced by a collection of such plats is inconceivably stiff, to an eye accustomed to a more natural mode of training. Eight American aloes (Agave Americana) , also in huge Dutch flower-pots, finish the decoration of the lawn, and, it must be confessed, harmonize very well with the formal evergreens just described. A very good collection of orange-trees in tubs was disposed along the sides of the walks in the flower-garden: two of the myrtle-leaved  variety were excellent specimens. All of them were pollarded in the style of evergreen plants.

The soil of the place, being a mixture of fine vegetable mould, resembling surface peat-earth, with a considerable proportion of white sand, seems naturally congenial to the growth of American shrubs; and indeed rhododendrons , magnolias , and azaleas  thrive exceedingly. In the flower-garden we saw Dahlias  in great vigour and beaty: they were growing in the open border to the height of six or seven feet, and the flowers were nearly double the size to which they usually attain in Scotland, and some of them were very brilliant colours. The roots are raised on the approach of frost in autumn, which is quickly indicated by the shrivelling of the leaves: they are kept over winter among sand, in the store-house, and are again planted out in the spring, when all risk of frost is over. The driest border and the poorest soil, are accounted best for dahlias.

Several kinds of tender plans were plunged in the open border for the summer; particularly the Peruvian heliotrope (Heliotropium Peruvianum) , the specimens of which were uncommonly luxuriant, and, being now in full flower, spread their rich fragrance all around. The European heliotrope (H. Europaeum)  is likewise not uncommon in the flower-borders.

In the fruit-garden we first saw pear and apple trees trained en pyramide or en quenouille, i.e. preserving only an upright leader, and cutting in the lateral branches every year.  Trees pruned in this manner occupy much less room, and throw much less shade, than those to which we are accustomed at home. It is evident that they can, when thought proper, be placed much more closely together than usual: those before us were planted at distances of eight feet. They, at the same time, in general produce a reasonable proportion of fine fruit; some of the trees in this garden indeed were fully loaded. This pyramidal mode, however, is calculated only for countries not exposed to frequent violent winds: with us, it could not, probably, be adopted with any degree of success, unless in the most sheltered situations. Even here, at Bruges, where high winds are of infrequent occurrence, some of the weaker trees had stakes to support them. These quenouille trees are here thought handsome or symmetrical; but to our eyes they appeared rather stiff and formal.

The north side of the fruit-garden is covered with a suite of glazed houses, consisting of five. In the centre is a stove or hot-house for the most tender plants; on each side of this is a green-house, for sheltering more hardy exotics during winter; and at each extremity is a house partly occupied with peach-trees, and partly with grape vines. In these last houses there are now ripe peaches, and we understood that many dozens of that fruit had been gathered; but ripe grapes can scarcely at all be expected in these houses, the two kinds of fruit not attaining maturity at the same period of the season. The sashes had some time ago been removed, in order to allow free admission to the sun’s rays and to air, - things indispensably necessary for giving flavour to the peaches: the young grapes had thus suffered a sudden check, from which they are not likely to recover. Some of the vines are trained on horizontal trellises in the front part of the interior of the houses, and some of the rafters. There appeared nothing worthy of imitation in the construction of the houses; and they seemed to be but indifferently managed. In the space of ground before the houses are ranges of pine-pits and melon frames; neither of them deserving of commendation. The kind of pine-apple chiefly cultivated is the queen; but the plants are very inferior to those which we lately saw at London, or which we commonly see in Scotland. One frame is dedicated to a collection of cockscombs (Celosia cristata) , and these certainly form the boast of M. Bertrand’s garden: they are of the dwarfish variety, but large or strong of their kind; and in brilliancy and variety of couleurs, they can scarcely be excelled.