Last modified: 2005-03-05 by ivan sache
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![[Flag of Steenvoorde]](../images/f/fr-59-st.gif)
by Olivier Touzeau
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The small city of Steenvoorde (4, 000 inhabitants; 2,982 ha) is located
in Flanders, on the border with Belgium. The neighbouring villages are Godwaersvelde, Boeschepe, Winnezeele and Houtkerque, and Dutch (locally
called flamand, Flemish) is still spoken there by a sizeable
proportion of the inhabitants.
The name of the city means in Dutch "gravelled ford", which recalls the
ford by which the Roman way from Cassel crossed the river Ey Becque
(becque is the local name of a brook, beek in Dutch). There was
there a priory depending on the Templars's commanderie of Eecke, now
a village located 6 km south of Steenvoorde, and an hospital founded by
the local lord in the beginning of the XVth century.
Steenvoorde was famous in the past for the production of woollen cloth.
Today, one of the biggest dairies in France is located there, as well
as a vaccine production plant owned by Institut Pasteur. The
detection kit currently used to detect BSE (mad cow's disease) is
produced in this plant.
Steenvorde has kept three windmills, the Steenmeulen, made of bricks,
and the Drievenmeulen and the Noordmolen, made of wood, and some of the
last fields grown with hops in France. There is a Hop Festival in
October, and the brewery Saint-Sylvestre, located in the neighbouring
village of Saint-Sylvestre-Cappel, prod