When part of the Netherlands separated to form the autonomous Dutch Republic in 1581, the remainder of the area stayed under Spanish rule until the War of the Spanish Succession. The Seventeen Provinces formed the core of the Habsburg Netherlands which passed to the Spanish Habsburgs upon the abdication of Emperor Charles V in 1556. The Imperial fiefs of the former Burgundian Netherlands had been inherited by the Austrian House of Habsburg from the extinct House of Valois-Burgundy upon the death of Mary of Burgundy in 1482. The Army of Flanders was given the task of defending the territory. This region comprised most of the modern states of Belgium and Luxembourg, as well as parts of northern France, the southern Netherlands, and western Germany with the capital being Brussels. They were a collection of States of the Holy Roman Empire in the Low Countries held in personal union by the Spanish Crown (also called Habsburg Spain).

Spanish Netherlands ( Spanish: Países Bajos Españoles Dutch: Spaanse Nederlanden French: Pays-Bas espagnols German: Spanische Niederlande) (historically in Spanish: Flandes, the name 'Flanders' was used as a pars pro toto ) was the Habsburg Netherlands ruled by the Spanish branch of the Habsburgs from 1556 to 1714.

March of empires: war of lords download