Upon his marriage with Isabella of Portugal, he founded, at Bruges, the celebrated order of the Golden Fleece.

What could be more practical or more devout than the conception?
Did not the Lamb of God, suspended at each knightly breast, symbolize at once the woollen fabrics to which so much of Flemish wealth and Burgundian power was owing, and the gentle humility of Christ, which was ever to characterize the order?
Twenty-five was the limited number, including Philip himself, as grand master.

The chevaliers were emperors, kings, princes, and the most illustrious nobles of Christendom; while a leading provision, at the outset, forbade the brethren, crowned heads excepted, to accept or retain the companionship of any other order.
The accession of so potent and ambitious a prince as the good Philip boded evil to the cause of freedom in the Netherlands.

The spirit of liberty seemed to have been typified in the fair form of the benignant and unhappy Jacqueline, and to be buried in her grave.

The usurper, who had crushed her out of existence, now strode forward to trample upon all the laws and privileges of the provinces which had formed her heritage.
At his advent, the municipal power had already reached an advanced stage of development.