5 The Nerve Centre of Political Networks? The Burgundian Court and the Integration of Holland and Zeeland into the Burgundian State, 1425–1477 Mario Damen A LL over Western Europe, late medieval princes offered aristocrats the iopportunity to exercise important state functions. They did not hesitate to grasp these chances because in this way they could not only defend the rights and benefits of their lord but also promote their own interests. However, in the process of forming what is commonly called the Burgundian state – all the duchies, coun- ties, lordships etc., which the Burgundian dukes from Philip the Bold to Charles the Bold succeeded in uniting in a personal union– the incorporation of the principal noble families of the different territories did not develop along the same lines. Werner Paravicini has noted that Burgundian, Picardian and Brabantine nobles dominated Philip the Good’s household, the court in its most narrow institutional definition. Conversely, the political integration of the counties of Holland and Zeeland in 1433 was not reflected in the composition of the household of the Burgundian duke. Paravicini explains the absence of nobles from Holland and Zeeland in the duke’s household by pointing to the enforced incorporation of the counties into the Burgundian state. Moreover, the nobles did not constitute a social and political block but were strongly divided into two rival political networks. 1 Rivalries between parties were a constant factor in the politics of the counties of Holland and Zeeland during the second half of the fourteenth and the fifteenth centuries. The two parties were the Hoeken and Kabeljauwen and consisted of nobles, countrymen and town-dwellers. Many authors have written on the political struggles fought out between the parties, though the debate continues over what they actually were. Wim Blockmans and Antheun Janse define them as political associations on a supra-local level connected to two or more rivals for princely power in the counties. Hence, these associations manifested themselves at times when a 1 W. Paravicini, ‘Expansion et integration: la noblesse des Pays-Bas à la cour de Philippe le Bon’, BMGN, 95 (1980), pp. 298–314.