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What would have been the fate of the Low Countries if they had not been unified by the house of Burgundy? Would they have stayed divided as they had been for most of the Middle Ages or would another power come along and pull the various principalities together into a major state?

I've been reading about the Low Countries in the first stage of the Hundred Years War, and the lack of political cohesion in Edward III's anti-French coalition is remarkable, with various princes switching sides and playing the French and the English off each other.

It occurs to me that any successful unification of the Low Counties would have to be based around Flanders, as Flanders was by far the wealthiest and most populous state in the region (although manifestly unstable). Since Flanders was on the path to being absorbed into France after the reign of Phillip the Fair, it would seem to me that any unified Low Countries post 1300 would be heavily under French influence. Is there a state in Germany with the strength and proximity to unify the Low Countries? Perhaps a more successful House of Luxembourg reasserting itself west of the Rhine?

Anyway, let the discussion begin!
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