BELGIUM

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

IPA (US):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does Belgium mean? 

• BELGIUM (noun)
  The noun BELGIUM has 1 sense:

1. a monarchy in northwestern Europe; headquarters for the European Union and for the North Atlantic Treaty Organization

  Familiarity information: BELGIUM used as a noun is very rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• BELGIUM (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

A monarchy in northwestern Europe; headquarters for the European Union and for the North Atlantic Treaty Organization

Classified under:

Nouns denoting spatial position

Synonyms:

Belgique; Belgium; Kingdom of Belgium

Instance hypernyms:

European country; European nation (any one of the countries occupying the European continent)

Meronyms (parts of "Belgium"):

Scheldt; Scheldt River (a river that rises in France and flows northeast across Belgium and empties into the North Sea)

Sambre; Sambre River (a river in western Europe that rises in northern France and flows generally east into Belgium where it joins the Meuse at Namur)

Meuse; Meuse River (a European river; flows into the North Sea)

Waterloo (a town in central Belgium where in 1815 Napoleon met his final defeat)

Namur (a city in south central Belgium situated on a promontory between the Meuse River and the Sambre River; the site of intense fighting in World War I and World War II)

Liege; Luik (city in eastern Belgium; largest French-speaking city in Belgium)

Belgian capital; Brussels; Bruxelles; capital of Belgium (the capital and largest city of Belgium; seat of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization)

Antwerp; Antwerpen; Anvers (a busy port and financial center in northern Belgium on the Scheldt river; it has long been a center for the diamond industry and the first stock exchange was opened there in 1460)

Bruges; City of Bridges (a city in northwestern Belgium that is connected by canal to the North Sea; in the 13th century it was a leading member of the Hanseatic League; the old city (known as the City of Bridges) is a popular tourist attraction)

Charleroi (city in southwestern Belgium; center of an industrial region)

Gand; Gent; Ghent (port city in northwestern Belgium and industrial center; famous for cloth industry)

Meronyms (members of "Belgium"):

Walloon (a member of the French-speaking people living in Belgium)

Fleming (a native of Flanders or a Flemish-speaking Belgian)

Belgian (a native or inhabitant of Belgium)

Domain member region:

commune (the smallest administrative district of several European countries)

battle of Ypres; third battle of Ypres; Ypres (battle in World War I (1917); an Allied offensive which eventually failed because tanks bogged down in the waterlogged soil of Flanders; Germans introduced mustard gas which interfered with the Allied artillery)

battle of Ypres; second battle of Ypres; Ypres (battle in World War I (1915); Germans wanted to try chlorine (a toxic yellow gas) as a weapon and succeeded in taking considerable territory from the Allied salient)

battle of Ypres; first battle of Ypres; Ypres (battle in World War I (1914); heavy but indecisive fighting as the Allies and the Germans both tried to break through the lines of the others)

Battle of Waterloo; Waterloo (the battle on 18 June 1815 in which Prussian and British forces under Blucher and the Duke of Wellington routed the French forces under Napoleon)

Battle of Fontenoy; Fontenoy (a battle in 1745 in which the French army under Marshal Saxe defeated the English army and their allies under the duke of Cumberland)

Bouvines (in 1214 the French under Philip Augustus defeated a coalition formed against him in one of the greatest battles of the middle ages)

Holonyms ("Belgium" is a part of...):

Europe (the 2nd smallest continent (actually a vast peninsula of Eurasia); the British use 'Europe' to refer to all of the continent except the British Isles)

Holonyms ("Belgium" is a member of...):

Common Market; EC; EEC; EU; Europe; European Community; European Economic Community; European Union (an international organization of European countries formed after World War II to reduce trade barriers and increase cooperation among its members)

NATO; North Atlantic Treaty Organization (an international organization created in 1949 by the North Atlantic Treaty for purposes of collective security)

Benelux (a customs union comprising Belgium and Netherlands and Luxembourg)

Derivation:

Belgian (of or relating to or characteristic of Belgium or the Belgian people)

 Context examples 

Following complaints about mobile phone antennae a consultation was organised by the Walloon Region in Belgium.

(Health threats caused by mobile phone radiation, EUROPARL TV)

How about the charming Bruges in Belgium?

(AstrologyZone.com, by Susan Miller)

A country in western Europe, between France, Belgium, and Germany.

(Luxembourg, NCI Thesaurus)

A country in Western Europe, between France, Belgium, and Germany.

(Luxembourg, NCI Thesaurus/CDISC)

Researchers at Belgium’s Ghent University have developed a process that turns grass into biofuel.

(Will We Soon Drive on ‘Grassoline’?, The Titi Tudorancea Bulletin)

For example, microbes that flourish on granite gravestones in Maine are more like those growing on granite gravestones in Belgium than they are to those on limestone tombstones just feet away.

(Tales from the crypt: Life after death in a graveyard, National Science Foundation)

Denotes a person having origins in any of the countries of northern Europe such as Belgium, Denmark, Austria, Switzerland, Norway, Sweden, or Great Britain.

(Northern European, NCI Thesaurus)

A country in Western Europe, bordering the Bay of Biscay and English Channel, between Belgium and Spain, southeast of the UK; bordering the Mediterranean Sea, between Italy and Spain.

(France, NCI Thesaurus/CDISC)

Models developed by Tajeddine and co-authors from France and Belgium indicate that, if Mimas is hiding a liquid water ocean, it lies 15 to 20 miles (24 to 31 kilometers) beneath the moon's impact-battered surface.

(Saturn Moon May Hide a 'Fossil' Core or an Ocean, NASA)

And then, France had increased by leaps and bounds, reaching out to the north into Belgium and Holland, and to the south into Italy, whilst we were weakened by deep-lying disaffection among both Catholics and Presbyterians in Ireland.

(Rodney Stone, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)