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Similarly, I find it weird that there is no direct route from Lille/Tournai to Rotterdam through Belgium. There is a huge detour over Maastricht.

Maybe this part of Belgium was not sufficiently under Roman control and too unsafe to travel through.

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As far as I can recall, this part of the Lower Countries was still mostly swamps.

There were still plenty of Roman settlements to the north of Brussels, so it's a bit curious that Belgica itself seems hardly populated. Maybe because of that tiny town that kept on resisting Roman rule?

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