Heerle
Heerle (Brabantic: "Èrel") is a village in the municipality of Roosendaal, in the Dutch province of North Brabant. Before the municipal reorganisation of 1997, Heerle was part of the municipality of Wouw. It lies between the cities of Bergen op Zoom and Roosendaal. Etymology. The name Heerle has been documented for the first time in the 13th century as "Harella" and is possibly a conjunction of the word "har" (meaning heightened sandy soil) and "loo", a small forest. The customary local Brabantic pronunciation differs significantly from the standard Dutch one, so that linguistic misconceptions regularly occur. History. Heerle was  mentioned for the first time in a charter of the Sint-Bernardusabdij in Hemiksem, which could raise tenth penning taxes in the village for the first time in 1277. In 1307, Heerle was proclaimed an independent parish, previously it was part of the parish of Bergen op Zoom. Regardless of having an independent church community, Heerle hadn't developed its own village governance and remained dependent on the aldermen of neighbouring Wouw. Furthermore, Heerle didn't have a village centre until the beginning of the 19th century.