Languages of Belgium
Before the federal structure and the language legislation gradually introduced in the 20th century, French was generally the only language used by public authorities. For example, the Dutch version of the Constitution has enjoyed equal status to the original French one only since 1967, and the German version only since 1991.
Of the inhabitants of Belgium, roughly 59% belong to the Flemish Community, 40% to the French Community and 1% to the German-speaking Community, though these figures relating to official Belgian languages include unknown numbers of immigrants and their children speaking a foreign language as primary language, and of Belgian regional migrants which may be assumed to largely balance one another for natively French and Dutch speakers. Though the standard form of Dutch used in Belgium is almost identical to that spoken in the Netherlands and the different dialects spread across the border, it is often colloquially called "Flemish".
Franco-Belgian comics
Belgium is actually and officially a tri-lingual country as there is also a small, yet sizable, officially recognized German-speaking minority, though Belgian comic home market first print releases, be it in Dutch or in French, are rarely translated into that language with German-speaking Belgians having to wait for internationally released editions for reading in their native tongue, typically those from licensed publishers stemming from neighboring Germany. Though Dutch and German are Germanic-language cousins, German-Belgium is encapsulated by French-Belgium, resulting in that French is the most utilized (second) language in that territory and has caused the handful of comic artist originating from there, such as Hermann and Didier Comès, to create their comics in French. Born Dieter Hermann Comès, Comès has actually "frenchified" his given name to this end, whereas Hermann has dispensed with his (Germanic) family name "Huppen" for his comics credits, though he maintained the Germanic spelling for his first name. Due to its relative modesty, both in size and in scope, and despite the close historical and cultural ties, no German-Belgian artists are as of 2018 known to have created comics specifically for the German comics world, when discounting commercial translations of their original Francophone creations.