On 27 April 1404, Philip the Bold, duke of Burgundy, died in the town of Hal, south of Brussels. The late duke's matrimonial policy had, in effect, led to the marriage of three Burgundian princesses to princes of the Empire. Heir to an important group of principalities, the new duke of Burgundy also took charge of the administrative and judicial institutions upon which ducal government relied. In the fourteenth century the position of the duke of Burgundy was such that, whether political, military or diplomatic, had repercussions across the length and breadth of Europe. The court of Burgundy was both an organ of government and a manifestation of prestige. The dynamism of the Burgundian territories, at the western Europe and the importance of their economic activities combined to give contemporaries an incomparable prosperity. Margaret of York and Mary of Burgundy saw that the way of rescuing survived of the Burgundian inheritance lay through an alliance with the house of Habsburg.