municipality, Liège province, Wallonia region, eastern Belgium. It lies along the Meuse River, 6 miles (10 km) upstream from Liège. Seraing is a historic hub of Belgium's iron, steel, and machine-building industries. In 1817 the English industrialist John Cockerill founded in Seraing what was to become one of the largest ironmaking and machinery complexes in Europe. The Cockerill works built the first steam locomotives on the European continent (1835) and was the first to use the Bessemer process in steel production (1863). The château of the prince-bishops of Liège was acquired by Cockerill in 1817 and now houses the offices of Cockerill Mechanical Industries, part of Cockerill Sambre SA. An old Cistercian abbey located at the edge of the town is now the Val Saint-Lambert glassworks, one of the largest in Europe. There are several other historic castles in Seraing. Pop. (2006 est.) 60,740.