The French victory over the Flemings at the Battle of Zierikzee in Zeeland (1304) may have assuaged the bitterness of defeat at the Battle of Courtrai (the Battle of the Golden Spurs) two years earlier but seems not to have been conclusive, despite the peace treaty signed at Athis-sur-Orge in 1305, since the efforts by Philip IV of France to extend control over Flanders continued until at least 1320. Perhaps because only two contemporary vernacular chronicles provide accounts of the battle, it has been little studied since a single article by Pierre J.-B. Legrand D'Aussy in the late eighteenth century – a study which until recently had dictated subsequent understanding of the naval tactics deployed in the encounter and of the course and outcome of the battle. The better known of the two vernacular authors is Guillaume Guiart, a former soldier who served in the French army at Mons-en-Pévèle (1304). He composed his memoirs toward the end of his life and thus at some distance from the events at Zierikzee, which he did not personally witness. Even less mined by historians than Guiart's rhymed chronicle, at least beyond Netherlandic studies, is that by the Utrecht author Melis Stoke, writing about these same events from an even more proximate point in time.

The battle and the received view of it have been returned to our attention in Susan Rose's Medieval Naval Warfare 1000–1500 (2002).