Antwerp City Hall
Antwerp-City-Hall is not a replica, as many houses on the Grote Markt - it's the original renaissance building. Only 10 years after completion it was burned to the ground in 1576 during the Spanish Fury. It was rebuilt three years later.
Grote Markt 1
1561 - 1564
56,0m / 184ft
The City Hall is a typical Northern Renaissance building. The middle section already shows characteristics of the new style that was developing: the Baroque. It was based on Italian principles and sometimes using Italian materials. The pink marble of the columns is rare in the northern sphere.
The small wooden doors on the ground floor used to be small shops. They were there in the beginning to pay off the loan for the City Hall.
Originally a statue of Brabo was installed on the top of the middle house. A statue of Maria has replaced it after the contra reformation.
Salvus Brabo was a local representative of the Roman Empire in Tongeren, the oldest city of the Roman province of Belgica and an important trade center between Colonia (Köln) and Lutetia (Paris). This was a real hero from the old school. As a nephew of Gaius Julius Caesar, he's pedigree went back via Romulus to Priamus of Troy who himself was a descendant of Jupiter (Zeus).
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