3-046-971 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

On the Place de l'Hotel de Ville, Brussels, 1872. 'The older quarters, in a different style, are full of interest; and the intelligent stranger will here find much to reward his explorations. The Grande Place, in front of the Hotel de Ville, offers the richest assemblage of architectural beauties and curiosities. The antique houses, with their elaborate decorative sculpture, which here command the visitor's admiration, were the halls of different guilds or trade corporations, which enjoyed a high degree of constitutional dignity, and some political authority, in the olden time'. From "Illustrated London News", 1872.