Belfry of Aalst

The bell tower of Aalst is a building from the 15th century. The building consists of three parts: the court house, the bell tower, and the area house. The bell tower is classified as a UNESCO World Heritage site. The court house was built in 1225 from Lede sandstone in the early Gothic style. The oldest part of the back facade is even a piece of Romanesque architecture. The Aalst court house is presumably the oldest preserved court house in the Netherlands, despite various destructions and renovations. For example, in 1380 the building was burned down during the Ghent uprising. The area house is the late Gothic protrusion at the front. It was built in 1474 to be torn down and rebuilt six months later. From this building, the laws were proclaimed by the stadtholder. The bell tower is the most striking part of the building and was built in 1460. The front facade features two statues representing the Counts of Flanders and Aalst, with a sundial in between. On July 7, 1879, part of the building was burned down by fireworks. As a result, the front facade, the pediment, the small tower, and the bell tower had to be restored. The carillon was then expanded from 38 bells to 52. This carillon can be heard every quarter of an hour. In 1960, the Neo-Gothic dial was replaced by a dial with half spheres. Since then, the bell tower has been nicknamed 'tettentoeren' by the people of Aalst. This is due to the resemblance between the half spheres and breasts. In front of the bell tower stands the statue of Dirk Martens. He was a Flemish printer and publisher from the Middle Ages. Louis Paul Boon wrote about this: 'The man who is only known as the Black Man standing with his back to the bell tower and facing the cafés.'

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