Dark Gate

No matter how well you look around the Prinsenhofplein, there seems to be nothing left of the old palace at first glance. The model in the square gives an impression of what the whole looked like. Has everything really disappeared? As you walk out of the street, you get the answer and stumble upon a visible remnant. You do have to walk through to get a good picture of it. The Donkere Poort is not just a back door, but a crucial exit, for this was the way the counts and dukes could immediately leave the city and had direct access to the countryside. With the naturally quite rebellious people of Ghent, that was no unnecessary luxury.

The Donkere Poort, which was actually called Noordpoort or Achterpoort, owes its nickname to the soot left on the stones by the industrial activities that arose here. Just before it, on the left, you can enter Sanderswal, a street where you can find a number of old sandstone remnants of the Prinsenhof at numbers 4 and 6. Here we are on the north side, at the private quarters where perhaps Emperor Charles, the last Burgundian, was born on February 24, 1500.

Mediahuis België