Antwerp Butchers Hall, Belgium - Arts and Museum

Art Gallery, Museum

The stylish rooms of the late Gothic Vleeshu is in the Vleeshouwerstraat comprise the previous council assembly room of the butchers' society. The imposing brick structure, built in 1501-04, was intentionally sited close to the Scheldt, allowing the blood of slaughtered animals to run off into the river. The Vleeshuis is now a museum of applied art and archaeology with collections of pre-historic, Egyptian, Roman and Merovingian artifacts; weapons and armor; ceramics; furniture; sculpture and woodwork; and coins. Among its most esteemed possessions are illustrations of the conversion of Saul in 16th C. Antwerp tiles, the Averbode Retable by Pieter Coecke van Aelst.