A pub crawl through 16th century Antwerp

Pieter Breughel the Younger - The Swann inn (detail) - Wikimedia CommonsThere are many Belgian cities where you can go through the night, from pub to pub. Cafés like dark holes hidden behind small Medieval portals, or gritty workman’s cafés in harsh white light. But the best place for a pub crawl is Antwerp: a cocktail of sailors, students, elderly hippies, workmen and drunk Dutchmen. And in the 16th century this wasn’t much different, if we are to believe someone who should know: the deity Bacchus himself.

(more…)