page_title: Fortifications of Antwerp
section_title: First fortification ca. 10th century AD
hierarchical_section_title: Fortifications of Antwerp / First fortification ca. 10th century AD
caption_attribution_description: English: Antwerp 1st fortification from X1th century Scetch on a 19th century streetmap, with overlay of 19th century construction of Scheldt quais
context_page_description: Antwerp was developed as a fortified city, but very little remains of the 10th century enceinte. Only some remains of the first city wall can be seen near the Vleeshuis museum at the corner of Bloedberg and Burchtgracht, and a replica of a burg named Steen has been partly rebuilt near the Scheldt-quais during the 19th century. Parts of the canals that protected the city between the 12th and 16th century have been covered and used as a sewage system. Both the 16th century city walls and the 19th century fortifications have been covered up by major infrastructure works during the 19th and 20th century.
context_section_description: Since the Treaty of Verdun (843) the river Scheldt was the natural and political border between the County of Flanders (belonging to the Kingdom of France) to the west and the German Empire. In 980 the German Emperor Otto II awarded Antwerp a margraviate, and ordered a fortification built on the wharf, part of his fortification program for his western border. Around 1106 the Counts of Leuven, the later Dukes of Brabant, acquired the Margraviate of Antwerp, and it continued to be part of the Duchy of Brabant until the end of the Ancien Régime.
  The first fortification consisted of a wall and ditch surrounding an enceinte built partly on the wharf. The wall was about 5 metres (16 ft) high and 1.35 metres (4.4 ft) thick and the ditch (on the north and southside of the fortification wall) was about 5 metres (16 ft)-10 metres (33 ft) wide. The ditch wa located at the north and eastside at the current location of the  street called Burchtgracht (a name that translates literally into "fortress ditch"), in the south it was at the Palingbrug. In 1104 Emperor Hendrik IV reinforced the walls to 12 metres (39 ft) high and 2 metres (6.6 ft) thick. The remnants of this wall can still be seen near the west face of the Vleeshuis at the end of the Vleeehuisstraat" .
  The wharf was a dry landmass, a dry hill protruding about 30 m into the main track of the river Scheldt (measured from the current 19th-century Scheldt-quayside). The enceinte within the wall was about 2.5 hectares (270,000 sq ft) in size, and contained 3 streets: the old Steenstraat (the current ramp leading to the het Steen building), the Zakstraat and the Mattestraat, and there was a square : the Burgplein. The rivershore sloped steeply into the river at the south and west of the wharf and more gently at the northside (the quays in the drawings to the right were constructed at a later date). On the westside there was only a fortification wall (no ditch) facing the river with a tollhouse at the wharfgate.  Within the enceinte the most important buildings were:
  house het Steen, (part of the current monument),
  house het hof van Cruyninghe (the Margrave's residence),
  the church dedicated to St Walburga, (which has entirely disappeared)
  the Vierschaer (the tribunal)
  a refuge of the Affligem Abbey
  a brewery.
  During recent excavations behind the Vleeshuis on the intersection of the current Vleeshuisstraat and Burchtgracht, the remainder of the medieval wall structure was excavated and also the floor of the cellar of house De Gans (The Goose, an inn) and a well. Another part of the fortification wall that had been enclosed in the old "badhuis" building (formerly the public baths) was made visible again when that building was demolished (a new structure has been built on the badhuis site, but the remainder of the medieval fortification wall is now better preserved, see gallery).
caption: Antwerp, 1st fortification from 11th century. Sketch on a 19th-century streetmap,  with overlay of 19th century construction of Scheldt quais.
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