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Visit of the city of Oudenaarde. The Beguinage of Oudenaarde. A former monastic community of women, the present site was occupied since the 15C, but most of the buildings date to the 18C-19C. Beguines are not nuns, the difference is that beguines are only living into the vow of chastity, and not of poverty.
- (41)
- Attraction
- Achterburg 4, Oudenaarde
Welcome to the beguinage of Oudenaarde: an oasis of peace since 1449. You wouldn’t tell looking around now, but this wonderful refuge used to be completely surrounded by the Scheldt. Coming in, you might have noticed Saint-Roch looking down on you. In the literal sense, to be sure!
Contrary to many other beguinages in Belgium (Flanders), the beguinage of Oudenaarde didn’t make it to the Unesco World Heritage List because it wasn’t considered to be sufficiently authentic and representative.
- (41)
- Achterburg 4, Oudenaarde, 9700
People also ask
Does Oudenaarde have a beguinage?
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What to see in Oudenaarde?
Close to the wall of the beguinage stands the much smaller chapel of Our Lady of Seven Dolours in Gothic Revival style. Although this beguinage doesn’t have any remarkable old houses – most date from the 19th and 20th century – it still feels like a lovely nostalgic place.
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- Achterburg 4, Oudenaarde, 9700
- Stadhuis
- Mou Museum
- Sint-Walburgakerk
- Ronde Van Vlaanderen
- Centrum Ronde Van Vlaanderen
- Onze-Lieve-Vrouwekerk
- Begijnhof Oudenaarde
- Provinciaal Archeologisch Museum
- Sint-Laurentiuskerk
- Archeologische Site Ename
Rising emphatically at the north end of the Markt plaza is one of the finest town halls in the country. This was built between 1526 and 1537 and has a highly decorative Brabantine Gothic style. You could lose a few awestruck minutes staring at it from the square. Every space on the facade has some kind of ornamentation, be it blind tracery or niche...
The museum in the cloth hall is not to be missed, for the strength of its collections and its engaging, tactile displays. The reason you have to go in is to marvel at the 15 sumptuous tapestries, woven in Oudenaarde in the 16th and 17th century. For hundreds of years, Oudenaarde was also an important hub for silversmithing, and the dazzling Boever-...
If you approach Oudenaarde from the south, the 88-metre tower of the Sint-Walburgakerk hoves into view before any other landmark. The tower, crested by a Baroque slate dome, is from the 16th and 17th centuries, and since 1894 has contained Oudenaarde’s 49-bell carillon. The city’s carilloneur puts on a concert every Sunday from 12:00 to 13:00, but ...
Spring, normally the start of April, is time for one of the five “Monuments” of profession road cycling. The Tour of Flanders is a one-day classic, run extensively on gruelling cobblestones and centred on Oudenaarde where the race has finished every year since 2012. The Ronde van Vlaanderen is contested by cobbled classics specialists. These cyclis...
This attraction in Oudenaarde tells you all you need to know about this one-of-a-kind race, beginning with a gripping 13-minute film that puts you in the saddle out on the course. The multimedia exhibition also portrays past winners, lets you feel what’s like to ride on cobbles and test your time on the steep Oude Kwaremont road against two-time wi...
Ambling along the right bank of the Scheldt you’ll come to a wonderful early Gothic church from the 13th century. Begun in 1234, the Pamelekerk would be completed in just 30 years, which has left it with a uniform Scheldt Gothic style. All of the hallmarks of this style are present, among them an octagonal tower, ambulatory, triforium, clerestory a...
As with many Flemish cities, Oudenaarde comes with a historic beguinage, a community for lay religious women who had taken vows, but still had financial independence. This is one of 26 beguinages around Flanders to be UNESCO listed, and has stood at the current location since the 15th century. The last of Oudenaarde’s beguines passed away in 1960 a...
Ename, a couple of kilometres downriver on the right bank of the Scheldt was an important harbour and trading centre in the High Middle Ages, at the boundary between the Kingdom of France and the Ottonian Holy Roman Empire. There’s an enthralling archaeological site, which we’ll talk about below, while the discoveries yielded by the site are on dis...
The PAM also looks after Ename’s astonishing church, built at the turn of the 11th century in an Ottonian style. This is one of Belgium’s best examples of Romanesque religious architecture, constructed from blue-black Tournai limestone. In the early 1990s, 18th-century modifications to the tower’s entrance were peeled back to reveal marvellous Byza...
Under the same umbrella, the archaeological site is on the right bank of the Scheldt, encompassing eight hectares and equipped with informative panels. What you’ll see are the foundations of Ename Abbey, a Benedictine monastery established in 1063 and suppressed and demolished during the French Revolution at the end of the 18th century. The abbots ...
Jun 17, 2018 · The Beguinage of Oudenaarde. A former monastic community of women, the present site was occupied since the 15C, but most of the buildings date to the 18C-19C. Beguines are not nuns, the difference is that beguines are only living into the vow of chastity, and not of poverty.
- Achterburg 4, Oudenaarde 9700,, Belgium
Contrary to many other beguinages in Belgium (Flanders), the beguinage of Oudenaarde didn’t make it to the Unesco World Heritage List because it wasn’t considered to be sufficiently authentic and representative. But we thought it would be a pity not to give it a quick look as it is located in the centre and entrance is free.
