Free audio walk in Middelburg
The Story of Middelburg
- 68 min
- 2.5 km
- 13 stops
- Free
Starts at Lange Delft 8
About this walk
Middelburg may not be the largest city in the Netherlands, but it does boast well over twelve hundred listed monuments.
During this hour-and-a-half walking tour, we pass the most famous among them — while focusing especially on what no longer stands. A church that disappeared beneath the Market Square, a prison that became a garden, and a street that was never the same after one night in May 1940.
Along the way, you'll discover where the telescope was invented and why the Oostkerk was paid for with beer. Twelve stops, nearly three kilometres, and a city you only truly understand once you know what has been lost.
The stops
Walk them in order; each story plays when you reach its pin.
- 1Stop 1
The market square and town hall
The square only came into existence after a church was demolished to make way for it.
Read the story - 2Stop 2
The Helm and the Observatory
A spectacle maker invented the telescope right here. He never got the patent.
Read the story - 3Stop 3
Kapoengang
The town prison once stood behind this alley, complete with a torture chamber and torture chair.
Read the story - 4Stop 4
Hofplein and the Van de Perre House
A city palace with the wrong name, standing where a vanished church once was.
Read the story - 5Stop 5
Spanjaardstraat
In 1460, the city council officially designated this street as the red-light district.
Read the story - 6Stop 6
Verwerijstraat
Two porters, a wine barrel, and a house name that explains itself.
Read the story - 7Stop 7
Oostkerk
Twenty years of construction, funded by beer and wine, and a skeleton carved above the door.
Read the story - 8Stop 8
The Pijpstraat and De Arabier
A pijp was a wine barrel, and the factory that stood here branded its casks with an Arab on horseback.
Read the story - 9
- 10Stop 10
Damplein and the grain exchange
Fifty buildings torn down to make room for cars. Then someone installed radioactive art in their place.
Read the story - 11Stop 11
Abdijplein and the Lange Jan
The most powerful abbey in Zeeland, with a tower that burned down three times.
Read the story - 12Stop 12
The Korte Burg and the phoenix
Many facades carry a small stone with an eagle rising from the flames and the year 1940 beneath it.
Read the story - 13Stop 13
Hofje onder de Toren
Twelve small houses, deliberately built low. In 1994, the council wanted to demolish them.
Read the story
Ready when you are
Walk The Story of Middelburg with ROODS.
13 stops through Middelburg, about 68 minutes. Open ROODS in your browser, walk to the first pin and the story plays.
- Stories on a map, with narrated audio
- Walk at your own pace, stop where you like
- Runs in your browser. An app is optional.
