This is one of those narrow passages that cut straight through the block behind the Markt, the market square. Middelburg is full of them, and they often lead to places you'd never guess were there from the street.
This spot once held the Gravensteen, the town prison, and at the same time one of Middelburg's first stone buildings, back when almost everything was still made of wood. Its oldest part already shows up in documents from 1477. It came with a torture chamber, torture chair and all, because right up into the eighteenth century inflicting pain was a normal part of how justice worked. A confession counted as the strongest proof there was, and if it didn't come freely, it was forced out.
The street out front still carries the memory. It's called Bachtensteene, which means behind the stone, and the stone in question was this building. Nothing of the prison itself survives. What you'll find here now is the garden of a care home.
We walk out of the alley and head north into the Bogardstraat. We follow it for about a hundred and fifty metres, until the street opens onto a square. Across the way stands a large eighteenth-century house with a curved facade, and that's where we pause for a moment.
