The university dates back to 1425. The town was hit badly in both world wars. The library was destroyed in 1914, rebuilt and damaged again 30 years later. In the 60s there was so much nationalistic strife between the French and Flemish speakers that in 1970 the French started their own university south of Brussels.
All of the town and university are charming. The town hall is a wedding cake of an edifice, with hundreds of statues perched in highly decorated niches all across the exterior.
The most arresting area is the Groat Begijnhof. It was a community of lay nuns founded in 1530. It contains red brick houses, convents, and a church on cobblestone streets, with picturesque squares and bridges over a typical Belgian bricked in waterway.
I had just about decided that autumn in Europe simply isn't as colorful as the US. But today in Groat Beijnhof the sun came out and the colors were stunning.
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