Muntplein

This guide to Muntplein in Bruges traces the site of a working mint recorded here as far back as thirteen oh three, where craftsmen known as munters hammered raw silver into the coins that paid Flanders's soldiers and merchants for roughly three centuries. It follows the unglamorous, itinerant lives of these coin-strikers, who moved between Bruges, Ghent and Ypres wherever the mint needed hands, and the eighteen eighty-four demolition that turned the old mint buildings into today's quiet square. Look for the streets radiating from the square, still carrying the mint's name.