BELvue museum

This guide to the BELvue museum in Brussels begins at half past two in the morning on 3 February 1731, with Marie Elisabeth of Austria asleep and her candles left burning as fire begins to spread through the Palace of Coudenberg above. It follows the palace's six centuries on the Brussels skyline, including the day in 1555 when Emperor Charles the Fifth gave up his throne in its Great Hall, and the decades the ruins sat untouched before the museum building rose beside them. Take a moment at the entrance before heading down into the older rooms below.