Conference
Good Governance and the Built Environment of Late Medieval Cities (ca. 1200–1700)
Royal Library of Belgium, Kunstberg (Monts des arts) 28, 1000 Brussel (Salle Panorama)
3-5 September 2025
Join the Royal Library of Brussels to discuss and explore how the built environment of late medieval cities was conceptualized and physically shaped in relation to ideals of good governance. The conference covers a broad historical period (1200–1700) and includes urban centers ranging from Northwestern Europe to the Middle East.
Attendance is free of charge, but registration is required. Please register via this form.
Find out more information on the Governing and Building website.
Conference Programme
Wednesday 3 September 2025
13:00 Welcome
13:30-15:15 Session 1: Governing and Building the City: An Introduction (Session chair: Jan Dumolyn)
Nele De Raedt (UCLouvain) – Good Governance and the Built Environment: Central Themes and Questions
Philip Muijtjens (UCLouvain) – A Curriculum for a City? The Library in the Palazzo Comunale of Pistoia (1458-1461)
Minne De Boodt (KU Leuven/UCLouvain) – Building Brussels in Time of Political Transformation: Dialogues on Good Governance and the Built Environment (1400-1466)
15:45-17:00 Session 2: Governing Ideals and the Built Environment (Session chair : Jelle Haemers)
Niklas Groschinski (Oxford University) – Leisure Spaces, Sensorial Pleasure, and Public Health in Premodern City Planning
Julien Régibeau (ULiège) – Order and Architecture: Policing the City of Liège during the Chiroux–Grignoux Conflict
Thursday 4 September 2025
09:00-10:15 Session 3: Municipal Authorities and the Design, Instrumentalization and Regulation of the Built Environment (Session chair: Chris Fletcher)
Frans Camphuijsen & Nathan van Kleij (Amsterdam University) – A Matter of Morals: Stone Fines, Good Governance and the Urban Fabric in Late Medieval Towns
Anna Pomierny-Wąsińska (University of Warsaw) – Just Measures: Surveyors, Space, and Urban (Good) Governance in Late Medieval Florence
10:45-12:30 Session 4: The Endowment of Semi-Public Organisations (Session chair: David Napolitano)
Angela Isoldi (Radboud University) – Spatial and Social Networks: Endowments Shaping the Urban Fabric in Mamlūk Cairo (1250-1517)
Theodora Giovanazzi (Swiss Federal Technology Institute Lausanne) – Governing through Housing: The Scuole Grandi and Urban Welfare in 16th-Century Venice
Emine Öztaner (Ibn Haldun University) – Nurbanu Sultan’s “Waqf Neighborhood” in Üsküdar: Constructing, Populating and Governing Ma‘mûre (16th and 17thCenturies)
13:30-15:00 Visit to collections of the KBR
15:00-16:45 Session 5: Collaborating Social Groups (Session chair: Minne De Boodt)
Merlijn Hurx (KU Leuven) – “Civic” and “Royal” Meat Halls in the Low Countries in the 15th and 16th Century
Emmanuel Joly (UCLouvain/IRPA) – The Prince and the Canons: Collaboration and Decision-Making in the remodelling of Liège’s Built Environment in the First Half of the 16th Century
Giuliana Mosca (Independent Scholar) – “In grande honore de la cità”: Government, Urban Space, and Architecture in 15th-century Perugia
Friday 5 September 2025
09:00-10:15 Session 6: The Representation of Governance (Session chair: Philip Muijtjens)
Elizabeth Den Hartog (Leiden University) – Local Lords on the Façade of Veere’s Town Hall (Netherlands). The Lords of Veere and their Relations with the Habsburg Regime in the Late 15th and Early 16th Centuries
Susan Tipton (Independent Scholar) – Good governance and the Built Environment: The Great Map of Augsburg (1626) and the Renewal of Civic Architecture in the Imperial City around 1600
10:45-12:00 Session 7: Ideal of Good Governance and Architectural Theory (Session chair: Nele De Raedt)
Miara Fraikin (KU Leuven) – “Building on the Foundations of Piety”: Architecture and Female Governance in 16th-Century France and the Low Countries.
Mats Dijkdrent (UCLouvain) – Engelbert of Admont as an Architectural Theorist: Ideas on Morally Good Architecture in 14th-Century Mirror Literature
13:30-15:00 Final discussion