I visited Antwerp recently, and found the forts surrounding the city to be very interesting. I attempted to write a blog post about my visit, but found myself reading about the history of Antwerp. It seems that ownership of it has been passed around quite a bit! I know that people say to never trust Wikipedia, and I found that the English Wikipedia articles sometimes seemed to disagree with what was being said on the Dutch articles/other websites. So, I tried to sort out a rough history of it for myself. Can any experts on the history of Antwerp do some fact checking for me, please? Let me know if I've missed any important events, or have made any errors. History isn't my background at all!
My post is currently here: https://vicharkness.co.uk/2015/09/30/an-overview-of-the-history-of-antwerp/ but let me know if linking to an external site is frowned upon!
Thanks in advance!
You are absolutely right to not rely on Wikipedia, and can I invite you to instead use a proper history book as a reference? J.Israel's "The Dutch Republic" is a fantastic read that gives very good context of the rise and fall of Antwerp, in particular in that important era approaching and including the Eighty Years' War.
While your overview is interesting, it missed very important events including the beginnings of the Dutch revolt in Antwerp, and the closure of the Scheldt, which led to the downfall of Antwerp.