Donkere Poort

The Donkere Poort stands as a dark, covered gatehouse that once served as a primary entrance to the sprawling Prinsenhof palace complex. Today, it remains one of the few physical fragments of the medieval estate where Emperor Charles the Fifth was born in fifteen hundred. During the nineteenth century, the gatehouse earned its name from the heavy industrial pollution of nearby factories that had coated the structure in soot, obscuring its original Burgundian architecture.