St Bavo's Cathedral

St Bavo's Cathedral dominates the Ghent skyline with a massive Gothic tower built from dark, weathered stone that contrasts sharply with the surrounding city architecture. This cathedral houses the Ghent Altarpiece, a complex collection of twelve panels painted by the Van Eyck brothers in the early fifteenth century. During the Protestant Reformation, local iconoclasts broke into the church to destroy religious images. To save the masterpiece, guards hid the panels in the tower, moving them repeatedly to escape capture for generations.