Possible Church Walls Found Under Cathedral in Belgium

ANTWERP PROVINCE, BELGIUM—Layers of rubble from earlier phases of construction were discovered underneath Saint Rumbold’s Cathedral in northern Belgium’s city of Mechelen, according to a Belgian News Agency report. Construction of the current church began in the early thirteenth century. Beneath the floor of the cathedral's northern section, archaeologists found pottery and construction materials dating to the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. The materials indicate that major alterations were made to the cathedral at that time. Beneath these layers, researchers uncovered an outer wall dating to the thirteenth or fourteenth century. An even earlier wall section, which had a different orientation, may have belonged to an earlier Romanesque-style church at the site. To read about walls made of human bone that were discovered at the site of Saint Bavo's Cathedral in Ghent, go to "If These Walls Could Talk."