Europe's Babylon: The Rise and Fall of Antwerp's Golden Age

A revelatory history of Antwerp—from its rise to a world city to its fall in the Spanish Fury—by the New York Times Notable author of The Edge of the World.

Before Amsterdam, there was a dazzling North Sea port at the hub of the known world: the city of Antwerp.

In the Age of Exploration, Antwerp was sensational like nineteenth-century Paris or twentieth-century New York. It was somewhere anything could happen or at least be believed: killer bankers, easy kisses, a market in secrets and ever...