Elewijt is a village in the municipality of

Zemst Zemst () is a municipality located in the Belgian province of Flemish Brabant. The municipality comprises the villages of Elewijt, Eppegem, Hofstade, Weerde, Zemst-Laar, Zemst-Bos and Zemst proper. On January 1, 2024, Zemst had a total popu ...

Flemish Brabant Flemish Brabant ( ; ) is a province of Flanders, one of the three regions of Belgium. It borders on (clockwise from the North) the Belgian provinces of Antwerp, Limburg, Liège, Walloon Brabant, Hainaut and East Flanders. Flemish Brabant also ...

Belgium Belgium, officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a country in Northwestern Europe. Situated in a coastal lowland region known as the Low Countries, it is bordered by the Netherlands to the north, Germany to the east, Luxembourg to the southeas ...

History

Roman period

The village was first founded in the 1st century as a Roman

vicus In Ancient Rome, the Latin term (plural ) designated a village within a rural area () or the neighbourhood of a larger settlement. During the Republican era, the four of the city of Rome were subdivided into . In the 1st century BC, Augustus ...

on a junction of roads. It kept existing until it was destroyed at the end of the third century. Hundreds of years later, a new village slowly began to arise, with the center half a mile to the south of the ruins of the old village.

post-Roman period

Throughout most of the late

Middle Ages In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the 5th to the late 15th centuries, similarly to the post-classical period of global history. It began with the fall of the Western Roman Empire and ...

, Elewijt and the nearby village of Perk formed a Herrschaft (territory) herrschaft. In the 11th century, a wooden fort was built in the southwestern part of the village. Later the

Elewijt Castle Het Steen ( or 'The Rock'), also known as the Rubens Castle (''Rubenskasteel''), is a castle in Elewijt, Flemish Brabant in Belgium. It was owned by the artist Peter Paul Rubens between 1635 and his death in 1640 and the castle features in some of ...

(''Het Steen'') was modernised and in the 1630s it was a residence of the famous painter Pieter Paul Rubens.

Monuments

Elewijt contains the castle of

Het Steen Het Steen is a medieval fortress in the old city centre of Antwerp, Belgium, one of Europe's biggest ports. The surviving structure was built between 1200 and 1225 as a gateway to a larger castle of the Dukes of Brabant which was demolished in ...

, which was owned by

Peter Paul Rubens Sir Peter Paul Rubens ( ; ; 28 June 1577 – 30 May 1640) was a Flemish painting, Flemish artist and diplomat. He is considered the most influential artist of the Flemish Baroque painting, Flemish Baroque tradition. Rubens' highly charged comp ...

from 1635 to his death in 1640, and featured in some of his paintings. Populated places in Flemish Brabant Nervii Zemst {{FlemishBrabant-geo-stub