Amersfoort Audioguides

Amersfoort received city rights in 1259 and spent the following two centuries becoming one of the most important trading towns in the central Netherlands, earning pilgrimage traffic, market income, and the city walls to protect both. The Koppelpoort, a 15th-century combined water and land gate where the Eem River flows under a fortified arch, is one of the best-preserved medieval water gates in Europe. The Tower of Our Lady, known as Lange Jan, is a free-standing 98-meter church tower that rises above the rooflines of the old town in a way that makes it impossible to lose your bearings.

The inner city has been remarkably well preserved since the Middle Ages.

The Muurhuizen, houses built directly into the old city wall after the wall became redundant in the 17th century, are a unique architectural feature visible in several locations around the perimeter of the old town. Amersfoort was named European City of the Year in 2024, a recognition partly of its architecture but also of its residents' high satisfaction with urban livability, a metric that puts it in unusually distinguished company.