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Abstract: At the beginning of the modern era, the Low Countries constituted one of the most densely packed urban networks of the European continent. Only two of these cities, however, consistently enjoyed major international fame at the time: Antwerp, the most important com- mercial metropolis of the North in the sixteenth century, and Brussels, the residence of choice of the nomadic Habsburg court. This dramatically different image is presented to the broader European public by the Florence-born merchant and chronicler Lodovico Guicciardini in his celebrated and influential Descrittione di tutti i Paesi Bassi, altrimenti detti Germania inferiore (first edition Antwerp, 1567; many revised editions in different languages). An outsider who became a well-informed insider, Guicciardini set a standard similar descriptions had to meas- ure up to henceforth. Moreover, the picture he paints of Antwerp and of Brussels, is reflected in contemporary iconography and especially, cartography.