← 1852 1851 1850 1853 in Belgium → 1854 1855 1856
Decades:	1830s 1840s 1850s 1860s 1870s
See also:	Other events of 1853 List of years in Belgium

Events in the year 1853 in Belgium.

Incumbents

Monarch: Leopold I

Head of government: Henri de Brouckère

Events

• 9 April – Prince Leopold sworn in as a member of the Belgian Senate.
• 9 June – Aalst railway station opens.
• 22 August – Marriage of Leopold, Duke of Brabant, heir to the Belgian throne, and Marie Henriette of Austria.^[1]
• 23 August – International Maritime Conference opens in Brussels under the chairmanship of Adolphe Quetelet and at the instigation of Matthew Fontaine Maury (ends 8 September)^[2]
• 19 September – First International Statistical Congress opens in Brussels under the chairmanship of Adolphe Quetelet.

Publications

Periodicals

• Almanach royal officiel (Brussels, H. Tarlier)^[3]
• Annales de pomologie belge et étrangère (Commission Royale de Pomologie) begins publication.^[4]
• Annuaire de la noblesse de Belgique, vol. 5, edited by Isidore de Stein d'Altenstein^[5]
• La Belgique Horticole, vol. 3.^[6]
• Bulletins de l'Académie Royale des Sciences, des Lettres et des Beaux-Arts de Belgique, vol. 20 (Brussels, M. Hayez)^[7]
• Recueil des pièces imprimées par ordre de la Chambre des Représentants, vol. 3.^[8]

Guidebooks and directories

• Bradshaw's illustrated hand-book for travellers in Belgium, on the Rhine, and through portions of Rhenish Prussia (London, W.J. Adams)^[9]
• Francis Coghlan, The Miniature Guide to the Rhine through Belgium and Holland (London, J. Onwhyn)^[10]

Art and architecture

Buildings

• Aalst railway station

Paintings

• Henri Leys, Frans Floris Going to a Saint Luke's Day Feast 1540
• Charles Verlat, Buffalo Ambushed by a Tiger
• Antoine Wiertz, Hunger, Madness and Crime

Births

• 31 January – Marie-Elisabeth Belpaire, Flemish activist (died 1948)
• 14 February – Jan Van Rijswijck, politician (died 1906)
• 20 December – Marie Parent, feminist (died 1934)

Deaths

• 11 January – Floris Nollet (born 1794), engineer
• 18 January – Antoine Payen the Younger (born 1792), painter
• 12 February – Joseph Van Hoorde (born 1818), horticulturalist
• 5 March — Hirsch Sommerhausen (born 1781), educator and translator
• 30 April – Edouard Mary (born 1796), social reformer
• 3 December – Lazare Richtenberger (born 1792), banker