The fame and beauty of the Market Place do not lie only in the Town Hall and the King's House, but perhaps first of all in the presence of a remarkably beautiful set of elaborately decorated guild houses. The name "guild houses" is most commonly used for the entire set of houses, although in reality they did not all belong to the medieval guilds. Some of the houses were always privately owned. During the Middle Ages and later every city in the Low Countries had guilds or corporations which always had a stake in the city administration. Because they were very wealthy and politically powerful , their importance had to show in their houses in which they regularly met to discuss new rules or regulations within their specific trade or commerce.