File:3 May 1815 – Tienen, Meeting Wellington - Blücher.jpg

English:

On May 3rd, 1815, the newspaper Gazette van Gend wrote : Thienen den 3 mey, de hertog van Wellington en prins de Blucher (generalissimus van het Pruisische leger) hebben elkaar ontmoet in Thienen en een vergadering gehad in Hotel de Tinne Schotel.
[Translation : “Tienen May 3rd, the Duke of Wellington and Prince Blücher (Feldmarschall of the Prussian army) met in Tienen and had a meeting at Hotel de Tinne Schotel.”]

The city clerk of Tienen for his part wrote : 3 Mei – Zÿn binnen Thienen in de Schotel ten thien uren voormiddag gearriveert van Brussel den generael Wellington ende van Luyck de generael Blusscher ende hebben ’t saem geconfereert tot 12 uren ende dan vertrocken wederom nae Brussel ende Luyck, van waer sÿ gekomen waeren. 
[Translation : "May 3 – Arrived from Brussels at Tienen in de Schotel at ten o'clock in the morning, the General Wellington and from Liège the General Blücher and they have discussed together until 12 hours and then left again to Brussels and Liège, from where they had come."]

On May 4th, the daily L'Oracle, published in Ghent, reported : Ces deux guerriers sont descendus à l'Hôtel du Plat d'Étain où, après une conférence de deux heures, ils ont fait un déjeuner dînatoire.
[Translation : These two warriors stayed at the Hôtel du Plat d'Étain where, after a two-hour conference, they had lunch.

Tienen lies about halfway (~ 50 km) between Brussels and Liège. As Wellington and Blücher had no language in common, the 2-hour discussion must have gone straight to the point about what would soon be the Battle of Waterloo. After the meeting, Blücher went back to Liège and Wellington to Brussels (► File:18_June_1815_–_Victory_at_Waterloo_–_Wellington's_Residence_at_Brussels.jpg).

About the inn. In the 18th c., a previous inn was already known as the Scheuleer or the Schotel, which later took the name of Hôtel d'Autriche. Having burnt down in 1791, it was reconstructed as hotel "Le Plat d'Étain" / "De Tinne Schotel", rated "tolerable" by a leading travellers' guide of the time. The advantage of its central location was lost when, in 1837, the new railways didn't run throug the city center. Soon afterwards, the building was converted into a hardware store, then a residence for the mayor and industrialist Victor Beauduin. In 1908 it became a school, the 'Institut Victor Beauduin', then the Provincial Institute for Technical Education. In 1986 this school moved and the building houses since then the "Academie Regio Tienen" (Academy for music, word and dance).

On June 19, 1999, on the occasion a now yearly commemoration of the Battle of Waterloo (► File:18_June_1815_–_Victory_at_Waterloo,_memorial.jpg), the former Tiene Schotel was honoured by a visit of the 8th Duke of Wellington (1915-2014).