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Quincy Market functioned from 1825 to the 1960s as the city’s wholesale food distribution center. By the 1980s, the market had been revived, the grand atrium restored, and a food court opened.

Peter Faneuil, an influential French Huguenot merchant, donated the hall to Boston in 1742. Today, the first floor is devoted to souvenir vendors, while the second floor is dominated by the Great Hall, where town meetings once took place.

Assembled in 1638 to defend the Massachusetts Bay Colony, the company has held court on Faneuil Hall’s fourth floor since 1746. The museum boasts war memorabilia dating from the Revolution to the War on Terrorism.

The many colonial-era artifacts unearthed during the hotel’s construction in 1982 are now on display in the plush lobby area. And should your inner epicurean require sating, visit the hotel’s exceptional Seasons restaurant.

Flanking each side of Quincy Market, these revitalized brick warehouses are filled with name-brand shops and many unique restaurants.

Bounded by Congress, Hanover, Blackstone, and North streets, this block is as old world as Boston gets. The city’s first commercial district, named after Boston’s first settler, William Blaxton, took root here during the 17th century. Two of the country’s oldest dining and drinking establishments – the Union Oyster House and Green Dragon Tavern – call the block home.

Every Friday and Saturday, vendorshawk the day’s bounty with unhinged abandon. Yet for all its boisterous chaos, the Haymarket handsomely rewards with cheap, fresh produce.

The city’s favorite brewer and patriot is immortalized in front of Faneuil Hall, where he delivered some of the Revolutionary era’s most impassioned speeches (see Samuel Adams’ Tea Tax Speech (1773)). Local sculptor Anne Whitney was commissioned to design the statue in 1880.

This 1995 memorial comprises six glass columns, symbolizing the Nazis’ principal death camps. Each column bears the numbers of one million victims, evoking the six million lives destroyed under Hitler.

Some claim this curious landmark was once the measuring point from which all distances to and from Boston were calculated. The stone is embedded into a brick wall at the corner of Marshall Street and Salt Lane.