[1][2][3] The square is located halfway down the Boulevard Maurice Lemonnier/Maurice Lemonnierlaan, in the Midi–Lemonnier or Stalingrad Quarter (southern part of the City of Brussels).

[1][3] Due to the construction of the Central Boulevards,[4][5] which attracted a more affluent public, and complaints from local residents about "its filth and its fleas", in March 1873, Brussels' municipal council decided to transfer the Old Market to the Place du Jeu de Balle/Vossenplein in the Marolles/Marollen district,[3] a function that square has kept to this day.

As early as 1889, it was renamed after François Anneessens, dean of the Nation of St. Christopher, who was beheaded in 1719 on the Grand-Place because of his resistance to innovations in city government detrimental to the power of the guilds and for his suspected involvement with uprisings within the Austrian Netherlands.

[9] Nowadays, the building is occupied by two departments of the Haute École Francisco Ferrer [fr] (HEFF).

[3] Since November 2013, there has been a comic strip wall with a four-storey mural depicting a scene from Thorgal on the corner of the Place Anneessens and the Rue de la Caserne/Kazernestraat.