Traveling to Prehistory, Muslim Spain or even the future is not entirely impossible. You just need to visit Spanish towns and cities and apply some imagination.
We review 10 of the countless architectural jewels, monuments and enclaves of the Spanish geography that keep alive the spirit of the time in which they were created and that allow us to explore the rich history of Spain.
Altamira
We begin our journey through time from the dawn of Humanity: the Altamira cave, located in the Cantabrian municipality of Santillana del Mar. Some of the most important pictorial and artistic samples of Prehistory are preserved there. Belonging to the Upper Paleolithic, it was used from about 35,600 years ago until about 13,000 years ago, when the main entrance of the cave was sealed by a collapse. Contains polychrome paintings, engravings, black, red and ocher paintings representing animals, anthropomorphic figures, abstract and non-figurative drawings. Its pictorial wealth is such that on many occasions it has been called the "Sistine Chapel of Rock Art", a value for which UNESCO declared this cave a World Heritage Site in 1985.
La Dama de Elche
he Iberians, as the writers of ancient Greece called the peoples that populated the Levant and the south of the Iberian Peninsula, also left an important mark on our country. One of its most important and best-preserved jewels is the Lady of Elche, a limestone sculpture made between the 5th and 4th centuries BC. depicting a lady with perfect features richly adorned with jewels and a cloak. Originally polychrome and with eyes filled with vitreous paste, it has a hole in the back that suggests its possible use as a funeral urn. Found by chance in La Alcudia (Elche) in 1897, it was bought by the Louvre Museum and, in 1941, it returned to Spain. It can be enjoyed at the National Archaeological Museum of Spain (Madrid), located a few meters from another Iberian jewel: the Dama de Baza.
Acueducto de Segovia
Few monuments reflect the enormous civil engineering capabilities of the Romans as well as the aqueduct of Segovia. Its construction dates from the beginning of the 2nd century AD, between the end of the reign of Emperor Trajan or the beginning of Hadrian's. Although the most visible and well-known part is the one that crosses the Plaza del Azoguejo, in the urban center of the city, it travels more than 15 kilometers until it reaches the square. It conducted the waters of the Fuenfría spring, where the water was collected, stored in a cistern and moved to a second tower where it was de-drained and decanted, to continue its path through its channel of ashlars. In total, it has 167 arches. Both the Roman aqueduct and the city of Segovia were declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1985.
Alcázar de Toledo
After the decline of ancient Rome and the invasions of the eastern Germanic peoples, the Iberian Peninsula came under the control of the Visigoth peoples. After internal struggles between the different branches, Toledo became the Visigothic capital of Hispania in 568 and the vicinity of the current Alcázar -built in the 3rd century as a Roman palace- houses the royal residences, to which were added churches such as the of Santa Leocadia. After the Muslim domination - when it is given its current name, "Al Qasar", which means "fortress" - new works are carried out in different centuries, which will continue during the mandates of the Christian kings. Among them, Alfonso X el Sabio, who manages to combine the knowledge of the Jewish, Arab and Christian cultures in the famous Toledo School of Translators, or the Catholic Monarchs themselves.
Mezquita de Córdoba
The current Spain would not be understood without the enormous and rich influence of Muslim culture, present for almost eight hundred years. And its maximum expression is found in the Mosque of Córdoba: a lavish monument begun in 786 and expanded during the different stages of the Emirate and Caliphate of Córdoba, until it became one of the largest mosques in the world - according to size of the city, one of the most populated in the world at that time. The most important monument of the Andalusian period -together with the Alhambra in Granada-, it was consecrated in 1238 as a cathedral after the Christian Reconquest of the city, which is why, inside, it houses a Plateresque Renaissance basilica built in the 19th century XVI. It was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1984 -years later the entire historic center of the city would be designated- and is one of the most visited monuments in Spain.
Archivo de Indias
The history of Spain - and of the world - would not be understood without the Discovery of America in 1492. With it, Seville - the exclusive port of trade with the New World - began several centuries of economic and cultural splendor. Due to the fact that the city's merchants carried out their commercial activities on the steps of the Cathedral -and even inside, on rainy days-, Felipe II ordered the construction of a new Lonja for the merchants. Built between 1584 and 1598 by Juan de Minjares, on plans by Juan de Herrera, the building would become the Archive of the Indies in 1785, when King Carlos III decided to centralize all the documentation related to the administration of the Crown's American territories. Declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 1987, next to the Cathedral and the Real Alcázar, it houses some 43,000 files, 80 million pages and 8,000 maps and drawings.
Palacio Real de Madrid
The end of the Austrian dynasty in the Spanish Crown and the arrival of the Bourbons after the War of Succession (1713) marked a turning point in the history of the country. A visible change in one of the great jewels of Madrid: the Royal Palace. Felipe V, the first Bourbon king, ordered its construction on the site left by the Real Alcázar, almost completely destroyed after a fire in 1734 that was used to justify the replacement of the old building by a palace according to the taste of the time. Begun in 1738, it had the participation of architects such as Juvara, Sachetti, Ventura Rodríguez and Sabatini. The result was an immense 199,000 square meter building with 3,418 rooms (almost double that of Buckingham Palace or the Palace of Versailles), the largest in Western Europe and one of the largest in the world. It houses jewels by Caravaggio, Velázquez or Goya, as well as a rich watchmaking, sculpture, porcelain and furniture and is one of the most visited monuments in Spain.
La Sagrada Familia
The change from the 19th to the 20th century is marked, both in Spain and in the rest of Europe, by the desire for cultural and artistic change. In this context, Catalan modernism was born, with Antoni Gaudí as its greatest exponent and the Sagrada Familia in Barcelona as its masterpiece. Begun in 1892 and still under construction, it is the artistic culmination of the brilliant architect, who practically dedicated himself exclusively to this building from 1915 until his death in 1926, and applied the techniques previously used in Park Güell and the crypt of the Colony Güell. Its style is organic, imitating the forms of nature, with abundant geometric shapes, and an interior that imitates a forest of inclined tree-lined columns. One of the most visited monuments in Spain -and the most visited church in Europe after the Vatican-, it has been a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 2005.
Torres Blancas
As the 20th century progressed, and despite the dictatorship, Spanish society kept looking forward. They are the 60s, a time of developmentalism, new neighborhoods, migrations from the countryside to the city and the desire to break with conventions. In this context, the architect Francisco Javier Sáenz de Oiza projects the White Towers, in Madrid's Avenida de América. An icon of organicist and brutalist architecture applied to a luxury apartment block. Award of Excellence Europe in 1974, its construction began in 1961 and was not finished until 1968. This iconic building was the spearhead of the organic stage of Madrid architecture, marked by neo-expressionism and some surrealist suggestions with an experimental nature.
Ciutat de les Arts i les Ciències
The last decade of the 20th century and the first decade of the 21st were marked by Spain's desire to claim itself to the world as a modern and open country. The Olympic Games in Barcelona and the Universal Expo in Seville, both in 1992, were two great examples, which were followed by a great deployment of infrastructure and urban expansion throughout the national geography. One example is the Ciutat de les Arts i les Ciències de Valencia, an architectural, cultural and entertainment complex designed by Santiago Calatrava and Félix Candela inaugurated in 1998 and located on the old Turia riverbed, which had been converted into a garden in the 1980s after diverting its course. With a futuristic style and now an emblem of Valencia, it houses the Hemisfèric, the Museu de les Ciencies, the Umbracle, the Oceanogràfic or the Palau de les Arts Reina Sofía, among others.