The Spanish capital is a city of water and war, marked by confrontation but proud of its culture. Jules Stewart guides us through the history of Madrid.
The oldest recorded history of the position that is now called Madrid dates back to the ninth century. At the time, it was the site of an Arab castle called Magerit – in ancient Arabic, “water position”. essential for the progression of the colony, which would be the capital of a united Spain.
Long before the Moors, the Romans arrived. They invaded the Iberian Peninsula at the end of the third century BC. C. , but they paid little attention to this little backwater; they were looking for much bigger prizes like Cadiz. The Visigoths, who arrived in the sixth century AD, incorporated it into their kingdom of Toledo, but for many years it remained an insignificant outpost.
In 711 AD, a force of Arabs and Berbers crossed the Strait of Gibraltar from North Africa, launching a wave of conquests that created the vast Muslim kingdom of Al-Andalus, which covered most of the Iberian Peninsula.
In the following century, the Arab emir Mohammed I ordered the structure of a fortified citadel in a position called Magerit, on the site now occupied by the Royal Palace of Madrid. Today there are few lines of Moorish profession, you can locate some sections of its walls next to the palace and cathedral of La Almudena, in the Emir Mohamed I Park.
This other important piece accompanies our podcast miniseries History’s Greatest Cities. Listen to the full episode about Florence with Jules Stewart and Paul Bloomfield, then explore the series.
The largest towns in history: Madrid
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The colony gained importance when Alfonso VI of León and Castile took Magerit from the Moors in 1085 the so-called Reconquista (Reconquista) of Spain through Christian forces.
A classic tale narrates an incident involving the soldier known as El Gato. When he reached the defenses of Magerit, he says, he jumped from his horse, climbed the wall, knocked down the Moorish standard and hoisted the Christian flag. .
One of his fellow Christians said, “Look, climb like a cat. “Today Gato is the nickname of a Madrileño, it can only be claimed through a resident of 3rd generation or more.
For a long time, Madrid remained a small agricultural colony and difficult to understand. There are some notable monuments from this period, such as the medieval Torre y Casa de los Lujanes, just off Calle Mayor, near the Mercado de San Miguel and the Casa de los Ángeles Villos Ángeles (Old Town Hall). Built in the fifteenth century for the prominent Luján family, it is a remarkable example of Mudejar architecture of the past.
In the Middle Ages, the population of Madrid was very diverse. Moors, Jews and Christians controlled to get along; indeed, as far as Iberian Jews were concerned, they owed allegiance to the culprit and were allowed to live their lives largely without persecution until 1492, when they were expelled from Spain. Today, only plaques mark the location of their ghettos. .
The great revival of Madrid took place in 1561, when the Habsburg king, Philip II, opposed it and moved his court there from Toledo. There are many reasons why he would possibly have chosen to do this: a compelling idea is that Philip sought to continue to rule the Spanish Empire and therefore tried to put some distance between himself and the influence of the Catholic Church, founded in Toledo.
Another strong argument is that it was a reaction to the need for a reliable and really extensive water supply. Toledo was developing rapidly, but its only source of water was the Tagus, in a deep gorge below the city; It is becoming increasingly difficult to provide sufficient drinking water to the population. Madrid, on the other hand, had much greater access to water, coming from the Manzanares River. Geographically, it was also at the center of the Iberian industrial routes and enjoyed a much milder climate. – at least initially.
When Felipe arrived, he had about 7,000 more people on board, all of whom needed shelter and firewood. Madrid was surrounded by forests plundered for wood. Certainly, enough trees that protected Madrid from the strong winds of the Guadarrama Mountains to the north have disappeared in recent years. time to radically replace. There is a saying that describes the weather in Madrid: Nine months of winter and three months of hell – nine months of winter and 3 of hell.
Philip, who had a difficult path to follow as the son of the tough Holy Roman Emperor Charles V, sought to make his mark on his new capital and its surroundings. Shortly after his arrival in Madrid, he ordered the foundation of a royal monastery. in the hills about 40 km to the northwest: the Royal Monastery of San Lorenzo de El Escorial, or simply El Escorial.
This vast complex, the largest Renaissance design in the world, includes many elements, plus a basilica, library, university, and palace. Even today, it’s an impressive position to make a one-day stop from the city.
Philip’s successors did not even live up to their own standards, let alone Charles V’s reputation, but the last Habsburg king, Charles II, was a particularly unfortunate case.
Suffering from poor physical condition and almost constant physical disabilities (to which was added the famous “Habsburg jaw”), his reign was explained through political crises and his inability to produce heirs. His death in 1700 ended Habsburg rule in Spain and sparked a dynastic clash that has become known as the War of the Spanish Succession, in which various factions fought not only for the kingdom but also for its vast empire.
In 1714, the victorious House of Bourbon moved there and today occupies the throne of Spain. And they did a lot for Madrid.
They centralized the government formula, thus strengthening Madrid’s strength as the capital of the Spanish Empire. They ushered in an era of architectural glory by building the existing Royal Palace, the largest in Europe, to update the Alcázar, which had stood on the site since the 9th century but destroyed for an upgrade in 1734.
They built the Puerta de Alcalá, the first fashionable post-Roman triumphal arch in Europe, completed in 1778, and the Conde Duque Barracks – today heritage and magnificent cultural center – designed by the architect Pedro de Ribera. He also built the Real Hospicio Barroco de San Fernando, which today houses the Museum of History of Madrid on Calle Fuencarral.
Madrid was occupied by French forces in March 1808, during Napoleon’s peninsular campaign. This triggered one of the most important events in the history of the city: the uprising of Dos de Mayo, in which some 2,000 Madrileños tried to expel the invaders. crushed and provoking serious punitive measures, it fomented new revolts in Spain and was represented through Goya. His paintings “May 3, 1808”, depicting resistance fighters executed by French troops, are exhibited in the Prado Museum.
The uprising is remembered and commemorated in the Community of Madrid, and May 2 is a holiday. Some of those affected have become heroes, such as Manuela Malasaña, a teenage seamstress who joined the armed combat with only her scissors and was summarily executed. The community in which he lived now bears his name in his honor, with the Plaza de Dos de Mayo at its center.
After French forces were driven out in 1813 and the king installed through Napoleon—his brother Joseph, derisively nicknamed Pepe Botella (meaning Joe Botella) through his reluctant Spanish subjects—overthrown, the Bourbons returned to the throne. But they may simply not save preventing Spain from gradually wasting its influence over its global empire. This culminated in 1898 with the Spanish-American War, which resulted in the loss of its last imperial possessions, adding Cuba, the Philippines and Puerto Rico.
Madrid, no longer the capital of an empire, declined accordingly as Spain entered an era of political instability. The First Spanish Republic came and went, for less than two years (1873-1874) before a coup d’état; The dictatorship of Miguel Primo de Rivera (1923-1930) did not last either. The people of Madrid got used to the political chaos and simply went on living.
Events took a much darker turn after the exile of Alfonso XIII in 1931. The Second Spanish Republic, founded after the deposition of Alfonso, lasted only a few years. The government, composed largely of socialists, communists, and various anarchists, frightened some elements of society, especially in the military and the Catholic Church. A coup d’état in 1936 provoked the Spanish Civil War and the arrival of General Francisco Franco. In doing so, Madrid has a city under siege, its population living in appalling maximum conditions.
Franco brought the Foreign Legion and other North African troops and marched on Madrid, but there he was arrested. For about three years, he was unable to access the city, which suffered constant aerial bombardment and shelling. The Telefónica building, the tallest skyscraper in Europe when it opened in 1930, was a common target as Republican forces used it as a vantage point. It is still a remarkable construction today.
In March 1939, Franco’s nationalist forces captured the capital, marking the end of the bloody civil war. The city was incredibly destroyed and an era of reconstruction began. Thousands of people from villages in Spain flocked there; For farmworkers, the ability to earn a wage on a scaffold seemed preferable to raising goats. This is what gives Madrid its varied character: very few people who live there are from the city.
Although officially independent from World War II, Spain had close ties to Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy. As a result, after the end of the conflict, the country, still ruled by Franco, became a foreign pariah. Spain was not part of the United States, the United Nations, the Common Market, the International Monetary Fund or any other organization that rebuilt Europe. But slowly, beginning in the 1950s, it emerged from this era of moribund economics.
By the time of Franco’s death in November 1975, the country had been transformed. The transition to democracy was largely peaceful, the early years were worrying as there were still many right-wing supporters on the streets and the fascist youth organization Force. Nueva committed some atrocities. But this era also saw the rise of La Movida Madrileña, a countercultural movement that drove political and economic change. It has also witnessed an artistic flowering, especially in the musical field, with a developing punk and synth-pop scene. .
Today, Madrid is a thriving and cosmopolitan city that offers smart living, if you have the stamina. In other words: don’t think about leaving before 11pm. As the American editor Ernest Hemingway said back in the 20s, the worst traffic jams in Madrid begin to form around midnight. It looks like a village that never sleeps.
Jules Stewart spoke with Paul Bloomfield, journalist and host of our History’s Greatest Cities podcast series
An Arab citadel that imperial capital, Madrid, is now a cosmopolitan city. Jules Stewart selects five must-see sites that shed light on its history
One next to the other, on the banks of the Manzanares River, stand two modest vaulted chapels. One is the chapel of San Antonio de los Angeles Florida, completed by order of Carlos IV in 1798. Dedicated to St. Anthony of Padua, it attracts crowds of young women waiting to get married every June 13.
But to understand the importance of the chapel, look up. The vaults of the ceiling, the spandrels and the dome are decorated with impressive frescoes by Francisco Goya, the wonderful Spanish painter of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, depicting angels and scenes. adding St. Anthony raising a man from the dead.
Later in his life, Goya was deeply marked through his reports on the French profession of Madrid through Napoleon and through the popular uprising of May 2, 1808, which prompted many subsequent works. He died in France in 1828, but his remains were returned to Spain decades later and he now rests in this chapel. In 1928, the same copy of the chapel next to it was built, to allow worship to continue preserving the original, hence the rare dual monuments.
Joaquín Sorolla y Bastida (1863-1923) is a Spanish artist famous in his country, but less known internationally. Born in Valencia, he spent many years in Madrid, where his last home in the central Chamberí district is now an immersive museum. In addition to his personal belongings, letters and photographs, it houses more than 1,200 of his paintings and drawings.
Sorolla’s portraits, landscapes and other works open a window into Spanish life in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. They include episodes from Madrid’s history and depictions of life: young people in poor health bathing in the sea, other people working, etc.
The first station in Madrid was inaugurated on February 9, 1851, on the occasion of the opening of the line that connected the capital with the small city of Aranjuez, located about 30 kilometers to the south. This small stop, then called Estación de Mediodía, was rebuilt in 1892 to create Estación de Atocha, the nucleus of the largest high-speed rail network in Europe.
It is a magnificent construction, with a large wrought iron roof, designed in collaboration with Gustave Eiffel. In 1992, the building was closed and its majestic halls now house exotic tropical plants and a turtle pond.
Outside is a poignant monument dedicated to the 191 victims of the Islamist suicide bombing of March 11, 2004, one of the darkest days in Madrid’s history.
In the early part of the nineteenth century, a cultural movement developed in Spain that influenced artists, thinkers and even politicians: Romanticism. The museum committed to this movement, housed in a magnificent palace from 1776, only exhibits works of art through Goya and Esquivel. , but also recreates pieces from the period to give an idea of how the bourgeoisie in question lived.
You can walk among period furniture, pianos, ceramics and even dolls, and tour the captivating Magnolia Garden, designed to the French taste of the eighteenth century.
On May 2, 1808, some 2,000 Madrilenians rose up against the French forces of Napoleonic profession. A revolt that will be crushed (the French will remain there for another five years) but that remains emblematic of the fierce spirit of the capital and its citizens. . The Plaza del Dos de Mayo, named in homage to this episode, is the center of the lively Malasaña neighborhood.
Visit to Café Manuela, named after the seamstress Manuela Malasaña, heroic figure of the uprising attacked by French troops. When they tried to rape her, she defended herself with scissors and summarily pinned against the wall and executed.
The Plaza del Dos de Mayo and the community are named after him. In the late 1970s and 1980s, coffee was a focal point of the Movida Madrileña, a countercultural movement that pushed political and economic renewal but also fueled a thriving punk and synthesizer. pop scene.
Today it evokes a finisecular atmosphere and is a place to play board games.
Jules Stewart is the author of a dozen books, including Madrid: The History (IB Tauris, 2012) and, with Helen Crisp, Madrid: Midnight City (Reaktion, 2020). I was talking to Paul Bloomfield. Listen to your partner’s podcast in Madrid or explore the whole series
Jules Stewart is a journalist and author. His books include Madrid, The History, Madrid: A Literary Guide for Travelers and, co-authored with Helen Crisp, Madrid: Midnight City.
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