Muslim Walls of Madrid

About

The Muslim Walls of Madrid (also known as the Arab Walls of Madrid), of which some vestiges remain, are located in the Spanish capital city of Madrid. They are probably the oldest construction extant in the city. They were built in the 9th century, during the Muslim domination of the Iberian Peninsula, on a promontory next to Manzanares river. They were part of a fortress around which developed the urban nucleus of Madrid. They were declared an Artistic-Historic Monument in 1954. They were built in the park of Mohamed I, named in reference to Muhammad I of Córdoba, considered the founder of the city. Along the Calle Mayor street, at number 83, next to the Viaduct that serves the Calle de Segovia, are still standing the ruins of the Tower of Narigües, which probably would have been an albarrana tower, with a separate location from the main wall itself, but connected thereto by a minor wall. Its function was to serve as a viewpoint. In the 20th century, some remains were destroyed. Those that once existed near number 12 Calle de Bailén were lost during the construction of an apartment block, although some walls were integrated into its foundations. The remodelling of the Plaza de Oriente...

As Torres Balbás says, "Islamization was a uniform urban mold, the result of a way of life." For example, the finding of winding streets corresponds to a context in which defense is a fundamental necessity.

With respect to the Walls, they fulfill several functions. Muslim cities have medinas at their cores, which include, among other buildings, the main mosque and the hammam. They are surrounded by walls, giving the area within defensive, symbolic and administrative functions. In Madrid, similarly, the walls were built to protect the city's core, not only from external danger, but also from internal revolts in the suburbs (also possibly walled). The differentiation of spaces produced by the walls, thanks to the gates - three in this case - also aided tax collection.

Thus, the city was divided between the medina or center of religious and commercial life, and the rabad, the "populous neighborhoods outside the walls". From a planning point of view, the walls promoted urbanism through both their gates and their path: the gates because through them ran the more heavily-trafficked streets and the layout because the neighborhoods would range around it.

Many examples show the different possibilities when building walls, from the materials used to various designs to suit the terrain.

The construction of these Walls is directly linked to the origin of Madrid. They were ordered to be built by the Córdoban emir Muhammad I (852 - 886) on an unspecified date between the years 860 and 880, according to a text of al-Himyari. It was in an area not chosen by chance. It was a wide cultivated valley, with easy access to water reserves. It defended the almudaina or Muslim citadel of Mayrit (first name of the city), located on the site currently occupied by the Royal Palace.

According to Muslim chroniclers of the time, high quality construction and materials were used to build the Walls. The historian Jerónimo de Quintana echoed these accounts in the following text of the 17th century: "very strong of masonry and mortar, raised and thick, twelve feet [almost three and half meters] in width, with large cubes, towers gatehouses and moats".

The mission of the fortified complex was to monitor the path of the Manzanares, which connected the steppes of the Sierra de Guadarrama with Toledo, threatened by the incursions of the Christian kingdoms of the north peninsula. It was governed as a ribat or community, simultaneously both religious and military.

The Walls of Mayrit were integrated within a complex defensive system, which extended through different parts of the Community of Madrid. These included Talamanca de Jarama, Qal'-at'-Abd-Al-Salam ( Alcalá de Henares ) and Qal'-at-Jalifa ( Villaviciosa de Odón ). However, do not think of Mayrit as a core of a large entity, but as one of many entities -so is it that sometimes is difficult to find references to the city in the chronicles-.

In the 10th century, the caliph of Córdoba Abd-ar-Rahman III ordered the reinforcement of the Walls, after suffering several situations of danger from the advance of the Christian King Ramiro II of León in 932. In the year 977, Almanzor chose the fortress of Mayrit as the origin point of his military campaign.

With the Christian conquest of Mayrit in the 9th century, the original walled area was expanded, raising one of wider perimeter, known as the Christian Walls of Madrid. Thus, the Madrilenian core did not lose its defensive function at any time.

The image of the Virgin of Almudena, Spanish : Santa María la Real de la Almudena, lit. ' Saint Mary the Royal of la Almudena ', formerly called Spanish : Santa María la Mayor, lit. ' Saint Mary the Great ', was found in 1085 (three centuries after the Christians hid it from Muslims) in the conquest of the city by King Alfonso VI of León and Castile, in one of the hubs of the Walls, near the gate Puerta de la Vega, and placed in the old mosque, for the worship and devotion of the Court and the people of Madrid.

As Torres Balbás says, "Islamization was a uniform urban mold, the result of a way of life." For example, the finding of winding streets corresponds to a context in which defense is a fundamental necessity.

With respect to the Walls, they fulfill several functions. Muslim cities have medinas at their cores, which include, among other buildings, the main mosque and the hammam. They are surrounded by walls, giving the area within defensive, symbolic and administrative functions. In Madrid, similarly, the walls were built to protect the city's core, not only from external danger, but also from internal revolts in the suburbs (also possibly walled). The differentiation of spaces produced by the walls, thanks to the gates - three in this case - also aided tax collection.

Thus, the city was divided between the medina or center of religious and commercial life, and the rabad, the "populous neighborhoods outside the walls". From a planning point of view, the walls promoted urbanism through both their gates and their path: the gates because through them ran the more heavily-trafficked streets and the layout because the neighborhoods would range around it.

Many examples show the different possibilities when building walls, from the materials used to various designs to suit the terrain.

The construction of these Walls is directly linked to the origin of Madrid. They were ordered to be built by the Córdoban emir Muhammad I (852 - 886) on an unspecified date between the years 860 and 880, according to a text of al-Himyari. It was in an area not chosen by chance. It was a wide cultivated valley, with easy access to water reserves. It defended the almudaina or Muslim citadel of Mayrit (first name of the city), located on the site currently occupied by the Royal Palace.

According to Muslim chroniclers of the time, high quality construction and materials were used to build the Walls. The historian Jerónimo de Quintana echoed these accounts in the following text of the 17th century: "very strong of masonry and mortar, raised and thick, twelve feet [almost three and half meters] in width, with large cubes, towers gatehouses and moats".

The mission of the fortified complex was to monitor the path of the Manzanares, which connected the steppes of the Sierra de Guadarrama with Toledo, threatened by the incursions of the Christian kingdoms of the north peninsula. It was governed as a ribat or community, simultaneously both religious and military.

The Walls of Mayrit were integrated within a complex defensive system, which extended through different parts of the Community of Madrid. These included Talamanca de Jarama, Qal'-at'-Abd-Al-Salam ( Alcalá de Henares ) and Qal'-at-Jalifa ( Villaviciosa de Odón ). However, do not think of Mayrit as a core of a large entity, but as one of many entities -so is it that sometimes is difficult to find references to the city in the chronicles-.