Royal Palace of Aranjuez

About

The Royal Palace of Aranjuez (Spanish: Palacio Real de Aranjuez) is one of the official residences of the Spanish royal family. It is located in the town of Aranjuez (Madrid), Spain. Established in the 16th century as a royal hunting lodge, the palace was built by order of Philip II. Under his reign it became one of four seasonal seats of the court along Rascafría, El Escorial and the Royal Alcázar of Madrid. The royal estate comprises a set of landscaped and ornate gardens and woodlands that house an extensive botanical collection. Several international treaties were signed there and several members of the royal family died in the palace, including: Elisabeth of Valois in 1568, Barbara of Portugal in 1758, Elisabeth Farnese in 1766, Maria Antonia of Naples in 1806, Maria Isabel of Braganza in 1818 and Maria Josepha Amalia of Saxony in 1828. In 1931, during the Second Spanish Republic, the royal estate was declared an Artistic Historical Monument and opened to the public. From 1977 to 1983, the palace served as a state guest house. The palace, gardens and associated buildings are part of the Aranjuez Cultural Landscape, which was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2001. Currently...

In the 12th century the Order of Santiago created an exclusive hunting reserve alongside the river Tagus near its junction with the river Jarama.

Its history as a royal site began in the 16th century, when the order's grandmaster Lorenzo I Suárez de Figueroa directed the construction of a grand hunting lodge designed for the recreation of members of the order and their royal and noble patrons, known as the Raso de Estrella (Star shaped Glade located between the present Royal Palace and Aranjuez railway station.) The site today is an open festival park.

In 1523 Charles I of Spain took possession of the area, which was designated Real Bosque y Casa de Aranjuez (Royal Woods and House of Aranjuez), in order to entertain his guests during the springtime hunting season.

In 1551, he established a botanical garden to catalog the newly catalogued species of plants brought from the Americas. Owing to distractions elsewhere, this mission was not entirely successful.

Philip II became aware of the fertile meadows of Aranjuez, and designated that a portion of land to the north of the river Tagus should be devoted to pottager and general agriculture in 1561.

In an adjacent plot to the south of the river, the King began construction of the first palace, on the same site as the existing building. Philip engaged the services of architect Juan Bautista de Toledo and later Juan de Herrera. They were also responsible for the palace and monastery of El Escorial. The site also included exotic animals such as dromedaries ( camellos in the period sources): about 10 in 1583 and about 40 in 1598.

After Philip's death in 1598, the works were still in progress with only the royal apartments, the chapel, the south tower and part of the western facade completed. An economic and political crisis, along with eventual extinction of the Spanish Hapsburg dynasty, resulted in the project being abandoned. Charles Stuart, Prince of Wales visited the palace in 1623 during his trip to Spain for the " Spanish Match ".

In 1700, the first Bourbon king of Spain, Philip V, decided to resume the work, intending to make Aranjuez a rival to the grand palace of Versailles. Subsequently, this imposing style would be applied to the Royal Palace of La Granja de San Ildefonso. Philip V added a new north tower, completed the west façade and defined the structure that would shape the current palace. The royal dromedaries were about 200, surviving even the occupation of the palace by the troops of Archduke Charles in 1710. They were not kept in a menagerie as in Versalles, but grazed around or were employed as beasts of burden. Bulls and exotic animals were also used in the royal pastimes, such as dumping them into the Ontígola reservoir to be shot by the royal musket. Little used, the palace was almost destroyed by fire in 1748.

Ferdinand VI rebuilt the palace. Although still respecting the original foundations, the new structure was to reflect the prevailing late baroque style and 18th century aesthetic, of an imposing and ostentatious exterior accommodating a series of sumptuously furnished spaces within. Farinelli directed musical entertainment.

The building is mainly due to Charles III in his reforming work for the capital city (he is sometimes called the Mayor of Madrid ) and modernization of the Spanish state.

The architect of the modern palace was the Italian Francesco Sabatini. He designed the two west wings, which provide the main building enclosing the courtyard, thus defining three sides of the cour d'honneur square that faces the original entrance. It is near the Raso de Estrella at the confluence of the two rivers. At one end of this complex was the chapel and opposite was designated as a theater, although it was never completed.

The decoration was enriched in the 18th and 19th centuries with paintings by various artists; in the halls hardwood furniture and several collections of tapestries, clocks, lamps and sculptures were installed. Many of these unique pieces adorn the halls, chambers and spaces. The Salón de Porcelana was the favorite retreat of Charles III.

Charles III took refuge there from Spanish politics for some time following the Esquilache Riots. He chose Aranjuez to be his spring and summer residence at a period of history when the royal court used to move from Madrid in the spring and did not return to the capital until October.

The King embraced physiocracy (an early form of economics in which the wealth of a nation supposedly lay in its soil and people rather than its treasury). Charles, who enjoyed the palace and its rural environment, established the Cortijo de San Isidro as an experimental farm and divided the palace gardens into the intimate Jardín del Parterre and the wider Jardín de la Isla. He held lavish parties and sometimes sailed along stretches of the Tagus in rich artistically decorated and gilded falúas.

Charles' son, Charles IV and his wife Maria Luisa of Parma erected a pavilion known as the Casa del Labrador (farmhouse), which is today open to the public and an important example of European Neoclassical architecture.

In 1807, Manuel Godoy, favorite of Charles IV's and Spanish prime minister, tried to make peace with Napoleonic France but faced the opposition of the rebellious heir to the throne Ferdinand (later called the "felon king" ). Godoy claimed that the kingdom was safe from the impending Napoleonic French invasion because of the treaties he had facilitated. In 1808, while Godoy was a resident in Aranjuez (within the Palace of Osuna) the rumor of invasion spread, resulting in an angry mob led by the rebellious supporters of Ferdinand finding him hiding in an attic. He was taken prisoner and later exiled. As a result of the successful Mutiny of Aranjuez in March of that year the palace Salón del Trono witnessed the abdication of King Charles IV in favor of his son Ferdinand VII, who himself abdicated in May.

In September 1808, in a formal ceremony held in the Chapel of the Royal Palace of Aranjuez before Monsignor Don Juan de la Vera, the Archbishop of Laodicea, the Supreme, central Junta was officially constituted.

After the Bourbon Restoration, Alfonso XII designated the Royal Palace of Aranjuez to be the residence of the noble household of the dukes of Montpensier. His bride to be was the daughter of that family, Mercedes of Orléans. In 1878 the bride and her entourage arrived for the ceremony from Madrid at an imposing but temporary railway station constructed near the grand Plaza de Armas (western) entrance to the Palace of Aranjuez.

This was the last grand event to be held in Aranjuez, as Maria Christina of Austria the monarch's second wife, his son Alfonso XIII and his wife Victoria Eugenie of Battenberg all preferred the Palacio de la Magdalena and Miramar Palace for their royal holidays.