Caught on canvas or let off the hook? Portraiture is a tricky business. An artist has to balance capturing the true likeness of the subject with flattering their ego. If said subject is a nasty piece of work, the job just gets even trickier. This post features three portraits of Spain’s most notoriously nefarious rogues, …
An inconvenient truth For many years, historians did not want to accept the fact that Muslims created the settlement of Madrid. Instead, the story went that the Romans founded Spain’s capital city. But the archeological evidence points in another direction. While Madrid was near an old Roman road that went from Merida to Zaragoza via …
If you’re looking for tours and tapas away from the tourist traps, then look no further! I’ve been running unique tours that show another side of Madrid for a while now. So, with mask laws lifting, it seems like the perfect time to add drinks and tapas to my itineraries. As I’ve been doing this …
Madrid has lost many treasured bars to the pandemic and last year, it looked like Café Barbieri in Lavapiés was going to be added to that list. Though the closure of this institution was announced in May 2021, I’m delighted to report that the café reopened under new management last month. Even better, with the …
Taking place just two years after Franco’s death in 1977, the Atocha Massacre was one of the darkest episodes in Spain’s transition to democracy. However, while the assassins aimed to goad the far right into a bloody exchange that would justify a coup, the wholesale murder of leftist lawyers and trade unionists instead met with …
From when mammoths stalked the Manzanares River to when Napoleon stomped through the city’s gates, these three museums reveal Madrid through the ages. And the good news is, they’re all completely free! The Museum of San Isidro: The Origins of Madrid The first of my three museums that reveal Madrid through the ages is The …
People from Madrid are a welcoming sort, but even so, they do have a strong sense of their own identity. Just like DNA, it is coded into the language, marking them out as citizens of the city. Which is why, if you’re in Madrid to stay, it’s worth getting to grips with some truly Madrileño …
Founded in 1478 to root out false Jewish converts to Christianity, the Spanish Inquisition was a bloodthirsty organization that killed between 5,000 and 10,000 people during its 350 year existence. Given these horrifying statistics, it might seem odd to say that the Spanish Inquisition wasn’t quite as bad as it has been made out to …
The Rastro is one of those typically Madrilleño experiences that can neither be Disneyfied nor gentrified. Though stalls are more strictly regulated these days, this outdoor flea market retains its raucous edge with vendors shouting out chollos while swarms of punters elbow each other out of the way, some of them so intent on snagging …
It’s not easy piecing together a Jewish history of Madrid. While nearby Toledo has not one but two medieval synagogues, little hard physical evidence of Madrid’s Jewish population remains. This stands to reason as Toledo was, of course, a much larger and more important location in medieval Spain. But documents attest to the fact that …