Salamanca City
Salamanca, throughout its long history,
has been a protagonist of Spain's most significant historical
events. Pre-Roman remains can be found in Teso de San Vicente,
beside the river Tormes, in the Verraco (Iberican statue representing
a bull) situated in the centre of the Roman bridge, in the city
walls, in numerous inscriptions and along the Calzada de la Plata
which, passing through Salamanca, united Mérida and Astorga.
Salmántica belonged to the Roman province of Lusitania,
was besieged by Hannibal but we have little information of the
Visigothic era. From the third Council of Toledo onwards the Bishops
of this city can be found to have participated in its decisions.
Conquered by the Arabs, lost and recuperated severals times by
the Christians, it was definitively reconquered by the great pro-European
king Alfonso VI who placed the colonialisation of this part of
his kingdom in the hands of his son-in-law, Count Raimundo de
Borgoña, married in 1096 to his first-born, Doña
Urraca, granting the city its first municipal charter.
In 1200 Alfonso IX founded what was to become eighteen years later
the University of Salamanca. Salamanca thus owes its renown and
prosperity to this king. The new University soon received great
favours from Fernando el Santo and Alfonso X el Sabio who established
the number and type of chairs the University was to be composed
of. In 1254, Pope Alexander IV called the University of Salamanca
"one of the four leading lights of the world".
The 15th century was a period of agitation in Salamanca as it
was in the rest of Spain. There was bitter fighting between the
supporters of D. Alvaro de Luna and the Infantes of Aragón.
But the violent fighting which divided the city in two was made
worse by a tragic event which occured in 1465. Two brothers of
the Manzano family killed two others of the Enrique family from
Seville due to an incident during a ball game. When their mother,
María Rodríguez de Monroy -afterwards to be called
María the Brave- saw the bodies of her sons, she silently
set off after the assassins. She found them at an inn in Viseu
(Portugal), killed them and returning with the heads of the two
Manzanos, threw them on the tomb stones of the church of Santo
Tomé where her sons rested.
The city was divided into two enemy groups, each side taking on
the name of the parishes of Santo Tomé or San Benito, bloodying
the city, inspite of the fervereous preaching of San Juan de sahagún.
Salamanca was visited on several ocassions by the Catholic King
and Queen, one of these due to the death of their son, Prince
don Juan, in 1497. The Catholic King lived here from October 1505
to March 1506.
Carlos I visited Salamanca in 1534, and Felipe II in 1543, marrying
his first wife, María of Portugal, here.
Felipe III revisited the city in 1600 with his second wife, Margaret
of Austria. The city took part in the War of Succession, on the
side of Felipe V. Conquered by the Archduke's troop, it was soon
recovered by the founder of the Bourbon dynasty, who stayed here
for several days in 1710, when the construction of the Plaza Mayor
(Main Square) was agreed.
Salamanca was badly affected by the Peninsula War. From 1808 to
1811 it was open to the armies who disputed the hegemony of Europe
on Spanish soil. At last, the battle of Arapiles, at the very
gates of the city and in which Wellington defeated Napoleon's
army, led to the withdrawl of the latter from Spanish territory.
But this withdrawl left behind the destruction of marvellous architectural
treasures, many colleges, palaces and buildings such as the Colegio
Mayor de Cuenca which was considered to be "one of the marvels
of architecture".
If the political history of Salamanca was not very eventful, it
was the diverse incidents in the life of the University, the distribution
of the professorships, the relationship between the lecturers
and the students, and between the latter and the people of the
city, which make up its history up to the 19 century.
In the field of Art, all the styles have left their most worthy
and exquisite mark on this city. The Spanish plateresque style,
of decorative quality and fine execution, offers its most beautiful
examples here in Salamanca. This decorative tendency of the Plateresque
style finds of a beautiful golden colour.
Innumerable historical celebrities, from Fray Luis de León,
Antonio de Nebrija, Francisco de Vitoria, Cervantes, Menéndez
Valdés, San Juan de la Cruz de Miguel de Unamuno or Gonzalo
Torrente Ballester, have passed through the city, both in the
university field as well as in that of the Arts, leaving the mark
of their knowledge on this beautiful city.
Today, the city offers the same aspect as do similiar ones in
the rest of the Spanish provinces, although perhaps with a more
intense spiritual life due to studies which were reanimated by
the founding of the Pontificia University (catholic university).
It is the university life, in all its aspects, which adds emotion
and colour to its daily rhythm. Its tradition, its present atmosphere,
make it apt to be considered, like Oxford and Cambridge, the Spanish
university city.
Everyday life could be said to centre around the magnificent Plaza
Mayor. Its archways echo with what is going on in the city.
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