Hello dear readers,
Madrid legend and curiosities is the topic of the cultural column of May.. We have written about TV series, libraries, museums, historical figures, but never mentioned all the myths, secrets and curiosities about this city. And we promise it’s not going be less entertaining than an escape room (oh, well, maybe a little)!
Legends and curiosities: streets names, optical illusions, miracles, important figures… helpMadrid will tell you some stories that will turn you into a real madrileño and will lead you to look at the places in Madrid with different eyes. You may want to share these information with your friends, to show off your knowledge while having a casual conversation about the city in your shared flat, or whenever somebody travels here to visit you and Madrid.
Get ready and enjoy the reading with us!
- Why madrileños are called “Los Gatos”?
Have you ever wondered why the folks here have this curious nickname? To find this out we have to go back in time, till the 11th century, when Madrid was dominated by Arabs. When the Christian troops of King Alfonso VI arrived down the walls of the city to surprise the enemy, one soldier climbed the outer walls just sticking his dagger in the gaps and then he ran fast to take the Moorish flag of in order to put the Christian one. His incredible agility (that reminds a cat) made the soldiers begin to call him “gato” (cat). In his memory and because of this gesture, his successors took the name of Gato.
Since then, the story became a legend and all the madrileños are also called “gatos”. - Trampajontos
What does this weird word mean? A trampajonto is an optical illusion that deceived someone into seeing what’s not there.
There are several of these tricks in the walls all around Madrid, where they create an illusion: paintings that represent what there could be there, beyond the building, if it had windows, terraces, people gathering etc…
You can spot a beautiful trampajonto in Plaza de los Carros and many others in the whole La Latina neighbourhood. - Kilómetro Cero
We are talking about one of the most instagrammed spots in Puerta del Sol: the Kilómetro Cero, the beginning point of the 6 main roads in Spain, back in the 18th century. This point is a reference for numbering the houses in Madrid, in fact, all the numbers 1 in any road always are the closest to Puerta del Sol. - “Puerta del Sol” - the origin of the name
Literally “door of the sun”, Puerta del Sol, the most famous public square in Spain, in the 16th century used to be the place where the eastern city entrance was located. Therefore, it was the first spot touched by the first rays of sunshine at daybreak. - The bear and the strawberry tree
Symbol of Madrid City since the 18th century, this bear managing to grab fruit from the tree has been on madrilean coat of arms. Before that time there was just a bear and, after a dispute between the local council and the catholic Church, in which both claimed landscapes from Madrid to Sierra de Guadarrama, the Church managed to take the control of the pastures, while the forest and hunting grounds were owned by the council. In order to celebrate the achievement, this last one added the strawberry tree on the coat of the arms.
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And we are done with this little curiosity/cultural/historical class for today! Don’t forget all this information, they’ll be useful when you have some guests visiting you here.
Waiting for the next month to come for a new topic about our cultural column, we remind you to follow us on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and our blog and stay tuned for more posts to come!
See you,
helpMadrid team