Aljafería

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General view, east side

The Aljafería is the city palace of Saragossa in the Spanish autonomous community of Aragon . The palace has a roughly square plan and is surrounded by defensive walls and a moat. The oldest parts date from the time of the Moorish rule (especially soon after 1065), parts have been added and changed several times over the centuries. The last major renovations took place in the 19th century, and extensive excavations and reconstructions were carried out after the Second World War.

The palace now houses a museum, an administrative wing housed in former barracks and the Aragonese regional parliament.

Location map

The Moors

In the second half of the 9th century a residential tower was built on the north side, later named after the drama by Antonio García Gutiérrez and the opera Il trovatore by Giuseppe Verdi , the "Tower of the Troubadours", whose lower floors date from this time.

The complex was expanded to its present size from or shortly after 1065 during the Taifa Kingdom , when a richly decorated summer palace was built here outside the city walls. The builder was King Abū Ǧaʿfar Aḥmad ibn Hūd al-Muqtadir , from whose name (Ǧaʿfar> al-Ǧaʿfariyyà) the name of the building was derived. The centerpiece was a north-south facing inner courtyard (today: Patio of St. Isabel) in the center, surrounded by passageways, to which the state apartments were connected in the north (restored). At that time (according to more recent research) the complex was surrounded by a wall with semicircular fortification towers, which was reconstructed on the east side, where the entrance is also, after the Second World War.

  • Northern arcades of the state apartments

  • Northern arcades of the state apartments

  • Patio of St. Isabel

  • Arcades in front of the parliament wing

  • Patio from above

After the reconquest

After the reconquest in 1118, the " Reconquista ", by the Christian ruler Alfonso I "el Batallador" (the warrior), the Aljafería became the palace of the Aragonese and Catholic kings. Over the centuries, major renovations and extensions were carried out, also using the Mudejar style.

Today you can still experience the state rooms, which were furnished by the Catholic kings from 1488 on the newly built upper floor above the old Moorish state rooms. In 1495 the work was completed and is described by the German humanist, doctor and geographer Hieronymus Münzer . A monumental staircase leads from the ground-level inner courtyard to a gallery on the first floor. The so-called throne room with its richly carved and colored and golden ceiling is located on this. The hall is surrounded by smaller rooms in which rich wooden ceilings have also been preserved.

  • Throne room (golden room)

  • Ceremonial staircase of the catholic kings

  • Different view, with wooden ceiling

  • Gallery in front of the throne room

The reconstructed Moorish fortress wall (around 1065) and the moat with corner bastion (from 1593) as well as the angular "Tower of the Troubadour"

From 1593 the mainly civil city palace was redesigned into a for the time modern citadel, i.e. a military building, by order of the - now all-Spanish - King Philip II . For this purpose, the entire complex was surrounded by an outer wall with pentagonal bulwarks and an impressive moat. These have been preserved, but the towers standing on the corners can only be recognized today on contemporary drawings.

Modern times

Further military conversions and extensions followed, for example several barracks blocks in the 18th and 19th centuries, especially under Charles III. , and finally, at the time of Isabel II, two neo-Gothic fortress towers. These extensions are still preserved and today characterize the west side of the complex, which is used for administrative tasks.

The Aljafería has been a listed building since 1931. Extensive restoration work began in 1947 and lasted until the 1980s. Extensive reconstructions were also carried out, such as B. the almost completely newly built semicircular towers of the eastern outer facade or parts of the Moorish state chambers. Like the other buildings of Mudéjar architecture in Aragon, the Aljafería has been on the UNESCO World Heritage List since 2001 .

The Aragonese parliament, Cortes de Aragón, has been meeting since 1987 in the hall located on the southeast side of the complex, just south of the patio .

literature

  • Sebastian, Manuel Exposito; Pano Gracia, Jose Luis; Sepulveda Sauras, Isabel: The Aljaferia of Saragossa. Art historical and literary guide . Saragossa 2005. (didactically good, successful and scientifically reliable presentation)

Web links

Commons : Palacio de la Aljafería (Zaragoza)  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

proof

  1. ↑ Sebastian, Manuel Exposito; Pano Gracia, Jose Luis; Sepulveda Sauras, Isabel: The Aljaferia of Saragossa. Art historical and literary guide. Saragossa 2005, here pp. 17–54.
  2. ↑ Sebastian, Manuel Exposito; Pano Gracia, Jose Luis; Sepulveda Sauras, Isabel: The Aljaferia of Saragossa. Art historical and literary guide. Saragossa 2005, pp. 71–90.

Coordinates: 41 ° 39 '23.1 "  N , 0 ° 53' 49.1"  W.