Calle Arias Montano
The street takes its name from Benito Arias Montano (Fregenal de la Sierra, c. 1525-1527 – Seville, 6 July 1598), theologian, orientalist and humanist to whom Philip II entrusted the Antwerp Polyglot Bible (1568-1572) and the organization of the library of the El Escorial Monastery from 1577. It lies in the Niño Jesús neighborhood, within the Colonia del Retiro (1925-1932).
When the developers of the Colonia del Retiro handed out names to their newly laid-out streets, they drew on the history of Spain. The colony was built between 1925 and 1932 under the Cheap Housing Law. One of those streets recalled Benito Arias Montano.
Arias Montano was one of those scholars who seem to hold several libraries in a single head: he came to command Latin, Greek, Hebrew, Arabic and Syriac. In 1566 Philip II entrusted him with an enormous task, the Biblia Regia or Antwerp Polyglot, which Christophe Plantin printed in eight volumes with the texts set side by side in five languages. The work brought him trouble: he was denounced to the Inquisition for relying on rabbinic sources, though the case ended in acquittal. From 1577 he took charge of organizing the library of the El Escorial Monastery, one of the great book repositories of the Europe of his time.