Calle de Felipe el Hermoso

Behind this name is an archduke of Burgundy who became king of Castile almost in passing. Philip of Habsburg was born in Bruges in 1478 and married Joanna, daughter of Ferdinand and Isabella, in 1496. The good looks that earned him his nickname were not enough to let him reign in peace: he clashed with his father-in-law Ferdinand over more than the role of consort, and when he died suddenly in Burgos in 1506, at twenty-eight, a rumor spread that Ferdinand had ordered him poisoned. From that death and Joanna’s grief grew the legend of the queen who followed her husband’s coffin along the roads of Castile. The Calle de Felipe el Hermoso is a short street in the Trafalgar neighborhood, between Balmes and Marqués de la Romana. It forms one side of the block around Madrid’s synagogue.