Calle de Francisco Silvela

Before it bore a politician’s name, this street was part of the Paseo de Ronda, the semicircular ring the Castro Plan drew in 1860 to mark the outer edge of the Ensanche. The stretch between the plaza de Manuel Becerra and the glorieta de López de Hoyos separated two worlds: to the south the Lista colony, with villas for the well-off; to the north, La Guindalera, humbler and built later. The council renamed it on 1 October 1915. Francisco Silvela y de Le Vielleuze (Madrid, 1845-1905) studied law, was a deputy for Piedrahíta for more than thirty years and held the portfolios of Interior, Justice, State and the Navy under Cánovas. On retiring he left Antonio Maura at the head of conservatism. What best keeps his name alive, though, is a phrase. On 16 August 1898, amid the loss of the last colonies, he published an article titled “Spain without a pulse” comparing the country to a patient in whom no vital signs can be found. The image struck deep and made him one of the central voices of conservative regenerationism.

The article “España sin pulso”, published by Silvela in El Tiempo on 16 August 1898 —⁠weeks after the armistice with the United States⁠—⁠, used the metaphor of a patient with no vital signs to describe Spain’s indifference to the colonial collapse. The phrase entered journalistic usage and became the most-quoted text of conservative regenerationism.