Calle de las Conchas

A short, narrow street linking the costanilla de los Ángeles with calle de Trujillos, in the Sol district. The name comes from a house on the old Calle de la Sartén whose facade bore shells in relief. It was supposedly owned in the late 16th century by one Diego de Alfaro, who covered the front with shells after making a pilgrimage to the Holy Land; when the building was rebuilt, only one remained above each balcony. Not all chroniclers agree. Another explanation holds that a pilgrims' hospital operated there, a guild that adopted the scallop shell as its emblem. Despite the disagreements, the versions point to the same thing: the name came from that house of shells. The 1656 map mislabels it as Contiac, and the 1769 one absorbs it into la Sartén. Not until the 1835 register did the stretch split off as a street of its own.