Calle de Oriente

Madrid named this street after no one memorable: it named it after a compass. The road runs through the Palacio district, between Calle del Humilladero and Calle de Tabernillas, and takes its name from facing west to east relative to the already built-up part of that south-western corner of the old town. Pure orientation, no tribute. It was not alone in this logic. It belonged to a group of straight streets ordering the space between Las Vistillas and Calle de Toledo, with neighbours del Mediodía and del Luciente, which on old maps appears as “de Occidente”. That named west confirms that Oriente made sense as its opposite point on the urban compass rose. No monument, no palace: houses of labourers and craftsmen, a neighbourhood that existed to work.