Calle de Ruy González de Clavijo

The name honors a Madrid traveler who, in the early 15th century, reached farther than almost any Castilian of his day. Ruy González de Clavijo was serving at the court of Henry III when the king put him at the head of an embassy to the East. The aim was to strike an alliance with Tamerlane, the fearsome lord of Central Asia, against the Ottoman Turks. The expedition left Castile in 1403 and crossed Constantinople, Persia and the steppes to reach Samarkand, capital of Tamerlane’s empire. Clavijo wrote down all he saw: cities, palaces, banquets and the figure of the conqueror himself. That account, the Embajada a Tamorlán, survives as one of the great works of medieval travel writing, on a par with the book of Marco Polo. Clavijo returned, was received by the king in 1406 and died in Madrid in 1412. He was buried on the site now held by the basilica of San Francisco el Grande, a short walk from the street that bears his name.