Calle del Agracejo

The barberry is a thorny shrub, Berberis vulgaris, with arching reddish branches armed with sharp thorns. In spring it covers itself with yellow flowers and, by late summer, with small red berries so sour that in some places it was called vinegar-plant. Jams and preserves were made from them, and the bark, an intense yellow, served for centuries as a dye. It grows in hedges, along paths and on sunny ground, the kind of rural landscape that surrounded Tetuán when these streets began to be laid out. The name fits the botanical tone of Valdeacederas, a neighbourhood whose place name evokes a valley of sorrels and which gathered rows of streets named after plants of the countryside. Agracejo is short and unassuming within that grid. Why the barberry in particular was chosen for this street has not survived; most likely it answered to the general criterion of the area. Anyone walking it today will look in vain for the shrub: only the word remains, planted on the sign.