Calle del Ángel

Calle del Ángel runs south from the Puerta de Moros square, wedged between Tabernillas and Calatrava, in the Palacio quarter. In barely one hundred and thirty-eight metres it dies among the tangle of alleys that surrounded the old Gil Imón field. The name springs from an oratory where an image of the Guardian Angel was venerated. The plot belonged to don Baltasar Gil Imón de la Mota, crown attorney of the Royal Council of Castile under Philip III and Philip IV. When he died, the image was taken to the Hospital of the Venerable Third Order of Saint Francis, on calle de San Bernabé, which still operates: it is the oldest hospital in Madrid still active. The oratory, by contrast, was swallowed by construction. The neighbourhood was one of humble people and manual trades, in the shadow of the convent of San Francisco el Grande. It is told that a procession left the oratory in which the neighbourhood children marched dressed as angels. No other name has been found for this street: the municipal register always records it the same, without a single documented change.