Calle del Bonetillo

A narrow, sloping street of the Palacio quarter, it runs down from plaza del Comandante Las Morenas to calle de la Escalinata. On Espinosa’s 1769 map it appears as calle de los Tintes, because dyers worked along this stretch; the name that finally prevailed comes, in the guild version, from the first hat factory documented in Madrid. The story that has spread most has another flavour, one of ecclesiastical revenge. Its protagonist is Juan Henríquez, a beneficiary of Santa Cruz and a carousing companion of Prince Carlos, son of Philip II. That friendship irked Cardinal Espinosa, the inquisitor general, who staged a fake funeral for him: returning home one night, Henríquez met a funeral procession leaving his own door, and was told the dead man was himself. His house was sealed and a pole with his cap dyed red was nailed to the roof, in full view. He spent four years in the Inquisition’s prison, and the cap hung up there just as long. The street kept the name of that cap that marked the house as a public warning.