Calle del Gobernador
After Julián de Picos, governor of Madrid in the time of Alfonso XI (14th century), to whom the Council granted lands beside the Atocha meadow, according to the chroniclers' tradition. He governed badly: around 1339 the king dismissed and condemned him for his abuses.
Madrid has streets named for kings and saints. This one bears the name of a man almost nobody liked.
The governor who gave it its name was Julián de Picos. He raised taxes with no reason to justify them and jailed those who could not pay, and word had it that much of what he collected never left his own pocket. Around 1339, Alfonso XI dismissed him, condemned him and ordered his house torn down, a punishment that then amounted to wiping someone off the city’s map.
And yet the name survived. Nearly three centuries later, the road crossing those lands came to be called after the old governor. The man they tried to erase ended up fixed forever in the street map. It is worth reading with caution: the episode comes from the chroniclers' tradition rather than from records that can be traced.
Its names
- Camino o calle que sale a las huertas de Valdemoroh.14th century–h.17th century
- Calle del Gobernadorh.1656