Calle de Lira

Anyone walking through the Estrella neighbourhood moves under a sky drawn on the plaques. Almost every street bears the name of a star or constellation: calle de los Astros, calle del Pez Volador, calle de la Cruz del Sur, calle de Perseo. The calle de Lira takes its name from the constellation Lyra, not simply the instrument. Lyra is small, barely a handful of stars, but it holds Vega, one of the brightest in the sky and a corner of the Summer Triangle. Greek mythology told that this celestial instrument was the lyre of Orpheus, the musician who could tame stones and beasts with his sound; when he died, the muses carried it up to the heavens. The neighbourhood is young: it was built in the fifties on land tied to the insurance company La Estrella, which is where the whim of naming its streets after the map of the sky begins.