Paseo de Ali Ben Yusuf

The Paseo de Alí ben Yusuf winds through the Campo del Moro gardens, descending the western slope of the old Alcázar that is today the Royal Palace. It was laid out in the late 19th century by the head gardener Ramón Oliva. The name points to an episode of 1109: the Almoravid emir Ali ibn Yusuf advanced through the lands of Madrid and camped outside the Alcázar, cut off the springs and settled in to wait for the Castilians to surrender. The siege went badly; an epidemic swept the camp and the army withdrew south. Here is the curious part: the name Campo del Moro is far younger than the legend suggests. It appears in no document until 1809, and settles in 1844, when Isabel II commissioned the garden’s design. It is a historicist label that Romanticism hung on the place centuries after the events. Earlier, the ground was called almuzara, from the Arabic al-musara, an extramural space for recreation and mounted manoeuvres.