Plaza de la Puerta del Sol

Sol

The name comes from the gate that the Arrabal wall opened to the east of Madrid, built around 1438. The first documentary mention dates from 1481. Two theories explain the name: the more accepted attributes it to the gate’s solar orientation (facing east, where the sun rises); the alternative, popular but undocumented, proposes that a relief or painting of a sun decorated its façade.

Before it was a square, it was a real gate. In the medieval wall stood a postern here facing east, opening onto the road to Alcalá. The fort guarding it fell in 1570, leaving an irregular gap where Mayor, Arenal, Alcalá and the Carrera de San Jerónimo came to an end. In the 17th century this crossroads was the city’s forum: beside the convent of San Felipe worked Madrid’s chief gossip-corner, where news of the Empire was discussed before any regular press existed. In 1768 Charles III commissioned the Royal Post House, which closed off the southern side. In front of it, in 1835, the Kilometre Zero marker was set, the origin of Spain’s radial roads. The great transformation came between 1857 and 1862, when Lucio del Valle demolished more than thirty buildings to open today’s semi-elliptical square. Since then almost no decisive episode in Spain’s history has avoided this square: the Second of May 1808, the Second Republic in 1931, the 15-M protests in 2011. The medieval postern ended up as the place where Spain speaks.

Its names

  • calle grande de la Puerta del Sol15th–16th century
  • Plaza de la Puerta del Sol17th century en adelante
  • Plaza de la Puerta del Sol (nombre actual)1860–presente
Sources (8)

Crossings