Logbook · 3 places

What to see and do in Madrigal de las Altas Torres

What to see and do in Madrigal de las Altas Torres (La Moraña, Ávila): 3 places across monuments, nature, activities and curiosities, with a photo and a Google Maps location.

1 Villages · 1 Nature · 1 Historical milestones

Towns near Madrigal de las Altas Torres

Spain › Castile and León › Ávila › La Moraña › Madrigal de las Altas Torres

What to see and do in Madrigal de las Altas Torres

Madrigal de las Altas Torres
Village
Madrigal de las Altas Torres is an abulense town of about 1,281 inhabitants, one of the most significant settlements in the district of La Moraña, at the northern edge of the province, between the Zapardiel and Trabancos rivers and near the borders with Salamanca and Valladolid. Girded by its walls, of which a good part of the hundred towers that give it its name is still preserved, it is known for the birth of Isabella the Catholic on 22 April 1451; also born here, around 1472, was the judge Vasco de Quiroga, a key figure in the evangelisation of the p'urhépecha people and first bishop of Michoacán, in present-day Mexico. The palace of John II in which the queen came into the world is today the monastery of Nuestra Señora de Gracia, and its plains shelter the great bustard.
The Tierra de Campiñas Special Protection Area (SPA)
Nature
Declared in 2000, it protects 139,734 hectares of cereal plain spread across Ávila, Valladolid and Salamanca. It gathers more than 2,000 great bustards and is Spain's largest wintering quarters for the red kite, with close to 1,500 individuals.
The trial of the pastry-maker of Madrigal
Historical milestone
The trial, documented in the Archivo Histórico de Simancas, began when the pastry-cook Gabriel de Espinosa, who had arrived in the village in 1594, was arrested in Valladolid while carrying valuable jewels given to him by doña Ana de Austria, a nun at the convent of Madrigal de las Altas Torres, who claimed they were for its restoration; the detainee claimed to be the vanished king don Sebastian of Portugal. Letters from doña Ana and from the chaplain fray Miguel de los Santos — a Portuguese and former confessor of don Sebastian — which addressed Espinosa as “Majesty”, made the judge in the case doubtful, and he asked Philip II to send someone able to recognise him. The king followed the trial by correspondence, and Espinosa ended up hanged, quartered and displayed at the gates of the town wall.