Carlos III's arches
Modern Europe's first triumphal gate — before Brandenburg.
Fernando Pascullo — CC BY-SA 4.0 · Ank Kumar — CC BY-SA 4.0 · Unknown authorUnknown author — CC0 · Diriye Amey from Locarno, Switzerland — CC BY 2.0
It is the Madrid gate that entered the heart: witness to entering kings and armies, made the city's lyrical centre by the famous Ana Belén song, and counted by Madrileños their truest symbol before even the bear and tree. Geographically small, sentimentally immense.
Sign in to write your review of this place.
No reviews yet — be the first.
The Puerta de Alcalá is modern Europe's first great triumphal gate — preceding Berlin's and Paris's by decades: Carlos III raised it in 1778 as the capital's royal entrance on the Alcalá de Henares road, and it became Madrid's most famous stone symbol and its best-loved song. Five arches of granite and white stone with two deliberately different faces — check the difference between its sides — and two centuries of war shell-scars still legible up close. It stands today in the Independencia traffic circle in full majesty, lit at night like a museum piece. It is the Retiro's touching neighbour — historically its gate — so the pause here opens or closes the park walk, and a quarter hour serves it with two photos: close by day, lit from the circle's pavement by night.
Modern Europe's first triumphal gate — before Brandenburg.
Two centuries of shellfire legible in the granite.
Plaza de la Independencia, 28001 Madrid