Who invented karaoke? The story, as it’s always been told, begins in Japan in the 1970s —except that’s not quite how it happened. It really began fifty years earlier, in Madrid. Before you raise an eyebrow, though, let’s back up: not everyone agrees on what karaoke actually is. The Real Academia Española —Spain’s own dictionary…

Every 27th of July, at the Real Monasterio de la Encarnación, something happens that has been repeating itself for four centuries now: a substance kept in a small glass ampoule —tradition holds it to be the blood of Saint Pantaleon— turns from solid to liquid. Some call it a miracle. Others, just as convinced, call…

On the outskirts of Madrid, where the oak and holm oak forest that gives it its name muffles the noise of the city, stands the Palacio de El Pardo —a medieval hunting ground, royal residence, setting for weddings, concordats and deathbeds, and for nearly four decades the place from which Francisco Franco governed Spain—. Today…

The shootings of 3 May 1808 in Madrid are among the most debated episodes of the Peninsular War — and the question of where exactly they took place remains open. “They shot three groups, each of forty people, at El Prado. Many (the figures are not known) were shot at the Church of La Soledad,…

Where was the medieval Jewish quarter of Madrid, and where exactly was it located? More than eight centuries after the first documented Jewish presence in Madrid, it remains an open question whether a separate and distinct Jewish quarter ever existed in the medieval city, since successive forced relocations and the scarcity of documentary sources make…

In the very heart of Madrid, steps away from the bustle of streets thronged with visitors to the shops and shopping centres that fill this part of the city, the sturdy facades of an old monastery stand out in sharp relief. Built in the Toledan style, with flint rubblework between brick string courses, these walls…