Salamanca Attractions

The climate of the almost treeless plateau shows sharp contrasts: the winter is severe and often bitterly cold, the summer sometimes almost unbearably hot.

The town

Salamanca is one of Spain's great tourist attractions. With its many old and historic buildings, including some particularly fine examples of Plateresque architecture, which here reached its highest point, the whole town has been declared a national monument and listed by UNESCO as part of the world's cultural heritage. In the clear light of the Meseta the old town, all built of golden-yellow stone from Villamayor, is of overwhelming effect. The best view of the town is from the Ávila road on the left bank of the Río Tormes. The narrow streets around the University and the Plaza Mayor, crowded with students, still preserve something of the atmosphere of the old university of Salamanca.

History

Salamanca, the Roman Salmantica, was captured by Hannibal in 217 B.C. and by the Moors in the eighth century A.D. During the long wars between Christians and Moors the town was almost completely destroyed, and only recovered some measure of importance around 1100, in the reign of Alfonso VI of Castile. Salamanca's international reputation was established, however, by its University, founded by Alfonso IX of León, which vied with the universities of Bologna, Paris and Oxford and transmitted Arab science and learning to the rest of Europe. In the 16th century the University had more than 7,000 students. The establishment of a bishopric in Valladolid (1593), which had previously been within the diocese of Salamanca, and the expulsion of the Moriscos in 1610, led to the decline of Salamanca, from which it has recovered only in recent times. During the occupation of Spain by French troops during the Napoleonic wars Salamanca was frequently a French base. In 1811 British troops defeated a French army in the Arapiles valley, to the south of the town, and thus initiated Napoleon's withdrawal from the Iberian peninsula.