El Escorial facts for kids
Quick facts for kids Royal Site of San Lorenzo de El Escorial |
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Real Sitio de San Lorenzo de El Escorial
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A distant view of the Royal Site
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| Alternative names | Monastery of El Escorial |
| General information | |
| Architectural style | Herrerian style |
| Location | San Lorenzo de El Escorial, Spain |
| Management | Patrimonio Nacional |
| Design and construction | |
| Architect | Juan Bautista de Toledo |
| Official name: Monastery and Site of the Escorial, Madrid | |
| Criteria: | Cultural: (i), (ii), (iv) |
| Designated: | 1984 (8th session) |
| Reference #: | 318 |
| Region: | Europe and North America |
| Official name: Monasterio de San Lorenzo | |
| Type: | Non-movable |
| Criteria: | Monument |
| Designated: | 3 June 1931 |
| Reference #: | RI-51-0001064 |
El Escorial, also known as the Royal Site of San Lorenzo de El Escorial, is a very important historical building in Spain. It was once a home for the King of Spain. You can find it in the town of San Lorenzo de El Escorial, about 45 kilometers (28 miles) northwest of Madrid, the Spanish capital.
King Philip II ordered El Escorial to be built between 1563 and 1584. It is known as the largest Renaissance building in the world. This huge complex serves many purposes. It is a monastery, a grand church (basilica), a royal palace, a burial place for kings (pantheon), a library, a museum, and even used to be a school and hospital.
El Escorial includes two main parts. There is the royal monastery itself. Then there is La Granjilla de La Fresneda, which was a royal hunting lodge. These places show how powerful the Spanish monarchy and the Roman Catholic religion were in Spain during the 1500s and 1600s.
Even though it was a royal palace, Philip II was the only king who actually lived in the main building. It started as a monastery for Hieronymite monks. Now, it is home to monks from the Order of Saint Augustine.
Philip II worked with the Spanish architect Juan Bautista de Toledo to design El Escorial. Toledo had experience working on famous buildings like St. Peter's Basilica in Rome. After Toledo passed away, his student Juan de Herrera finished the project.
In 1984, UNESCO recognized El Escorial as a World Heritage Site. It is a very popular place for tourists. More than 500,000 people visit El Escorial every year, often on day trips from Madrid.
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Why Was El Escorial Built?
El Escorial is located at the foot of Mount Abantos in the Sierra de Guadarrama mountains. King Philip II chose this quiet spot. He wanted to build a grand place to remember Spain's victory in the 1557 Battle of St. Quentin against France.
Philip also wanted El Escorial to be a special burial place. He planned for his parents, Charles I and Isabella of Portugal, himself, and future kings to be buried there. The king also imagined El Escorial as a center for learning. It would support the Counter-Reformation, which was the Catholic Church's response to the Protestant Reformation.
The first stone of the building was placed on April 23, 1563. The main architect, Juan Bautista de Toledo, died before it was finished. His apprentice, Juan de Herrera, took over and completed the building in 1584. This took just under 21 years. Even today, people in Spain say "la obra de El Escorial" (the work of El Escorial) to describe something that takes a very long time to finish.
Since then, El Escorial has been the burial site for most Spanish kings from the last five centuries. This includes kings from both the Bourbon and Habsburg families.
What Does El Escorial Look Like?
The building's floor plan looks like a gridiron, which is a cooking grill. Many people believe this design honors Saint Lawrence. He was a saint who was martyred by being roasted on a grill in the 3rd century AD. Saint Lawrence's feast day is August 10, the same day as the Battle of St. Quentin in 1557.
However, the exact reason for the building's shape is debated. Some say it was inspired by descriptions of the Temple of Solomon from ancient texts. Statues of David and Solomon at the entrance to the basilica support this idea. Philip II admired Solomon's wisdom.
El Escorial is built mostly from gray granite found nearby. It looks simple and strong, almost like a fortress. It is a giant rectangle, about 224 by 153 meters (735 by 502 feet). Inside, there are many connected hallways and courtyards. At each of the four corners, there is a square tower with a spire. Near the center, the tall bell towers and round dome of the basilica rise up.
King Philip II told his architects to make the building "simple in the construction, severe in the whole, nobility without arrogance, majesty without ostentation." This means he wanted it to be grand but not showy.
Besides its main purposes, El Escorial also holds a huge collection of art. You can see famous artworks by artists like Titian, El Greco, Velázquez, and many others. The library also contains thousands of very old and valuable manuscripts.
Exploring the Royal Monastery
The main entrance to El Escorial is on the west side. It has three doors. The middle door leads to the Courtyard of the Kings (Patio de los Reyes). The side doors lead to a school and the monastery. Above the middle door, there is a statue of Saint Lawrence.
Courtyard of the Kings
The Courtyard of the Kings is named after the statues of the Kings of Judah. These statues decorate the front of the Basilica, which is at the east end of the courtyard. Red marble steps lead up to the large public chapel.
The Basilica
The Basilica of San Lorenzo el Real is the main church in El Escorial. It was first designed like a Latin cross, with a long main aisle. But the design was changed to a Greek cross, where all four arms are the same length. The dome of the basilica is very tall, almost 100 meters (328 feet) high. It was inspired by the dome of St. Peter's Basilica in Rome.
The most decorated part of the church is around the main altar. Behind the altar is a huge altar screen, almost 28 meters (92 feet) tall. It is made of red granite and jasper. It has gilded bronze statues and paintings. On either side are life-size bronze statues of King Charles I and King Philip II's families, kneeling.
One chapel in the basilica displays a famous Crucifix carved from white marble by Benvenuto Cellini.
Royal Burial Vaults
Underneath the royal chapel of the Basilica is the Royal Pantheon crypt. This is the special burial place for the kings and queens of Spain. It is an octagonal (eight-sided) room made of marble. Most Spanish monarchs since Charles I are buried here.
The remains of the Count of Barcelona, who was the father of King Juan Carlos I of Spain, are also here. He never became king himself. The room has an altar and sarcophagi (stone coffins) made of bronze and marble.
There is also the Pantheon of the Princes. This is where queens who were not mothers of kings, and princes and princesses, are buried. This part was built in the 1800s.
Pantheon of the Kings
This chamber has twenty-six marble tombs. They hold the remains of kings and queens who ruled Spain from the Habsburg and Bourbon families. This includes kings from Charles I up to the present day. The only kings not buried here are Philip V and Ferdinand VI.
The tombs also hold the remains of royal spouses who were parents of monarchs. For example, Francis of Asis de Bourbon, husband of Queen Isabella II, is buried here.
The most recent monarch buried here is King Alfonso XIII. His wife, Victoria Eugenie of Battenberg, was also buried here in 2011. The parents of King Juan Carlos I, Infante Juan, Count of Barcelona, and Princess María de las Mercedes of Bourbon-Two Sicilies, are waiting to be buried here.
There are special rooms called pudrideros, or decaying chambers. The bodies are placed in lead urns in these rooms. After about fifty years, when the bodies have decomposed, they are moved to the marble tombs in the pantheon. Only monks from the Monastery can visit these rooms.
Pantheon of the Princes
This part of the pantheon was finished in 1888. It has nine burial chapels. It is the final resting place for princes, princesses, and royal spouses who were not parents of monarchs. The tomb of Prince John of Austria is particularly famous.
One recent burial was Infante Alfonso of Spain in 1992. He was the younger brother of King Juan Carlos I. He was first buried in Portugal after a shooting accident in 1956.
Palace of Philip II
Next to the main altar of the Basilica is the residence of King Philip II. His rooms are simply decorated. There is a window from his room where the king could watch mass from his bed. This was helpful when he was sick with gout.
Hall of Battles
This long gallery was first called the King's Gallery. But it became known as the Hall of Battles (Sala de Batallas). This is because its walls are covered with fresco paintings. These paintings show important Spanish military victories, like battles against the Moors and the French.
Gardens of the Friars
King Philip II loved nature, so he ordered these gardens to be built. They are a peaceful place for rest and thinking. Students from the school at the monastery still use them today for studying and relaxing.
The Royal Library
El Escorial has three libraries, but the Royal Library is the most famous. It was designed to be a grand work of art from the very beginning. Architects Juan de Toledo and Juan de Herrera designed it. They also designed the library's shelves. It was one of the most advanced libraries in Europe at the time.
The Royal Library is more than just a place for books; it has a special meaning. It connects the monastery and the seminary, showing the link between the spiritual and physical worlds. Books on everyday subjects like history are near the entrance. As you go deeper into the library, the subjects become more abstract, like poetry and mathematics. The subjects closest to the basilica are theology and geometry. This design suggests that visitors should move from concrete knowledge to abstract understanding before reaching God.
The library was one of the first to arrange bookcases along the walls. This was a new idea at the time. Today, the library holds over 40,000 books. It is a large hall, 54 meters (177 feet) long, 9 meters (30 feet) wide, and 10 meters (33 feet) tall. It has marble floors and beautiful wooden shelves.
The ceiling of the library is decorated with frescoes painted by Pellegrino Tibaldi. These paintings show the seven liberal arts: grammar, rhetoric, dialectic, music, arithmetic, geometry, and astronomy.
A big fire in 1671 destroyed about 5,280 handwritten books (codices). However, the printed books were saved. The library has over 600 very old printed books (incunabules) and thousands of books from the 16th and 17th centuries. It also has many medieval codices (ancient manuscripts).
How the Library Grew
King Philip II gave his own collection of documents to the library. He also worked hard to get the best libraries and works from across Western Europe. He had a special room for ancient manuscripts in many languages, including Latin, Greek, Hebrew, Arabic, and Spanish.
Philip II sent ambassadors to travel through his empire and other kingdoms. Their job was to find and buy the best books for El Escorial's library. By 1576, the library had over 4,500 books. Philip also bought the valuable library of Diego Hurtado de Mendoza.
The library continued to grow under Philip II's son, Philip III. He ordered that a copy of every book published in the Spanish Empire should be sent to El Escorial. The library reached its largest size under Philip IV.
After the 1671 fire, a priest named Antonio de San José spent over 25 years reorganizing the surviving books. He counted 45,000 books. Later, when the Bourbon family took the throne, some books were moved from El Escorial to France or to other royal libraries.
Today, the library still has over 40,000 volumes. It includes many important illuminated manuscripts, like the Ottonian Golden Gospels of Henry III.
The Reliquaries
King Philip II gave El Escorial one of the largest collections of reliquaries in the Catholic world. Reliquaries are special containers that hold relics, which are small pieces of saints or holy objects. This collection has about 7,500 relics. They are stored in 570 beautifully sculpted reliquaries designed by Juan de Herrera. These reliquaries come in many shapes, like heads, arms, or small boxes. They are found throughout the monastery, with the most important ones in the basilica.
Adjacent Buildings
Juan de Herrera also designed the Casas de Oficios (Official Buildings). These are located across from the monastery's north side. His successor, Francisco de Mora, designed the Casa de la Compaña (Company Quarters).
Images for kids
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Monastery and its reflection
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Pool from the Monastery
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View of El Escorial, by Michel-Ange Houasse (1723)
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A distant view.
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View of El Escorial from the Seat of Philip II
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The Casita del Principe, was built in 1771–75 to designs of Juan de Villanueva, for the Prince of the Asturias, the future Carlos IV
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The Monastery with the garden
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Wooden model of the roof
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High altar of the Basilica
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Courtyard of the Evangelists
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Wall in the Hall of Battles
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El Escorial. View from the northwest
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See also
In Spanish: Real Monasterio de San Lorenzo de El Escorial para niños
- History of early modern period domes
- List of carillons
- Spanish Golden Age
- Valle de los Caídos
- Patrimonio Nacional
- Herrerian style
- Imperial Route of the Community of Madrid
