Grado

The oldest traces of human activity in the Grado area go back to the Bronze Age. A few Iron Age hill forts survive, though these were little more than fortified rock outcrops. Roman evidence is sparse, despite richer finds in neighbouring districts, partly because the population was distributed very differently then.

The most notable Roman survival is the Chapipi hoard: thirteen gold coins of emperors Constantine, Theodosius, Honorius and Arcadius, plus a gold ring missing its setting. These were hidden in a cave at La Asniella, in the parish of Coalla, apparently during the chaos of the Germanic invasions and the collapse of Roman authority. Found in 1934, most of the hoard is now in the Archaeological Museum of Oviedo, with three coins in the National Archaeological Museum in Madrid.

In the early Middle Ages the area was divided between three distinct territories, Pramaro, Salcedo and Bayo or Grado, rather than forming a single unit. Alfonso X, known as the Wise, drove the creation of a single town that brought the three together, partly to curb abuses by the clergy and nobility. The new settlement took its name from one of those territories, was laid out along a central street in the classic Camino pattern, and was enclosed by a wall and moat, though the wall was meant to define the town's boundaries rather than defend it militarily.

Grado grew to become one of the most important towns in Asturias. Power over the town shifted repeatedly. In the fourteenth century it came under Alfonso, illegitimate son of Henry II of Castile, and a century later passed to the Quiñones family.

Local people did not gain meaningful autonomy until much later; a court in Oviedo ruled against the monopoly of a few ruling families in 1774, confirmed by a higher court in 1783. During the Napoleonic Wars the town was invaded four times, with serious damage to its artistic heritage, and a local regiment was raised and sent to fight far from home.

Little of Grado's medieval fabric survives in the town centre, apart from fragments of its old wall, currently being restored. Its strongest architectural identity comes from later centuries.

The Capilla de los Dolores is a Baroque chapel declared a Historic Artistic Monument. Built in squared stone, it has a rectangular plan divided into three sections: a taller front bay with a dome on pendentives, and two further bays with barrel vaults. Outside, tall buttresses are the dominant feature, and the doorway carries a round arch flanked by pilasters, with a niche framed by columns above it.

Next to the chapel, the Palacio de Miranda-Valdecarzana is also a declared Historic Artistic Monument. Its bones are medieval, but the building was thoroughly remodelled in later centuries. The entrance opens onto a monumental staircase leading to a courtyard held up by octagonal columns.

The parish church of San Pedro was built between 1884 and 1890. Large in scale, it draws on Romanesque Revival forms, with a rectangular plan, a square apse, three chapels, and two towers framing the main façade.

The Palacio Velázquez, locally known as El Capitolio, is a substantial two-storey country house with a four-storey tower, large windows, an Ionic entrance portico, and an extensive garden. Starting from El Capitolio, the street Calle Eulogio Díaz Miranda carries a sequence of Indiano mansions built by returning emigrants from the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, including Villa Granda, the Palacete de la Familia Martínez, the palacete at number 26, La Quintana, and El Calabión.

Outside the town, the Iglesia de San Martín in Gurullés dates from 1117 and is the third oldest Romanesque church in Asturias. It has a single nave, a semicircular apse, and a main portal with three round-arched archivolt orders on columns. The Iglesia de Santa María in Restiello preserves medieval wall paintings depicting the Crucifixion, considered the most artistically significant paintings in the whole municipality. The Torre de Villanueva, a tall square medieval tower with five storeys, arrow slits and machicolations, was once part of a castle belonging to Count Gonzalo Peláez de Coalla; together with an adjacent palace and chapel, it is a declared Historic Artistic Monument. The Puente de Peñaflor, a bridge rebuilt several times since its original medieval construction, marks the Camino de Santiago's entry point into the Grado district and was also the site of a battle against Napoleonic forces.

The practical information provided in the source relates to Grado in the Friuli-Venezia Giulia region of Italy, not to Grado in Asturias, Spain. Using it would introduce false details about this town. NONE