Salamanca

Human settlement at Salamanca goes back to the late Bronze Age. Ceramic remains found on the hill of San Vicente point to the Cogotas I culture from around the start of the first millennium BC, and the same hill later held a continuous settlement associated with the early Iron Age Soto de Medinilla culture. A second Iron Age nucleus developed on what is now called the hill of the cathedrals, a fortified settlement that persisted until the Roman period. In 2013, a site of open-air Palaeolithic rock art was discovered at La Salud on the banks of the river Tormes, including an engraving of a two-headed horse carved into slate by a combination of pecking and incision, dated to around 20,000 years ago.

The city's later history is woven into the making of the modern Western world. In 1492, the scholar Antonio de Nebrija produced his Grammatica, the first systematic study of a Western European vernacular language — the starting point of the Spanish Golden Age. Nebrija was also the first person in the Western world to claim authorship rights over his own work. That same year, the council of the University of Salamanca met to consider Columbus's proposal for a westward voyage, and Columbus stayed at the Dominican convent of San Esteban while seeking support. The Salamancan astronomer Abraham Zacut provided crucial scientific backing for the expedition.

The university produced or shaped several other world-changing figures. Hernán Cortés studied here before sailing to the Americas. Beatriz Galindo, known as "la Latina," is considered the first woman to attend a university anywhere in the world, and Luisa de Medrano became the first woman to teach at a university, doing so in the academic year 1508–1509. The School of Salamanca, led by Francisco de Vitoria, reformulated natural law, laid the groundwork for modern international law and economics, and actively participated in the Council of Trent. At that same Council, mathematicians from Salamanca proposed to Pope Gregory XIII the reformed calendar that bears his name and remains in global use today, based on studies carried out at the university in 1515 and 1578. Fray Luis de León produced a partial Spanish translation of the Bible here, and the oldest surviving printed book on modern chess, Luis Ramírez de Lucena's Repetición de amores y arte de ajedrez, was published in Salamanca in 1496. Miguel de Cervantes, possibly a student here, drew on the city in several works, including Don Quijote and the short piece La Cueva de Salamanca.

Salamanca's old city was designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1988. Its most visited landmark is the Plaza Mayor, a baroque square designed by the architects Alberto and Nicolás Churriguera, which functions as the social and physical centre of the city. Adjoining it is the smaller Plaza del Corrillo, where the Romanesque church of San Martín stands alongside a row of arcaded houses whose stone column capitals are carved with symbols representing the days of the week — a moon for Monday, the god Mars for Tuesday, and so on.

The city has two cathedrals built directly against each other. The Old Cathedral dates from the Romanesque period; the New Cathedral is far larger, begun in the late Gothic style and completed much later. The point where they meet is known as the Patio Chico. The main tower of the New Cathedral was built over the Old Cathedral's bell tower, and a crack caused by the 1755 Lisbon earthquake is still visible in the stonework.

La Clerecía, now home to the Pontifical University, is a baroque complex begun in 1617 and completed roughly a century and a half later as a Jesuit royal college. It features a three-body church façade, twin 50-metre towers, a large dome, and a notable cloister.

The Dominican convent of San Esteban has a plateresque façade in the form of a triumphal arch, a baroque altarpiece by José Benito Churriguera, and a Renaissance cloister known as the Claustro de los Reyes. The convent of Las Dueñas, built in 1533, is known above all for its irregular pentagonal cloister, which adapted to the layout of earlier buildings on the site, with carved capitals of fantastical figures on its upper storey.

Near the cathedrals, the Huerto de Calixto y Melibea is a garden said by some to be the setting of Fernando de Rojas's La Celestina, beside which Roman city wall remains survive. Other monuments in the old city include the Colegio de Fonseca, the churches of San Marcos, Sancti Spiritus, San Juan de Barbalos and San Cristóbal, the convents of Las Claras and Santa Teresa, and the Campo de San Francisco, the city's first public garden, laid out on the grounds of a former Franciscan convent.

The nearest major airport is Madrid Barajas, 200 km east. Salamanca Matacan Airport, 15 km from town, has only occasional summer flights, for example to Mallorca via Air Nostrum (an Iberia subsidiary). From Madrid Chamartín, Alvia trains run every couple of hours, taking 1 hr 40 min via Segovia Guiomar; slower services from Madrid Príncipe Pío via El Escorial and Ávila take up to 3 hours.

The main station is 1 km northeast of the centre, small but modern, with cafes and a car-rental office but no left luggage. Bus 1 from outside goes to the old centre; Bus 11 runs west along Paseo de San Vicente to the hospital and university medical campus. A secondary stop, Salamanca La Alamedilla, is 500 m southwest and useful for shortening the walk in, but eastbound trains cannot be boarded there.

Monbus runs hourly from Madrid Estación Sur (3 hours, via Moncloa and Ávila); five daily services also start from Madrid Airport T4 and T1. Avanza runs from Valladolid every two hours (90 min). One Alsa service crosses the country north–south, connecting A Coruña, Santiago de Compostela, Pontevedra, Vigo, Ourense and Zamora with Salamanca before continuing south overnight.

Food is meat-heavy — ribs, chorizo, jamón, panceta, jeta — though several places offer a decent vegetarian choice. Tapas bars line Van Dyck, 1 km north of Plaza Mayor. Mesón Cervantes is a traditional restaurant at