Besides relevant Arabic remains — such as 70 meters’
worth of wall, or the medieval
homes that bring the origin of
Madrid forward in time — the
digs around the Royal Palace
have unearthed a burial site
with well-preserved remains
and a granite staircase corresponding to the building of the
Royal Armory of Felipe II, the
monarch who made Madrid his
kingdom’s capital in 1561.
At House 1, as the experts
are calling it, under the square
separating the armory from the
cathedral, archeologists found
a skeleton. This is “the only
Visigoth vestige found in the
city,” says Andréu. It belongs to
a man who lived here around
the eighth century, according
to two carbon-dating measurements. Diggers nicknamed him
“Valentín” because he was
found on February 14, 2009.
This man died at age 25,
probably after a tough life. His
bones show signs of osteoarthritis, the wearing out of the
joints typical of someone who
has frequently carried heavy
weights around. His feet were
missing, probably having been
severed after death when a
dump was built near his grave
in medieval times, later to become the site of a house.
Valentín was buried with no
goods, which has lead experts
to believe that he died of natural causes as he walked
through an area that would
one day be Madrid, but which
at that point was nothing more
than open fields.
SOURCE: EL PAIS IN ENGLISH.
No comments:
Post a Comment