Boadilla del Monte

History

The placename could come from the Arabic "Boadil-la", showing a Saracen domain of the territory. Another option is that the name comes from "boa", word that in the 13th century meant "rush-like plant". In the 15th century, the Catholic Monarchs gave Don. Andrés Cabrera and his wife, Doña Beatriz de Boadilla, the noble rank of Count and Countess of Chinchón, being Boadilla part of their territory. The "Señorío de Boadilla del Monte" had owners such as the Count of Toreno and the Marquess of Mirabal. Doña Josefa de Mirabal, 3rd Marchioness of Mirabal, had the permission of Castilla's Council to sell this señorío to the Infante Don Luis, who ordered Ventura Rodriguez, a neoclassic architect, to restyle the old Palace of the Two Towers. In the middle of the 19th century, Boadilla added to its municipal limits the old municipality of Romanillos, with only 30 inhabitants. The town –at that time little more than a village– was the scene of a fierce battle in December 1936 in which the International Brigades (including Winston Churchill's nephew, Esmond Romilly) fought to defend Madrid against Franco's insurgent army. The battle lasted three days, during which most of Romilly's British comrades were killed.

Geography

The municipality is located at an altitude of 682 MSL, in a terrain crossed by creeks, as well as the Guadarrama river. In it we can find big areas of holm oaks and pine trees. Although it has a varied topography, the slope is smooth, generally S.W. oriented. The municipality is located to the west of Madrid, and shares borders with Majadahonda to the north, Villaviciosa de Odón and Alcorcón to the south, Pozuelo de Alarcón to the east, and Villanueva de la Cañada and Brunete to the west. Almost all municipality's terrain is lower Miocene soil, classified inside the "samartiense". It is composed of limestone, marl and gypsum. * Average annual temperature: 13,6 °C * Average annual precipitation: 500,5 m³ between March and December. The main winds come from the S.W., and the climate is temperate: the average temperature in January (the coldest month) is 5 °C; and in July (the hottest month), it is 24,1 °C. * Rivers: Guadarrama, Aulencia. * Creeks: Calabozo, Las Pueblas, Valenoso, Prado Grande, Los Pastores, Los Mojuelos. Holm oaks, pine trees, oaks, ash trees...

Most-observed species

• Eurasian Magpie

  Pica pica (Linnaeus, 1758) · Aves
  38,416
• Common Wood-Pigeon

  Columba palumbus Linnaeus, 1758 · Aves
  35,433
• House Sparrow

  Passer domesticus (Linnaeus, 1758) · Aves
  32,614
• Eurasian Blackbird

  Turdus merula Linnaeus, 1758 · Aves
  31,983
• Monk Parakeet

  Myiopsitta monachus (Boddaert, 1783) · Aves
  27,597
• Spotless Starling

  Sturnus unicolor Temminck, 1820 · Aves
  26,731
• Rock Pigeon

  Columba livia J.F.Gmelin, 1789 · Aves
  24,833
• Great Tit

  Parus major Linnaeus, 1758 · Aves
  22,229

Most recent

• M 3.4 — 2013-11-05
  2 km SSE of Alcorcón, Spain
• M 2.6 — 2008-06-21
  7 km SW of Guadalix de la Sierra, Spain
• M 3.5 — 2008-05-06
  5 km E of Tembleque, Spain
• M 2.9 — 2008-04-28
  Spain
• M 4.1 — 2008-04-28
  4 km ENE of Tembleque, Spain
• M 3.2 — 2008-02-26
  1 km NE of Tembleque, Spain