Madrid

Sister cities

• San Juan
• Cannes
• Santo Domingo
• Brussels
• Berlin
• New York City
• Tirana
• La Serena
• Sarajevo
• Rio de Janeiro
• Miami
• Damascus

History

The site of modern-day Madrid has been occupied since prehistoric times. There are archaeological remains of the Celtic Carpetani settlement, Roman villas, a Visigoth basilica near the church of Santa María de la Almudena and three Visigoth necropolises near Casa de Campo, Tetuán and Vicálvaro. The first historical document about the existence of an established settlement in Madrid dates from the Muslim age. In the second half of the 9th century, Umayyad Emir Muhammad I built a fortress on a headland near the river Manzanares as one of the many fortresses he ordered built on the border between Al-Andalus and the kingdoms of León and Castile, with the objective of protecting Toledo from Christian attacks from the North and as a starting point for Muslim offensives. After the disintegration of the Caliphate of Córdoba in the early 11th century, Madrid was integrated in the Taifa of Toledo. In the context of the wider campaign for the conquest of the taifa of Toledo initiated in 1079, Madrid was seized in 1083 by Alfonso VI of León and Castile, who sought to use the town as an offensive outpost against the city of Toledo, in turn conquered in 1085. Following the conquest, Christians occupied the centre of the city, while Muslims and Jews were displaced to the suburbs. Madrid, located near Alcalá (under Muslim control until 1118), remained a borderland for a while, suffering a number of razzias during the Almoravid period, and its walls were destroyed in 1110. Madrid was confirmed as villa de (linked to the Crown) in 1123, during the reign of Alfonso VII. The 1123 Charter of Otorgamiento established the first explicit limits between Madrid and Segovia, namely the Puerto de El Berrueco and the Puerto de Lozoya. Beginning in 1188, Madrid had the right to be a city with…

Geography

Madrid lies in the centre of the Iberian peninsula on the southern Meseta Central, 60 kilometres south of the Guadarrama mountain range and straddling the Jarama and Manzanares river sub-drainage basins, in the wider Tagus River catchment area. With an average altitude of , Madrid is the second-highest capital of Europe, after Andorra la Vella. The difference in altitude within the city proper ranges from the around Plaza de Castilla in the north of city to the around La China wastewater treatment plant on the Manzanares' riverbanks, near the latter's confluence with the Fuente Castellana thalweg in the south of the city. The Monte de El Pardo, a protected forested area covering over a quarter of the municipality, reaches its top altitude () on its perimeter, in the slopes surrounding located at the north-western end of the municipality, in the Fuencarral-El Pardo district. The oldest urban core is located on the hills next to the left bank of the Manzanares River. including those to the South West on the right bank of the Manzanares. Madrid has the second highest number of aligned trees in the world, with 248,000 units, only exceeded by Tokyo. Madrid's citizens have access to a green area within a 15-minute walk. Since 1997, green areas have increased by 16%. At present, 8.2% of Madrid's grounds are green areas, meaning that there are of green area per inhabitant, far exceeding the per inhabitant recommended by the World Health Organization. A great bulk of the most important parks in Madrid are related to areas originally belonging to the royal assets (including El Pardo, Soto de Viñuelas, Casa de Campo, El Buen Retiro, la Florida and the Príncipe Pío hill, and the Queen's Casino). The other main source for the "green" areas are the owned by the…

Most-observed species

• Eurasian Magpie

  Pica pica (Linnaeus, 1758) · Aves
  49,743
• Common Wood-Pigeon

  Columba palumbus Linnaeus, 1758 · Aves
  45,835
• House Sparrow

  Passer domesticus (Linnaeus, 1758) · Aves
  41,991
• Eurasian Blackbird

  Turdus merula Linnaeus, 1758 · Aves
  41,548
• Spotless Starling

  Sturnus unicolor Temminck, 1820 · Aves
  36,155
• Monk Parakeet

  Myiopsitta monachus (Boddaert, 1783) · Aves
  33,659
• Rock Pigeon

  Columba livia J.F.Gmelin, 1789 · Aves
  30,378
• Great Tit

  Parus major Linnaeus, 1758 · Aves
  28,919

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