Morella: gates, arcades and the castle: a self-guided walk

By Alleytale

The walls, the arcaded streets and the castle summit

Morella's gates, towers and arcaded streets sit on a hill that kings, armies and Carlist generals fought over, and every lane climbs toward the castle on its rock.

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The stops

1. 1Sant Mateu Gate

   This gate in the southern stretch of the walls is described as one of Morella's most emblematic and as the direct way in from the coast. It was built in the second half of the 13th century and restored in the 1960s. It has three levels: the first connects with the wall walk to the Torre Beneito, the second with the one that leads to the Torre de Fredes, and the top is finished with semicircular windows and a roof of Arab tiles.

   

2. 2Blasco de Alagón Street, La Plaça

   Blasco de Alagón Street is the best-known street in Morella, called La Plaça by the locals because a market has been held here since the Middle Ages. Dozens of medieval arcades line it, sheltering the houses behind from the cold Morella winters. It shares its name with Blasco de Alagón, the lord who led the Christian forces that took Morella in 1232 and issued the town's first settlement charter the year after.

   

3. 3Plaza de los Estudios

   This square is known for the facades and balconies of its houses and for the large sundial in its centre. When the Sexenni comes round, the festival held every six years in honour of the Virgin of Vallivana, the pilgrims bringing her image from her shrine make their entry by the Pla dels Estudis. The town council decided in 1673 to give thanks in this way every six years, after an epidemic.

   

4. 4Convent of Saint Francis

   The Franciscan convent at the foot of the castle was founded on 17 May 1272, and its cloister was finished by the end of that century. In the chapter house, the Sala de Profundis, a Gothic fresco of the Dance of Death from the 15th century survives. Morella's tourism leaflet calls it one of the few examples of medieval macabre art in the Mediterranean.

   

5. 5Basilica of Santa Maria la Major

   The church was built between 1265 and 1343 but was not finished until 1593, when Gaspar Punter, bishop of Tortosa and a Morella native, consecrated it. Its only two entrances are the Gothic side doors, the larger Door of the Apostles and the smaller Door of the Virgins, and inside the raised choir sits unusually far down the nave, in the second-to-last bay, reached by a spiral stair. During the Western Schism Pope Benedict XIII held pontifical services here, and in 1958 the church was raised to a minor basilica.

   

6. 6Town Hall of Morella

   This civil Gothic building has served as Morella's town hall since the 15th century and won the Europa Nostra award for its restoration in 1997. Its two Gothic halls, the Consell and the Justícia, are where the town's laws were made and its courts held. The two pairs of giants of Morella, the Christians and the Moors, usually stand in its entrance.

   

7. 7Sant Miquel Towers

   These twin towers with octagonal bases, 23.7 metres high and crowned with battlements, form the main entrance to Morella; sources date them to the 14th or 15th century. In front of the gate stands a replica of the town's stone cross, which recalls the 1414 meeting in Morella of Pope Luna, Saint Vincent Ferrer and Ferdinand of Antequera. The original cross is kept in the council hall of the town hall.

   

8. 8Nevera Gate

   The Nevera gate, north of the old town, takes its name from a medieval ice house, a nevera, where ice and food were once kept nearby. Built in the 14th century and restored in the 1960s and again late in the 20th century, it has twin rectangular towers joined by a double pointed arch. It is more modest than the town's other entrances, and a stretch of the wall walk links it to the Sant Miquel gate.

   

9. 9Morella Castle

   The castle crowns a rock roughly 1,070 metres above sea level, a fortress of Islamic origin whose buildings were fitted out for Christian kings after the Reconquista. The story goes that it was breached only twice: by betrayal at the conquest, and by Carlists under Cabrera, who slipped in through the overhanging latrines of the wall in 1838. Legend says the French hanged Josefa Bosch, known as la Pardala, from one of its towers, which now bears her name.

   

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