Salamanca:
Sightseeing

The University of Salamanca is one of the oldest in the world, founded by King Alphonse IX only a short period of time after the Universities of Bologna and Paris. The building you can see today however was built at the time of the catholic kings, and is considered a masterwork of plateresque style. The façade is ornamented with numerous figures, the most famous among them the "frog on a skull", which numerous tourists try to make out - not easy considering the large number of small figures.

In the University's interior certainly the huge Library of 160.000 volumes is the main attraction. Worth visiting is also the staircase with reliefs showing scenes of bullfighting and the customs of students in old times who used to write their names at the façade with bulls blood.
In the center of the square in front of the University there is statue of Fray Luis de Léon, a famous poet and professor who was persecuted by the inquisition. When after years in prison he came back to give lessons, his first words were: "As we mentioned yesterday ..."

In Calle Calderón there is the Unamuno Museum in the building where this poet and rector had his office.

Those statues remind of important historical or legendary figures, who have determined Salamanca's long history of high culture.

Let us start with Caballero Charro, the personification of the salmantinian farmer, who is breeding the bull. His monument is to be found at Plaza de España.

Figures of medieval literature are the lovers Calixto y Melibea, in the "Gardens of the Matchmaker Celestina, where, as legend tells us, they used to meet in secret.

A statue of Saint Teresa of Avila you will find at the square called after her, a statue of famous jurist Padre Vitoria face to face to the Convento de San Esteban where he was living. At the same square lived, by the way, Christopher Columbus for some time. He didn't find open ears for his projects in Salamanca, maybe this is the reason why is monument is not located here but at Plaza de Colón.

Famous authors who lived in Salamanca were Nebrija, whose monument you may visit close to the Church of San Marcos, Gabriel y Galán, at the square called after him and Miguel de Unamuno, close to the Convento de Santa Ursula.

At the end a few more monuments the visitor to Salamanca should not miss:

El Puente Romano, the Roman bridge over the river Tormes, one of the best conserved in all Spain. The House Lis, an outstanding example of the modernist architecture of early 20^th century. And finally the avenue Gran Via, of unique harmony as all the buildings and the beautiful arcades are made of the golden stone from Villamayor.