Palace sights in Granada
- Sort by:
- Popular
-
A
Palacio Nazaríes
This is the Alhambra's true gem, the most brilliant Islamic building in Europe, with its perfectly proportioned rooms and courtyards, intricately moulded stucco walls, beautiful tiling, fine carved wooden ceilings and elaborate stalactite-like muqarnas vaulting, all worked in mesmerising, symbolic, geometrical patterns. Arabic inscriptions proliferate in the stuccowork.
The Mexuar, through which you normally enter the palace, dates from the 14th century and was used as a council chamber and antechamber for audiences with the emir. The public would have gone no further.
From the Mexuar you pass into the Patio del Cuarto Dorado, a courtyard where the emirs gave audiences, wi…
reviewed
-
B
Palacio de los Leones
The Palacio de los Leones is one of the most stunning structures within the Alhambra, and according to some, the royal harem. It was built in the second half of the 14th century under Mohammed V, at the political and artistic peak of Granada's emirate. The rooms of the palace surround Alhambra's most popular symbol, the Patio de los Leones (Lion Courtyard), a marble fountain that channelled water through the mouths of 12 carved marble lions.
Carved especially for this palace, the fountain was originally brightly painted, chiefly in gold, but the originals are now being replaced by copies. The patio's four water channels, running to and from the central fountain, represent…
reviewed
-
C
Palacio de Comares
This fabulous palacio was originally built by Emir Yusuf I, and thereafter served as the private residence for the ruler. It's built around the Patio de los Arrayanes (Patio of the Myrtles), and named after the hedges surrounding its rectangular pool and fountains. The rooms along the sides may have been quarters for the emir's many wives. Finely carved arches atop marble pillars form porticos at both ends of the patio.
Through the northern portico, inside the Torre de Comares (Comares Tower), is the Sala de la Barca (Hall of the Blessing) from the Arabic al-baraka for blessing, a word endlessly carved on the walls. This room leads into the square Salón de Comares (Comare…
reviewed
-
D
Generalife
The name Generalife means 'Architect's Garden', and this soothing composition of pathways, patios, pools, fountains, trimmed hedges, tall trees and, in season, flowers of every imaginable hue, is the perfect place to end an Alhambra visit.
The Muslim rulers' summer palace is in the corner furthest from the entrance. Within the palace, the Patio de la Acequia (Court of the Water Channel) has a long pool framed by flowerbeds and 19th-century fountains, whose shapes sensuously echo the arched porticos at each end. Off this patio is the Jardín de la Sultana (Sultana's Garden), with the trunk of a 700-year-old cypress tree, where Abu al-Hasan supposedly caught his lover, Zoray…
reviewed
-
E
Patio del Cuarto Dorado
You pass into this courtyard from the Mexuar, with a small fountain and the Cuarto Dorado (Golden Room) on the left. This patio was where the emirs would give audiences to their subjects. The Cuarto Dorado takes its name from its beautiful wooden ceiling, which was gilded and redecorated in the time of the Catholic Monarchs. On the other side of the patio is the entrance to the Palacio de Comares through a beautiful façade of glazed tiles, stucco and carved wood.
reviewed
-
Night Visits
The Palacio Nazaríes is open for night visits. Tickets cost the same as daytime tickets: the ticket office opens 30 minutes before the palace's opening time, closing 30 minutes after it. You can book ahead for night visits in the same ways as for day visits.
reviewed
-
F
Palacio de Dar-al-Horra
Down a short lane is the 15th-century Palacio de Dar-al-Horra, a romantically dishevelled mini-Alhambra that was home to the mother of Boabdil, Granada’s last Muslim ruler.
reviewed
-
G
Palacio de Carlos V
This huge Renaissance palace sticks out like a sore thumb in the Alhambra, because it clashes spectacularly with the style of its surroundings; were it in a different setting its merits would be more readily appreciated. Begun in 1527 by Pedro Machuca, an architect from Toledo who studied under Michelangelo, it was financed, perversely, from taxes on the Granada area's Morisco (converted Muslim) population.
Funds dried up after the Moriscos rebelled in 1568, and the palace remained roofless until the early 20th century. The main (western) façade features three porticos divided by pairs of fluted columns, with bas-relief battle carvings at their feet. The building is squar…
reviewed
