The Parador de Oropesa, also known as Virrey de Toledo, is a four-star Parador hotel located in the town of Oropesa, in the province of Toledo, in the autonomous community of Castile-La Mancha, Spain. It was converted over a number of years from two of the buildings forming the compound of the (Oropesa Castle). The Parador is located both in the Palacio Viejo (Old Palace), also known as the Palacio Doña Elvira, which dates from the end of the 14th century, and in the (New Palace), also known as the Palacio de los Álvarez de Toledo, which was built in the 16th century.
The two palaces were the residence of the (Counts of Oropesa), part of the noble family of the (House of Toledo). The family died out in the early 19th century and the castle and palaces were inherited by the Duque de Frías (Dukes of Frías). In the early 20th century the buildings passed into public ownership, serving as a school, housing for the Guardia Civil (Civil Guard), a theatre, the municipal slaughterhouse, and storage for grain, while the central courtyard served as a bullring and as a location for local entertainment and festivities.
In 1929 part of the New Palace was converted into one of the earliest Paradores, the first to be constructed within a pre-existing historical building, with nine bedrooms and space for 19 guests. Much expanded since, into both the New and Old Palaces, it is now one of the most popular venues in the Parador chain.
The original buildings and their early history The Parador de Oropesa is established within the complex of the castle of Oropesa. The castle complex consists of four attached major buildings: two castles and two palaces, together known as the Palacio Condal (Comital Palace). The Castillo Viejo (Old Castle) or Patio Musulmán (Muslim Courtyard) dates from the 12th and 13th centuries and the Castillo Nuevo (New Castle) from the 14th and 15th centuries. The Parador is situated in the two palaces, the Palacio Viejo (Old Palace) of the 15th century, and the Palacio Nuevo (New Palace) built in the 16th century.
Beginnings The castle at Oropesa was built first as a watchtower on a hilltop to control the transit of livestock. It was built by the Vettones, an Iron Age pre-Roman people of the Iberian Peninsula. Later the Romans built another tower there to control the road they had built between the cities of Toledo and Mérida. They also built an inn to serve travellers, provide horse supplies and house military detachments. The Muslim occupation of Iberia, begun in the year 711, saw the building of a much larger fortress on the remains of the ancient Roman castellum. Two circular towers of Arab origin remain as part of the later fortifications."Un castillo de origen árabe", Parador Museo: Oropesa, Paradores de Turismo de España S A, Madrid, 2010.
Crown ownership
King Alfonso VI de León y Castilla captured Toledo in 1085. Oropesa and the Muslim-built castle came under his control. His descendant Alfonso X de Castilla gifted the town to its citizens, and Alfonso's son, Juan de Castilla rewarded the Oropesa nobles for their loyalty with further fortifications and the building of a town wall in 1321. In 1366 Enrique II de Castilla granted the lordship of Oropesa to García Álvarez de Toledo as a reward for supporting him in the war against Pedro el Cruel."Mansión del virrey de Perú", Parador Museo: Oropesa, Paradores de Turismo de España S A, Madrid, 2010.
Aristocratic ownership and the first palace García Álvarez de Toledo's son, Fernán Álvarez de Toledo y Zúñiga, the second lord of Oropesa, with his wife Elvira de Ayala, lady of Cebolla,A Franco Silva, "Oropesa: el nacimiento de un señorío Toledano a fines del siglo xiv", Anuario de Estudios Medievales, 15, (1985), pp299-314. built the first palace and enlarged the castle at the end of the 14th century. This palace, on the north side of the castle complex and abutting the castle, is a Mudéjar-Gothic building with a long hall room on the upper floor approached from the courtyard by a wide stone interior staircase. The hall was embellished by a polychrome wooden coffered ceiling decorated with the coat of arms of the Álvarez de Toledo family and those of other families connected by marriage. A mirador (lookout point) was built onto the hall, as an internal balcony or loggia open to the air with four foliated Gothic arches. The exterior arch spandrels displayed three coats of arms, one being of the Álvarez family and the other two of the Zúñiga family."Sabores del campo Arañuelo", Parador Museo: Oropesa, Paradores de Turismo de España S A, Madrid, 2010. Plateresque details were added to the first palace in the 16th century. The building came to be known as the Palacio Doña Elvira and the viewpoint as the Mirador de Doña Elvira. The front of the building, and the viewpoint, faces the northwest and looks over the extensive flat valley of the Rio Tiétar, which flows through the Campo Arañuelo, and beyond that the fertile foothills of La Vera and the Sierra de Gredos.
In 1477 the Álvarez de Toledo male line was elevated from lords to counts by Isabel la Católica as thanks for Álvarez support in the War of the Castilian Succession against Afonso V of Portugal. They became the (Counts of Oropesa).
The New Palace In the 16th century, the Counts of Oropesa built the New Palace. There is a difference of opinion as to whether the architect was Juan de Herrera (1530-1597) or his closest disciple Francisco de Mora (1552-1610)."Aires góticos y renacentistas", Parador Museo: Oropesa, Paradores de Turismo de España S A, Madrid, 2010. They are known to have worked together on a number of prominent Spanish buildings, including the Alcázar of Segovia and El Escorial, so it is possible they collaborated in the design of the New Palace.
Grander than the Old Palace, this building was designed in the style of the (Spanish Renaissance). Situated roughly at right-angles to the Old Palace it faced west-southwest. The main façade was elongated, symmetrical, predominantly flat and unusually high. Built of stone with occasional red brick infill, two full length stone belt courses divided the façade horizontally into three sections. Internally there were three floors with mezzanines, producing some peculiarities in the fenestration pattern. Most prominently, there were seven wrought-iron balconies, served by full-height glazed doors, in a row above the first of the stone string courses. The balconies retain their original metalwork."El balcón de Alfonso XIII", Parador Museo: Oropesa, Paradores de Turismo de España S A, Madrid, 2010. All the windows were framed with plain, monumental dressed stone and capped by red brick arches.
At roof level six large rectilinear chimneys were visually situated above and between the seven vertical window alignments. To the right of the façade was an octagonal ground-based structure of two double-height storeys to the height of the second belt course. It was built of padded ashlar stone and the second storey featured large windows crowned by triangular pediments on each of the seven faces. The eighth face connected with the southern corner of the main building. The upper storey was known as El Peinador de la Duquesa (the Duchess's dressing room)."El peinador de la Duquesa", Parador Museo: Oropesa, Paradores de Turismo de España S A, Madrid, 2010. Unfinished stonework on the northern corner of the palace shows that a similar matching structure was to have been built there. The main entrance of the New Palace was centred in the building. Wide enough for a carriage, it led straight through the ground floor of the palace into the courtyard in front of the castle.
The rear of the New Palace, facing the castle, had none of the symmetry or style of the frontal façade. It was more complex in presentation, with a number of blocks of differing dimensions projecting eastwards, and northwards to connect with the western end of the Old Palace. Some of the windows on the rear side are framed with red brick, with brick fans forming the lintel. Others are surrounded with plain dressed stone in a similar way to the windows on the façade.
To the south of the New Palace a further wing projected eastward, reached by a corridor extended from the gallery behind the New Palace. It housed a church where the counts and their families worshipped from a private gallery. This wing also contained service areas including kitchens, staff bedrooms, haylofts and stables."La inglesia del palacio", Parador Museo: Oropesa, Paradores de Turismo de España S A, Madrid, 2010. It has since been demolished.
The rear of the New and Old Palaces had an L-shaped double-height open gallery, supported by 32 Ionic stone columns, facing onto the courtyard. At the central corner of the gallery the Old Palace's semi-exterior staircase emerged at the upper level, having risen from the ground floor at the rear of the New Palace. The gallery gave its name to the central courtyard which became known as el patio de las galerías.María José Rodríguez Pérez, "Parador de Oropesa (Toledo)", La red de Paradores: Arquitectura e historia del turismo 1911-1951, Turner y Paradores de Turismo de España, Madrid, 2018, .
Internally, the New Palace was laid out in a similar way to most aristocratic houses of the time, with interconnecting rooms in a corridor formation, allowing visual communication from one end of the building to the other, both on the floor housing the reception and ceremonial rooms, and on the floors above housing the bedrooms. On the first floor above the ground floor a large room, built as an apothecary, was the transitional space between the Old and New Palaces. Just off it was a medieval tower dating from the Arab period which became part of the palatial complex when the two palaces were conjoined."La antigua botica", Parador Museo: Oropesa, Paradores de Turismo de España S A, Madrid, 2010.
Some unfinished external construction areas show the New Palace remained incomplete, though occasional building improvements and changes were carried out over subsequent years. The 5th Count of Oropesa, some time after 1619, began an elevated walkway into the town from the New Palace. A series of brick arches was built, leading to the parish Church of Our Lady of the Assumption, so the countess and her suite could leave the palace and attend mass without having to mix with townspeople. On the count's death in 1621 the project was unfinished and remained that way as the widowed countess abandoned Oropesa for the court in Madrid.Andrew Ayers, "Overarching ambition: Two houses, Oropesa, Spain by Parades Pedrosa Arquitectos", The Architectural Review, EMAP Publishing, London, England, 21 February 2018.
For nearly another 200 years the castle and palaces remained in the hands of the Álvarez family. Over four centuries the family had hosted celebrated figures at the palace, including Carlos I of Spain, later Holy Roman Emperor, and San Pedro de Alcántara, whose cell has been preserved by the Parador. The involvement of the Counts of Oropesa in political and military activities established the castle as an important centre of support and at other times of resistance. In 1808 the castle and palaces were sacked by French troops during the Peninsular War.
At the beginning of the 19th century the lineage of Álvarez de Toledo died out and the lordship passed to the citizens of Oropesa. Soon after, the Duques de Frías, who claimed descent from the Counts of Oropesa, succeeded in taking over the castle. The new nobles found the palace to be in a very dilapidated condition. The last aristocratic owner of the complex was José Bernardino Fernández de Velasco, the fifteenth Duque de Frías. On the duke's death in 1888 the castle and palaces, still in poor condition, were sold to Enrique Gutiérrez de Salamanca and Ruffo de Gambert, who raised mortgages on the two palaces in order to buy them.
Castle and palaces under the ownership of Oropesa