Touring the Realejo and Albaicín

Like I mentioned, the other day we toured the area surrounding the Centro de Lenguas Modernas. However, it turns out I was wrong in thinking we had gone through the Albaicín - we hit the very beginning of it, but most of the area we looked at was the Realejo. Just as the Albaicín was once the Muslim quarter of Granada, the Realejo was the Jewish quarter. One major landmark we looked at was the Iglesia de Santo Domingo. It's a beautiful church, but its presence in the originally Jewish space carries some dark overtones from the time of the Inquisition.

When Ferdinand and Isabella conquered the last Moorish territory in Granada, they turned to ensuring that Spain would be thoroughly Christian, using cruel measures; Muslims and Jews were forced to convert or otherwise face exile, imprisonment, or worse. Our guide told us that the very space where the Iglesia de Santo Domingo is now was originally a synagogue, which was destroyed and replaced with the church. For the Christians who came to power in Granada, doing this was a way of sending the message that there would be no place for Jews in the new Spain.

The Iglesia is quite serene now, yet at the same time it's a reminder of a very tumultuous time in Spanish history. Anyway, here's some photos of it, along with the rest of the tour.