Puerta de Alcántara

The Alcantara Gate (Spanish: Puerta de Alcántara) is a city gate located in Toledo, in Castile-La Mancha, Spain. It gives access to the interior of the historic center of the city, passing through its eastern side the surrounding wall. It is in front of the bridge called Puente de Alcántara, that crosses the Tagus river and that in turn is protected by two gates fortified in its ends.

Of Arab origin, it dates from around the 10th century, although important modifications were made during the Christian era. It had great relevance in the defense of the city during the Middle Ages, to be the place through which people and goods entered.

The gate is a gateway in a bend, typical of Hispanic-Muslim military engineering, and its main consists of a horseshoe arch located between two square towers and crenellated with arrowslits on its sides.

Text adapted from “Puerta de Alcántara” on Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0.

Puerta de Alcántara ranks #143 of 6,412 worldwide in the atlas's castle fame ranking, and #33 of the 433 mapped in Spain. Founded c. 950, it is older than 95% of the atlas's dated landmarks — one of 76 atlas entries founded in the 10th century. See how Spain compares in the castle statistics.

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Read the full history on Wikipedia ↗