|
|
 |
Extract from the El Escorial Travel Guides:
The monastery of
EL ESCORIAL
was the largest Spanish building of the Renaissance: rectangular, overbearing and severe, from the outside it more resembles a prison than a palace. Built between 1563 and 1584, it was originally the creation of Juan Bautista de Toledo, though his one-time assistant,
Juan de Herrera
, took over and is normally given credit for the design.
Felipe II
planned the complex as both monastery and mausoleum, where he would live the life of a monk and "rule the world with two inches of paper". Later monarchs had less ascetic lifestyles, enlarging and richly decorating t...
read the whole El Escorial Travel Guides...
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|