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Is St. James Really Buried in Santiago de Compostela, Spain?

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As you head down a curve of the busy San Pedro street, you catch your first view of the twin bell towers of the cathedral of Santiago de Compostela—and you catch your breath. Petite hatchbacks rattle across the cobblestone as your feet seem drawn farther down the path, although that might just be gravity pulling you downhill toward the old zone. You cinch up your backpack’s sternum strap for the final approach of this multiple-night pilgrimage. For not the first time on your Camino, you lose your sense of direction as you enter Santiago’s old town: granite flagstones at your feet, stone-and-graying-plaster houses on either side, and overcast skies above disorient you—yet your eyes eventually lock on to a spray-painted yellow arrow on the side of a building. Once you’re back on autopilot, you start to reflect on why you started this crazy, 70-mile-plus hike in the first place. Rúa de San Pedro, Santiago de Compostela Maybe you hiked from Sarria farther inland as a cheap and hea...
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13 Maps That Explain Galicia

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You may not know it, but I am a HUGE nerd when it comes to maps. On family road trips, I would pass the miles by browsing the jumbo-sized road atlas, and I even memorized the regions and provinces of Spain…for fun. So I thought I would combine my love of maps with my love for Galicia, this unique region in Spain’s northwestern corner. I hope you enjoy staring at these thirteen maps as much as I have! 1) Galicia from space (Source: Wikimedia Commons ) Even in the satellite view you can tell how green and forested Galicia really is—a stark contrast from the Castilian meseta  or flat plateau to the southeast that is mostly covered in rolling plains. 2) The Roman province of Gallaecia (Source: Wikimedia Commons ) By the 1st century BCE, all of the Iberian peninsula had come under Roman rule, and its northwestern corner belonged to the vast imperial province known as Tarraconensis. Years later, during the administrative reforms of Emperor Diocletian (r. 284-305), this r...
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My 10 Favorite Cathedrals in Spain

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Eighty-seven—that’s the number of Catholic cathedrals in Spain today. Although I didn’t grow up Catholic (I’m a Southern Baptist turned Episcopalian), this church nerd managed to visit 26 of Spain’s cathedrals that span a multitude of architectural styles and layouts when I lived in the country from 2012 to 2015. Why cathedrals? There’s nothing intrinsic about a cathedral that automatically makes them big and beautiful; they’re simply home to the cathedra or seat of a bishop. But from the Middle Ages onward, bishops enjoyed great social status, and the churches where they presided reflected this prestige with monumental works of architecture. (Fun fact: Barcelona’s soaring Sagrada Família is not a cathedral, as it is not the seat of the bishop of the diocese of Barcelona). With so many cathedrals to see in Spain, it’s hard to know what to focus on. Below I’ve composed a list of my top ten favorite ones, which includes crowd-favorites like the cathedral of Sevilla as well as of...
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