Plaza del Pilar

Plaza del Pilar is the largest open space in Zaragoza and the point where its religious, civic and social life meet. It is a long, paved rectangle running down towards the Ebro, and three of the city’s main monuments face onto it: the Basilica of Our Lady of the Pillar, the cathedral known as La Seo, and the Renaissance exchange building called La Lonja. Nearby stands the city hall, and a statue of the painter Francisco de Goya, who was born in Aragon and trained in Zaragoza, looks across the square. A large modern fountain, the Fuente de la Hispanidad, is shaped like a map of Latin America and acknowledges the Spanish-speaking world.

The Baroque basilica dominates the plaza, with its tiled domes and towers visible from far along the river. The present building mostly dates from the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries and replaced earlier churches on the site. It is dedicated to the Virgin of the Pillar, the centre of one of Spain’s oldest Marian devotions. Tradition holds that the Virgin appeared to the apostle James while he was preaching in Zaragoza and left him a pillar, which is still venerated in a chapel inside. Goya painted frescoes in the domes as a young man, and the Basilica’s interior is rich with sculpture, altarpieces and gilded decoration. Two bombs that fell through the roof during the Spanish Civil War and failed to explode are displayed inside as a reminder.

The devotion shapes the calendar of the whole city. Each October the plaza fills for the festival of the Virgin of the Pillar, when thousands of people queue to leave flowers in an offering that forms an enormous floral cloak around the Virgin’s image. Outside festival time, the square is a place to sit, meet and watch the day pass, with pigeons, buskers and school groups crossing between the churches.

The plaza is also a good starting point for other parts of the city. The Aljafería Palace, an eleventh-century Islamic palace that later housed kings of Aragon, lies a short distance west, and the narrow streets of the old town known as El Tubo, a lively area for tapas, begin just behind the basilica. The riverbank walkway beside the Ebro gives a good view of the basilica from the Puente de Piedra, the old stone bridge.

The square suits a short stop of an hour or so, longer if you want to go inside the basilica or climb one of its towers. Early evening, when the buildings are lit and the plaza fills with people strolling, is a pleasant time, and visiting is easy on foot from anywhere in the centre of Zaragoza.