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Almanzora Palace

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Drax:
The last tears of the Almanzora Palace
The monumental building has just suffered new collapses and is approaching a state of ruin
Imagine that you have before you one of the most representative neoclassical buildings of all that exist in the province of Almería. Situated in front of its imposing and ornate main façade, watch one of its roofs collapse. Then a canopy. Now your balustrade, which is slowly falling in front of you, rushing down your wall to the floor like tears that slide unchecked down a cheek. Stone by stone.

For this to happen to a building that is an architectural paradigm of its time and that is even inscribed in the Andalusian Historical Heritage, it is not necessary to imagine it. This is exactly what has happened - and is happening - with the Palacio del Almanzora, located in the neighbourhood that shares its name, in the municipality of Cantoria.

In semi-ruin
The only difference with the sequence described in the first paragraph, to adjust to the truth, is that this succession of events did not take place suddenly. It has been happening for decades without, so far, no Administration with the possibility to do so has decided to lift a finger.

Declarations and visits? Countless and of all colours. And to honour the topic - which in this case is much more than a topic - those images in front of the collapsed face of the palace have flourished for decades like mushrooms every time the electoral campaigns have arrived.

It is true that the private nature of part of the monumental palace has not made things easier, but neither has there been the necessary insistence on the part of the supra-municipal administrations, who have played to put off the few who today continue to show their faces for him, as is the case of the association 'Salvemos el Palacio del Almanzora' or the City Council, which in previous years has tried to encircle this situation. In vain. The historic rooms in which, for example, the Guadix-Almendricos railway line was forged and which ended up passing through Almanzora instead of Los Vélez because the almighty Marquis Antonio Abellán Peñuela, it was better for him (where is it going to stop) that the station was located near the door of his house.

It is just an anecdote that is as much a part of the palace's history as its architecture. And it will be precisely that, oral history, the only thing that remains alive if you do not act quickly. Because just a few weeks ago a lintel and one of the windows on the main façade collapsed . Two new tears within an incessant crying for centuries and that only some of their neighbours hear - really.

The recent purchase by the provincial administration of Cortijo del Fraile shows that when you want, you can. However, in this case the architectural urgency is even greater, since it is where its main value lies, beyond the conspiracies that were hatched in it.

Responsibility
That said, not all the burden should fall on the political inaction of the Junta or the central government. Civil society must also reconsider. Except for the previously mentioned exceptions, for decades no one has raised their voices in the palace, except the usual ones. A monument that should have a whole region behind it but that remains only as it appears in the photographs.

And so, the moment that nobody wants to imagine is getting closer and closer. That day in which, with the unrecoverable palace and practically on the ground, the tributes arrive, the photographic exhibitions of what one day was and those of what one day could be. Perhaps those who could do something, even if it was only to raise their voices as a servant, and they did not speak about him excitedly. Meanwhile, the Almanzora Palace continues dying with its last tears in the form of ruins that will never return to it.

A statement of Opinion by GUILLERMO MIRÓN for LaVoz de Almeria - 17th July 2021

Judi_bk:
This is so sad.  They had a fund raising campaign some years ago but nothing much else has hapoened

Roscoe:
If this was restored just think of the money it could bring to the area.  This is Spain!

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