GUADALAJARA

guadalajara, the capital of the spanish province of guadalajara, on the left bank of the river henares, and on the madrid-saragossa railway, 35 m. e.n.e. of madrid. pop. (1900) 11,144. guadalajara is a picturesque town, occupying a somewhat sterile plain, 2100 ft. above the sea. a roman aqueduct and the roman foundations of the bridge built in 1758 across the henares bear witness to its antiquity. under roman and visigothic rule it was known as _arriaca_ or _caraca_; its present name, which sometimes appears in medieval chronicles as _godelfare_, represents the _wad-al-hajarah_, or "valley of stones," of the moors, who occupied the town from 714 until 1081, when it was captured by alvar yanez de minaya, a comrade of the more famous cid. the church of santa maria contains the image of the "virgin of battles," which accompanied alphonso vi. of castile (1072-1109) on his campaigns against the moors; and there are several other ancient and interesting churches in guadalajara, besides two palaces, dating from the 15th century, and built with that blend of christian and moorish architecture which spaniards call the _mudejar_ style. the more important of these is the palace of the ducal house del infantado, formerly owned by the mendoza family, whose _panteon_, or mausoleum, added between 1696 and 1720 to the 13th-century church of san francisco, is remarkable for the rich sculpture of its tombs. the town and provincial halls date from 1585, and the college of engineers was originally built by philip v., early in the 18th century, as a cloth factory. manufactures of soap, leather, woollen fabrics and bricks have superseded the original cloth-weaving industry for which guadalajara was long celebrated; there is also a considerable trade in agricultural produce. guadalquivir (ancient _baetis_, moorish _wadi al kebir_, "the great river"), a river of southern spain. what is regarded as the main stream rises 4475 ft. above sea-level between the sierra de cazorla and sierra del pozo, in the province of jaen. it does not become a large river until it is joined by the guadiana menor (guadianamenor) on the left, and the guadalimar on the right. lower down it receives many tributaries, the chief being the genil or jenil, from the left. the general direction of the river is west by south, but a few miles above seville it changes to south by west. below coria it traverses the series of broad fens known as las marismas, the greatest area of swamp in the iberian peninsula. here it forms two subsidiary channels, the western 31 m., the eastern 12 m. long, which rejoin the main stream on the borders of the province of cadiz. below sanlucar the river enters the atlantic after a total course of 360 m. it drains an area of 21,865 sq. m. though the shortest of the great rivers of the peninsula, it is the only one which flows at all seasons with a full stream, being fed in winter by the rains, in summer by the melted snows of the sierra nevada. in the time of the moors it was navigable up to cordova, but owing to the accumulation of silt in its lower reaches it is now only navigable up to seville by vessels of 1200 to 1500 tons.