1. Palace of Charles V2. Apartments of Emperor Charles V: Queen’s Rooms and Closet3. Church of Santa María de la Alhambra4. Convent of San Francisco (now Parador Nacional)5. Generalife (Renaissance Gardens)6. Walled precinct (Bastions – Tendilla Cistern – Gate of the Seven Floors and Gate Of Justice)78. Gate of the Pomegranates – Russet Towers and Ravelin9. Plaza Nueva – Chancellery10. Church of Santa Ana11. Castril House12. Monastery of Santa Isabel La Real – Palace of Dar Al-Horra13. Hospital of San Juan de Dios14. Royal Monastery of San Jerónimo15. Cathedral16. The Madrasa17. Ecclesiastical Curia18. Plaza de Bibarrambla, Alcaicería and Zacatín19. Imperial Church of San Matías20. Casa de los Tiros21. Royal Chapel and Merchants’ Exchange
Basin of Charles V
Located near the Gate of Justice, this fountain was made in 1545 to a design by the Italianised Pedro Machuca. With the exception of the added Tendilla arms and some other adornments, it was fashioned by the Genoese Nicolao da Corte, who was working on the reliefs of the Renaissance palace. This offers further proof of the constant cultural exchange between Italy and Spain that characterises the Renaissance in Granada.
Its construction was financed by Don Luis Hurtado de Mendoza, third Count of Tendilla and second Marquess of Mondéjar. Mendoza was Captain-General of the Alhambra from 1515 to 1539.
The three masks on the first tier are decorated with ears of corn, flowers and fruits, and have been interpreted as allegories either of Granada's three rivers, the Darro, the Genil and the Beiro, or of the three productive seasons of the year. At the ends are the Tendilla arms.
The second tier and the semicircular pediment are dedicated to the emperor. The inscription on the second tier reads: "IMPERATORI CAESARI / KAROLO QUINTO / HISPANIARUN REGI" (Emperor Caesar Charles V King of Spain), while the semicircular pediment contains the imperial coat-of-arms with the two-headed eagle and the motto "PLUS OULTRA". The pedestals flanking the inscription contain emblems alluding to the Emperor. On one side are two pillars on the sea enclosing a globe and bearing the motto "Non Plus Oultra", and on the other the linked chain and the flint symbolising the Order of the Golden Fleece, of which he was the sovereign.
The fountain is crowned by the imperial arms and the two-headed eagle, evidencing the hierarchy of power. The governor of the Alhambra, the Count of Tendilla, is at the base, but above him is the King of Spain, who is also the Emperor.
On the stretch of wall against which the basin of the fountain rests are four carved medallions with mythological scenes: Hercules killing the Lernaean Hydra, the twins Phrixus and Helle crossing the Hellespont astride a ram (as an allusion to the Order of the Golden Fleece), Daphne pursued by Apollo, and finally Alexander the Great.
This type of fountain with a basin built against a wall, derived from the trough for watering horses known in Spain as a pilar or pilón, denotes a domestic and/or public use given its strategic location next to the Gate of Justice, one of the main entrances to the precinct of the Alhambra. However, this is surpassed by the cultured discourse deployed across its front, where the rigorous classical order of the architecture is accompanied by allegories in the purest classical tradition to signify the city's three rivers, mythological scenes of a heroic nature in direct allusion to the figure of Emperor Charles V, and the crowning imperial emblem of the two-headed eagle. Together with this are two other emblems specific to the Emperor: the golden fleece, traditional to the House of Burgundy, and the device created for him as the lord of the New World, the "Plus Ultra", associated with the figure of Hercules as the fleece was with the hero Jason.
