World Heritage Sites: A Rich and Varied Window into Spanish History and Culture

Wherever you travel in Spain, don’t forget to look up and visit some of the country’s 40 locations on the UNESCO World Heritage List of sites of “outstanding universal value.”

Visiting these sites yields a fascinating panorama of Spanish history, ranging from ancient cave art in Northern Spain to the flamboyant early 20th century Modernist architecture of Catalan Antoni Gaudí. The list also includes five sites selected for their extraordinary natural setting and biodiversity. For a full list with information on each site, visit: http://whc.unesco.org/en/statesparties/es .

The list below offers a selective introduction to the wide variety of options and the town or region where they are located:

Pre-historic sites:
Caves of Altamira and Paleolithic cave art, Santillana del Mar, Cantabria
Sierra de Atapuerca caves, with fossils that are millions of years old, Burgos

Roman sites:
Aqueduct, Segovia
Ancient cities of Tarragona, Catalonia and Mérida, Badajoz, Extremadura

Moorish architecture
Mosque and city center Cordoba
The Alhambra, Granada

Cathedrals and Other Church architecture
Cathedrals of Seville, Burgos
Monasteries of Poblet, Catalonia and El Escorial, Madrid province
Romanesque churches of Valle de Boi, Catalonia

Natural sites
Donana National Park, Huelva and Seville provinces, Andalusia
Garajonay and Tiede National Parks, Canary Islands

Mixed sites
Island of Ibiza, Balearic Islands, with Phoenician ruins, coastal and marine ecosystems
Pyrenees region, near French border, for mountain landscape and traditional way of life

Modernist architecture
Works of Antoni Gaudí, including Güell Park, Sagrada Familia Cathedral and several houses, Barcelona