Torre del Sagrario

You’re standing at the foot of the Torre del Sagrario, one of the most iconic landmarks of old Cádiz, a tower attached to the Church of Santa Cruz, the city’s former cathedral, rising above the Campo del Sur and looking straight out to sea. What you see is a privileged witness to eight centuries of religious and architectural history. The tower in its current form dates from 1692, though its origins may be even older: some say it was once the minaret of the mosque that stood here before the Reconquista, others that it was a Mudejar structure from the thirteenth century. Its sturdy rectangular shape reflects late seventeenth-century architecture, while much of its elegance comes from a major renovation in the mid-eighteenth century by Torcuato Cayón, one of Cádiz’s leading architects and a key figure in the shift from baroque to neoclassical style, who worked on the new cathedral and reshaped this tower to give it the refined look it still has today. And if you happen to be here at dusk, pay attention to the atmosphere along the Campo del Sur: locals say that when night falls and the Atlantic mist begins to rise, a white figure sometimes drifts between the old and new cathedrals, the spirit—so the legend goes—of a sacristan lost at sea during a storm who returned to watch over the two temples that still anchor the spiritual heart of Cádiz.