Santa Maria del Naranco

Ramiro I built this as part of a palace complex around 848, and it was not a church originally but a hall, probably for ceremony and banqueting, with a vaulted lower level and an upper chamber opening at both ends into porticoes with columned arcades. It was converted to a church later, which is why it survived. The style, Asturian pre-Romanesque, developed in the small Christian kingdom that held the north while the rest of the peninsula was under Muslim rule, and it uses barrel vaulting, buttresses and carved medallions with rope-like columns in a way that appears nowhere else. San Miguel de Lillo stands a hundred metres away, part of the same complex, with carved doorjambs showing circus scenes. UNESCO listed them in 1985.

What you actually see

• The upper hall - a vaulted chamber with porticoes at both ends.
• The rope columns - carved twisted shafts unique to the Asturian style.
• The carved medallions - relief panels along the interior walls.
• San Miguel de Lillo - a companion building with carved doorjambs nearby.

When to go

April to June and September to November; both buildings are visited on guided tours at set times and close on Mondays, with shorter winter hours. Asturias is wet in every season.

Honest expectations

Access is by guided visit only at fixed times and the buildings are small, taking about an hour for both. Only part of San Miguel survives, the rest having collapsed. The hillside site is exposed and often wet.

Nearby

Oviedo and its cathedral are three kilometres below; the Camino Primitivo passes through the city.