Enigmatic architectural or sculptural finds, ghosts and curses… Barcelona is a city full of unsolved mysteries. In the search for answers to these enigmas are some of the most emblematic points of the city. A more “disturbing” way of doing tourism.
The curse of the Liceu
What opera doesn’t have its ghost and curse? The history of this emblematic setting has not been free of cursed legends either. A first fire in 1861, a terrible flood six months later, the anarchist bomb of 1893, which caused twenty deaths, the collapse of its roof in 1945, the second fire in 1994…. Some say that it is the fault of the souls in pain of the monks of the looted and burned convent where its foundations were built…
The skull pierced by a dagger from the Pont del Bisbe
The bridge of Carrer del Bisbe, which joins the Generalitat with the Casa dels Canonges, shows, in its lower part, a skull pierced by a dagger. The reason for its existence and meaning may have to do with the spite of the architect who built it, Joan Rubió i Vellver, a disciple of Gaudí and a fan of modernist symbology, whose architectural plans for the Gothic quarter were cut short.
The magic square of the Sagrada Familia
It is a stone square with 16 number boxes located on the wall before crossing the Passion gate. No matter where you add it, in the combinations of reading your numbers, the result is almost always 33. The urban legend says that it reflects Gaudí’s masonic experience. The cryptogram is actually an invention of Josep Maria Subirach, creator of the sculptures on the Passion façade. The number 33 would respond to the age of the death of Jesus Christ on the cross.
