Bellver Castle

Bellver Castle crowns a pine-covered hill about 112 metres high just west of central Palma, and its name, from the medieval Catalan "bell veer", means simply "beautiful view": from the roof you look over the city, the port, the bay and the Serra de Tramuntana. It was built in the first years of the 14th century, between about 1300 and 1311, for James II of Majorca, as a royal residence that could also defend itself. The master best documented in the building accounts is Pere Salvà, who also worked on the Almudaina palace in the city; the stone was quarried from the hill itself, and some of the quarries lie directly under the castle, which has caused cracking over the centuries.

What makes Bellver remarkable is its geometry. It is one of very few circular castles in Europe: a round two-storey building wrapped around a round courtyard, with a large cistern beneath the well-head at its centre. On the ground floor the courtyard is ringed by low round arches; above them runs an elegant Gothic gallery of pointed arches on slender octagonal columns, a combination also found in the royal palaces of Palma and Perpignan. Three towers are attached to the outer wall, pointing east, south and west, while the great keep stands apart to the north, joined to the roof terrace by a stone bridge. A moat and outer works surround the whole. It was meant for court life as much as for war, with a chapel, kitchens, and state rooms under ribbed vaults on the upper floor.

As a fortress it held out against sieges in 1343, when Peter IV of Aragon absorbed the kingdom of Majorca, and in 1391, and was taken only once, in 1521, during the revolt of the Germanies. Its longer career was as a prison. The widow and children of James III were held here after his death in 1349; much later the enlightened minister Gaspar Melchor de Jovellanos spent 1802–1808 inside, and used the time to write the first detailed description of the castle. In 1931 the Spanish Republic handed it, with its forest, to the city of Palma. It opened as a museum in 1932 and now houses the city's history museum, with collections that include archaeological finds and classical sculpture; the courtyard is used for concerts and civic ceremonies.

Palma itself is the capital of the Balearic Islands and the island's main port, and from Bellver the whole city can be read at a glance, from the harbour at Portopí to the old centre.

Getting there

The castle is about 3 km west of central Palma, in the Bellver forest above the Sant Agustí and El Terreno districts. Palma de Mallorca Airport (PMI) is about 10 km away in a straight line. A road climbs to a car park beside the castle, city buses stop at the foot of the hill, and a stairway path leads up through the woods from the forest gate on Carrer del Polvorí in El Terreno.