Archive of the Indies: what it is and why it is in Seville

A building designed for trade

Compared with the Gothic exuberance of the Cathedral, the Casa Lonja is strikingly sober: cubic volumes, stone and brick, balustrades and pinnacles with hardly any ornament. It is the same severe classical language Juan de Herrera used at El Escorial.

That restraint made sense: it was a working building, designed for contracts, valuations and signatures. Walking its galleries with this in mind helps you picture the comings and goings of the merchants who sustained the city’s economy.

Why it matters

Much of what we know about the Spanish presence in the Americas comes from the documents kept here: maps, letters, lawsuits, passenger lists and royal accounts. Researchers from all over the world still consult them.

For travellers, the Archive also has a very Sevillian value: it completes the triangle with the Cathedral and the Alcázar. If the Cathedral speaks of religious power and the Alcázar of royal power, the old exchange speaks of trade, the engine that made Seville one of the richest cities in Europe in the 16th century.

Why it is in Seville

After 1503, Seville held the monopoly on trade with the Americas through the House of Trade (Casa de la Contratación). Merchants, bankers and navigators did business in the city for generations, literally on the steps of the Cathedral, which the chapter eventually found unacceptable.

The solution was to build an exchange: a building for trade beside the Cathedral. Centuries later, once trade had moved to Cádiz, that building became the place to gather the scattered documents about the Indies.

What to see nearby

It stands between the Cathedral and the Real Alcázar. To follow the thread of the Seville of the Indies, walk down to El Arenal, the old port district.