History of Madrid "Madrid" evolved from the Mozarabic "Matrit", which is still in the Madrilenian gentilic. The site of modern-day Madrid has been controlled since prehistoric times, and archaeological research found a small Visigothic village nearby. In the mid-9th century, Muhammad I of Córdoba constructed a small castle where the Palacio Real stands today. The Moors built a citadel, al-Mudayna, around this castle. They named the area after the nearby Manzanares River, which the Muslims called al-Majrīṭ (Arabic: "source of water"). From this came the name "Majerit", later spelled "Madrid". The Moors controlled the citadel until Alfonso VI of León and Castile conquered
Cercanías Madrid Madrid as bedroom communities only started in the late 1960s, in two different parts of the metropolitan area: The main Madrid-Zaragoza-Barcelona line followed the valley of the Henares river, going through the important town of Alcalá de Henares to Guadalajara and Zaragoza. The towns around the line (Coslada, San Fernando de Henares, Torrejón de Ardoz, Alcalá itself) and some suburbs within the city of Madrid (Vallecas Villa, Vicálvaro) started to grow large bedroom communities, which relied heavily in the railway for commuting to Madrid. At the same time, the former rural towns of Alcorcón, Móstoles, Leganés, Fuenlabrada and Getafe (and