The Alcazar, like the Cathedral, is another building that's impossible to photograph from within the city. There has been a fort here, at Toledo's highest point, since Roman times, but it's been destroyed and rebuilt so many times that very little remains of the older versions. The fort took on its present shape in the sixteenth century, but that only meant that subsequent versions kept the same design. Its most recent destruction took place in the Spanish Civil War, in 1936. The city of Toledo sided with the Republican government, but the local army supported the rebel Fascists and barricaded themselves in the Alcazar. The city tried for many months to capture the rebels by destroying the building, eventually reducing it to rubble. But the army stayed lodged in tunnels below the rubble, until the Fascists sent additional troops to occupy Toledo and free the remaining Alcazar defenders. The Alcazar was rebuilt by Franco as an exact replica of the destroyed building, and dedicated as a museum to the glory of Fascism. Understandably the fort no longer serves that function in these post-fascist days, but I'm not sure what function it does serve since it was closed for renovation during our visit.