From high above the Castilian meseta, a swallow gliding and wheeling in and out in search of food or shelter or friends might see a clump of buildings, then wide open space, then more clumps, then more space, the occasional river or wetlands, the inevitable church steeples at the heart of the clumps, with dwellings and a town hall huddled around them, and large or small squares where, if the bird swooped low, it might see people going about their business, lingering to talk, fingering the merchandise. Some towns were more beautiful than others, richer, more important, but they all had the same elements, noises, smells, purpose. There was probably some sort of wall, or there had been at some point. There were shrines scattered about the outlying countryside, among the fields, along the roads leading to neighboring towns and villages and then to the city. There were mills on the riverside, poorer neighborhoods on the outskirts. The local aristocrat might have a grand home in the town, or an estate outside. The kingdom was a body, according to the old commonplace, and each of these iterations, each of its parts, echoed the meaning and organization of the whole.