Museo de las Casas Reales
Dominican Republic · Americas
About
The Museo de las Casas Reales (English: Museum of the Royal Houses) is one of the important cultural monuments built during the colonial era in Hispaniola, now the Dominican Republic. It is located in the Colonial district of Santo Domingo.
It was the Palace of the Real Audiencia of Santo Domingo, called then Edificio de las Casas Reales, and it is the first (oldest) headquarters of Spanish power in the New World.
The building dates back to the sixteenth century, and was built to house the administrative offices of the Spanish colonies in the Americas, at the time any trespassers would be sentenced to death.
It is part of the UNESCO World Heritage Site called Colonial City of Santo Domingo.
Adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA)。Photography via Wikimedia Commons.