Apple builds flagship store on top of PLAGUE HOSPITAL

Apple has plonked its flagship Madrid store atop the ruins of a 15th century hospital built to care for plague victims.

According to a report in Spanish-language newspaper El Pais, which we ran through Google Translate, the Apple store not only has a load of iGoods "in its basement", but the remnants of the city's old Buen Suceso hospital.

Workers first discovered the ruins while building the store basement and immediately phoned the local council to find out how best to preserve them.

A decision was made to symbolically trace the outline of the walls on the floor of the basement, before covering up the ruins again so fanbois can re-excavate them once Peak Apple has come and gone.

The fruity firm originally suggested leaving a window in the floor, to allow customers to get a glimpse of the ruins. But this scheme was scotched by local planners.

"It's just foundations. The information that they suggest about the shape of the walls is more important," said Jaime Ignacio Muñoz, director of Madrid's heritage department.

Builders also found the ruins of the hospital's church when building a train station in 2009 next to the site of the Apple store, which also contained human remains, so it wasn't entirely unexpected that the remains would be there. Those ruins were left intact and were put behind glass so commuters - and now fanbois - can gawp at them.

The hospital and church were built in the early 1400s to care for the victims of a plague epidemic. They were first named after St Andrew, before the name was changed to Buen Sucesco. The buildings were demolished in 1854. ®