University of Osuna functioned from 1548 until 1824. The building of the former university is significant both architecturally and for its long history as a seat of the university. Its construction was ordered by Don Juan Téllez Girón, founder of the university. The First Duke of Osuna was responsible for numerous buildings in his domain, nearly all of a religious character. The university building is, therefore, particularly notable as an essentially civil building devoted to education.
The buildings erected under the patronage of the First Duke of Osuna are important primarily because of the adoption and diffusion of new stylistic currents and ideas from the Italian architecture of the time. The Renaissance aspects of the buildings are patent, as is the relation to the ideology of humanism in a building expressly created as a center for modern education.
The surviving university building testifies to the Renaissance aesthetics, providing one of the most singular and defining architectural examples of Osuna's past greatness.
References:The Château de Foix dominates the town of Foix. An important tourist site, it is known as a centre of the Cathars. Built on an older 7th-century fortification, the castle is known from 987. In 1002, it was mentioned in the will of Roger I, Count of Carcassonne, who bequeathed the fortress to his youngest child, Bernard. In effect, the family ruling over the region were installed here which allowed them to control access to the upper Ariège valley and to keep surveillance from this strategic point over the lower land, protected behind impregnable walls.
In 1034, the castle became capital of the County of Foix and played a decisive role in medieval military history. During the two following centuries, the castle was home to Counts with shining personalities who became the soul of the Occitan resistance during the crusade against the Albigensians.