Cabins and spreaders

There are still glimpses, in that rural Spain of sordid interiors and roots lost in time, of those times, lost in the inextricable quagmire of History, of intertwined worlds and traditions, which although now seem pious to us, at the time meant a confrontation of cultures and ways of thinking.

Of the deep Soria, through whose veins the blood of the proud Celtiberians still runs, there are still places that even in the 21st century, continue to cling to their ancient traditions, although subject, as it could not be otherwise, to the circumstances of the faith imposed by former Christian missionaries.

Located, approximately, nine or ten kilometers from Medinaceli, the town of Romanillos is an invitation to mystery and a sample, basically, of what has been said so far.

The traveler who enters Romanillos for the first time, on his way to more relevant towns, which does not mean more history, like Barahona - famous for his witches, for that untamed lady, La Varona, from where her name possibly comes and for her terrifying airones wells - feel that mix of cultures, hardly set foot at the entrance to the town.

There, next to the small hermitage-humilladero, half a dozen old stone crosses - what in Galicia they call cruzeiros, well known by pilgrims who deposit their tribute of stones in them as offerings to the ancient lares or geniuses of the roads- Some beautiful buildings, cabins or huts still survive, although now they are only a refuge for shepherds and a store for farm implements, in times before Jesus Christ they were the basic home of the ancient Celtiberian tribes who populated the place.

Family houses, conical in shape -locks, are called in León and Galicia- their roofs with intertwined branches and leaf litter, impervious to frequent rainfall, return the imagination to other times and other customs, which although nowadays seem distant to us , they do not stop possessing, deep down, a strong sense of nostalgia, romanticism and aesthetics.

Located a few meters from where the crosses and the hermitage-humilladero –with their typical baroque cube appearance- point to the Way of the Cross that every Holy Week reproduces the scenes of the Passion and death of Christ, his presence, after all, does not stop pointing to those types of places where in the past the hunting targets roamed mountains and forests, while they were 'chased by lustful shepherds, to the rhythm of the flute and the reed of old gods with feet in the shape of a goat's foot, like old Pan.

NOTICE: Both the text and the accompanying photographs are my exclusive intellectual property.