El Hierro, nicknamed ''Isla del Meridiano'' (the "Meridian Island"), is the second-smallest and farthest-south and -west of the Canary Islands (an autonomous community of

Spain , image_flag = Bandera de España.svg , image_coat = Escudo de España (mazonado).svg , national_motto = ''Plus ultra'' (Latin)(English: "Further Beyond") , national_anthem = (English: "Royal March") , i ...

), in the

Atlantic Ocean The Atlantic Ocean is the second-largest of the world's five oceans, with an area of about . It covers approximately 20% of Earth#Surface, Earth's surface and about 29% of its water surface area. It is known to separate the "Old World" of Afr ...

off the coast of

Africa Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent, after Asia in both cases. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of Earth's total surface area ...

, with a population of 10,968 (2019). Its capital is Valverde. At , it is the second-smallest of the eight main islands of the Canaries.

Name

Africa 1595, Gerardus Mercator (3797082-recto)

The name ''El Hierro'', although spelled like the Spanish word for 'iron', is not related to that word. The ''H'' in the name of the metal is derived from the ''F'' of Latin ''ferrum'' (compare ''higo'' for 'fig'), a phonetic mutation that was complete by the end of the Middle Ages. The confusion with the name of the metal had effects on the international naming of the island. As early as the 16th century, maps and texts called the island after the word for 'iron' in other languages: Portuguese ''Ferro'', French ''l'île de Fer'', and Latin '' Insula Ferri''. Nevertheless, the origin of the name ''ero'' or ''erro'' or ''yerro'' is not definitely known. It is thought to be derived from one of several words in the

Guanche language Guanche is an extinct language that was spoken by the Guanches of the Canary Islands until the 16th or 17th century. It died out after the conquest of the Canary Islands as the Guanche ethnic group was assimilated into the dominant Spanish cultur ...

of the pre-Hispanic inhabitants, known as Bimbaches. Juan de Abreu Galindo (in a manuscript translated and published by George Glas in 1764) gives the native name of the island as Esero (or '' Eseró''), meaning 'strong'.

Richard Henry Major Richard Henry Major (October 3, 1818 – June 25, 1891) was a geographer and map librarian who curated the map collection of the British Museum from 1844 until his retirement in 1880. Biography Major was born in Shoreditch in 1818 to Richard ...

, however, in notes o
his translation
o
''Le Canarien''
observes that the

Guanche Guanche may refer to: *Guanches, the indigenous people of the Canary Islands *Guanche language Guanche is an extinct language that was spoken by the Guanches of the Canary Islands until the 16th or 17th century. It died out after the conquest of ...

word ''hero'' or ''herro'', meaning 'cistern', could easily have lapsed into ''hierro'' by a process of

folk etymology Folk etymology (also known as popular etymology, analogical reformation, reanalysis, morphological reanalysis or etymological reinterpretation) is a change in a word or phrase resulting from the replacement of an unfamiliar form by a more famili ...

. It is believed that the Bimbaches had to construct cisterns to save fresh rainwater. The ''Gran diccionario guanche'' gives the meaning of the Guanche word ''hero'' in Spanish as "fuente" ('spring

ater source Ater (Hebrew אֲתַר) is an Old Testament male name. #A descendant of Hezekiah, who returned from Babylon ; #An Israelite, who subscribed to Nehemiah Nehemiah is the central figure of the Book of Nehemiah, which describes his work in reb ...

History

The ancient natives of the island, called '' Bimbaches'', were subjected to Spanish rule by

Jean de Béthencourt Jean de Béthencourt () (1362–1425) was a French explorer who in 1402 led an expedition to the Canary Islands, landing first on the north side of Lanzarote. From there he conquered for Castile the islands of Fuerteventura (1405) and El Hi ...

(d.1425) – more by the process of negotiation than by military action. Béthencourt had as his ally and negotiator Augeron, brother of the island's native monarch. Augeron had been captured years before by the Europeans and now served as mediator between the Europeans and the Guanches. In return for control over the island, Béthencourt promised to respect the liberty of the natives, but his son eventually broke his promise, selling many of the ''bimbaches'' into

slavery Slavery and enslavement are both the state and the condition of being a slave—someone forbidden to quit one's service for an enslaver, and who is treated by the enslaver as property. Slavery typically involves slaves being made to perf ...

. Many Frenchmen and

Galicians Galicians ( gl, galegos, es, gallegos, link=no) are a Celtic- Romance ethnic group from Spain that is closely related to the Portuguese people and has its historic homeland is Galicia, in the north-west of the Iberian Peninsula. Two Romanc ...

subsequently settled on the island. There was a revolt of the natives against the harsh treatment of the governor Lázaro Vizcaíno, but it was suppressed.

Landslides and tsunami

There is evidence of at least three major

landslide Landslides, also known as landslips, are several forms of mass wasting that may include a wide range of ground movements, such as rockfalls, deep-seated slope failures, mudflows, and debris flows. Landslides occur in a variety of environments ...

s that have affected El Hierro in the last few hundred thousand years. The most recent of these was the 'El Golfo' landslide that occurred about 15,000 years ago, involving collapse of the northern flank of the island. The landslide formed the El Golfo valley and created a debris avalanche with a volume of 150–180 km³.

Turbidite A turbidite is the geologic deposit of a turbidity current, which is a type of amalgamation of fluidal and sediment gravity flow responsible for distributing vast amounts of clastic sediment into the deep ocean. Sequencing Turbidites were ...

deposits related to this landslide have been recognized in drill cores from the Agadir Basin to the north of the Canary Islands. Detailed analysis of these deposits suggests that the slope failure did not occur as a single event but a series of smaller failures over a period of hours or days. Local

tsunami A tsunami ( ; from ja, 津波, lit=harbour wave, ) is a series of waves in a water body caused by the displacement of a large volume of water, generally in an ocean or a large lake. Earthquakes, volcanic eruptions and other underwater explo ...

are likely to have been triggered by these landslides but no evidence has been found to confirm this. Coast El Golfo

2011 seismic activity

The Instituto Vulcanológico de Canarias (Volcanological Institute of the Canary Islands) and National Geographic Institute's seismic monitoring station located in Valverde detected increased

seismic Seismology (; from Ancient Greek σεισμός (''seismós'') meaning "earthquake" and -λογία (''-logía'') meaning "study of") is the scientific study of earthquakes and the propagation of elastic waves through the Earth or through other ...

activity beginning on 17 July 2011. The seismic monitoring network was increased in density on 21 July to allow better detection and location of the seismic events. There was an

earthquake swarm In seismology, an earthquake swarm is a sequence of seismic events occurring in a local area within a relatively short period. The time span used to define a swarm varies, but may be days, months, or years. Such an energy release is different f ...

with in excess of 400 minor tremors between 20 July and 24 July; by 27 July a further 320 earthquakes had been recorded. On 25 August there were reports that some horizontal deformation had been detected, but that there was no unusual vertical deformation. At that time, the total number of tremors had exceeded 4,000. Between 4;15 and 4:20 a.m. on 10 October 2011 the earthquake swarm changed behaviour and produced a

harmonic tremor A harmonic tremor is a sustained release of seismic and infrasonic energy typically associated with the underground movement of magma, the venting of volcanic gases from magma, or both. It is a long-duration release of seismic energy, with distin ...

. Harmonic tremors are produced by

magma Magma () is the molten or semi-molten natural material from which all igneous rocks are formed. Magma is found beneath the surface of the Earth, and evidence of magmatism has also been discovered on other terrestrial planets and some natural s ...

movements and can indicate that an eruption has begun. Later the same day a small submarine eruption began, 7 km south of La Restinga. On 11 October the volcanic threat level at La Restinga was raised from "yellow" to "red" after minor rockfalls on the slopes above the town. Temporary evacuation of the 600 inhabitants was ordered and, despite a reduction in activity, they were still unable to return 20 days later. As of 7 November 2011 a confirmed surtseyan type of eruption phase has started at the fissure. On 4 December 2011 the eruption was ongoing with vigorous phreatic bubbles emerging. After the 2011 eruption, fossils of single-celled marine organisms were found in restingolites, a type of

tephra Tephra is fragmental material produced by a volcanic eruption regardless of composition, fragment size, or emplacement mechanism. Volcanologists also refer to airborne fragments as pyroclasts. Once clasts have fallen to the ground, they re ...

, that were released into the water.

Climate

The climate of El Hierro depends on the area. The climate ranges are from

subtropical The subtropical zones or subtropics are geographical and climate zones to the north and south of the tropics. Geographically part of the temperate zones of both hemispheres, they cover the middle latitudes from to approximately 35° north and ...

Mediterranean The Mediterranean Sea is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded by the Mediterranean Basin and almost completely enclosed by land: on the north by Western and Southern Europe and Anatolia, on the south by North Africa, and on the ea ...

(''Csa'' / ''Csb'') in the center of the island, to

semi-arid A semi-arid climate, semi-desert climate, or steppe climate is a dry climate sub-type. It is located on regions that receive precipitation below potential evapotranspiration, but not as low as a desert climate. There are different kinds of semi-ar ...

(''BSh'') and to a

desert climate The desert climate or arid climate (in the Köppen climate classification ''BWh'' and ''BWk''), is a dry climate sub-type in which there is a severe excess of evaporation over precipitation. The typically bald, rocky, or sandy surfaces in desert ...

(''BWh'') in coastal parts (according to the Köppen climate classification). Although the temperatures are very influenced by the ocean. This is the climate chart from El Hierro Airport, which is the only airport in the island and also the island capital's airport:

Geography, flora and fauna

El Hierro's size and geography supports entirely endemic species including the critically endangered El Hierro giant lizard (''Gallotia simonyi''), for which there is a captive breeding programme, allowing its reintroduction. The non-barren parts of the interior rely on

relief precipitation Orography is the study of the topographic relief of mountains, and can more broadly include hills, and any part of a region's elevated terrain. Orography (also known as ''oreography'', ''orology'' or ''oreology'') falls within the broader discip ...

, not much more than the average of 19 rainfall days per year, high relative humidity and geothermal springs. This non-arid parts have thermophilous (geothermal heat-liking)

juniper Junipers are coniferous trees and shrubs in the genus ''Juniperus'' () of the cypress family Cupressaceae. Depending on the taxonomy, between 50 and 67 species of junipers are widely distributed throughout the Northern Hemisphere, from the Arcti ...

clumps and a pine forest with other evergreens. In 2000, El Hierro was designated by

UNESCO The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization is a specialized agency of the United Nations (UN) aimed at promoting world peace and security through international cooperation in education, arts, sciences and culture. It ...

as a

Biosphere Reserve A nature reserve (also known as a wildlife refuge, wildlife sanctuary, biosphere reserve or bioreserve, natural or nature preserve, or nature conservation area) is a protected area of importance for flora, fauna, or features of geological or o ...

, with 60% of its territory protected to preserve its natural and cultural diversity. Among

cetacean Cetacea (; , ) is an infraorder of aquatic mammals that includes whales, dolphins, and porpoises. Key characteristics are their fully aquatic lifestyle, streamlined body shape, often large size and exclusively carnivorous diet. They propel the ...

s in these waters, it is notable that several species of lesser known

beaked whale Beaked whales (systematic name Ziphiidae) are a family of cetaceans noted as being one of the least known groups of mammals because of their deep-sea habitat and apparent low abundance. Only three or four of the 24 species are reasonably well-kn ...

s inhabit around the island. Like the rest of the Canary Islands chain, El Hierro is volcanic and sharply mountainous. One eruption has to date been recorded on the island, but is not confirmed: from the Volcan de Lomo Negro vent in 1793, lasting a month. A submarine eruption occurred, however, offshore La Restinga village in 2011/2012. Except as landscaped at its harbour towns the shore is rocky and in places precipitous. El Hierro is a island, formed late, about 1.2 million years ago after three successive eruptions, the island emerged from the ocean as a triangle of

basalt Basalt (; ) is an aphanitic (fine-grained) extrusive igneous rock formed from the rapid cooling of low-viscosity lava rich in magnesium and iron (mafic lava) exposed at or very near the surface of a rocky planet or moon. More than 90% of a ...

ic dykes topped with a

volcanic A volcano is a rupture in the crust of a planetary-mass object, such as Earth, that allows hot lava, volcanic ash, and gases to escape from a magma chamber below the surface. On Earth, volcanoes are most often found where tectonic plates are ...

cone more than 2,000 metres high. With continued activity resulting in the island expanding to have the largest number of

volcano A volcano is a rupture in the crust of a planetary-mass object, such as Earth, that allows hot lava, volcanic ash, and gases to escape from a magma chamber below the surface. On Earth, volcanoes are most often found where tectonic plates are ...

es in the Canaries (over 500 cones, another 300 covered by more recent deposits), together with approximately 70 caves and volcanic galleries, including the Cueva de Don Justo whose collection of channels exceeds 6 km. Landslides, plant erosion and seasonal wind erosion have reduced the size and height of the island. The current highest point is in the middle of the island, in Malpaso, at high.

Tourism and transportation

Like all of the Canary Islands, El Hierro is a tourist destination. It is served by a small airport— El Hierro Airport at Valverde—and a ferry terminal at Puerto de la Estaca, both of which connect to

Tenerife Tenerife (; ; formerly spelled ''Teneriffe'') is the largest and most populous island of the Canary Islands. It is home to 43% of the total population of the archipelago. With a land area of and a population of 978,100 inhabitants as of Janu ...

. Though El Hierro has a

Parador A ''parador'' (), in Spain and other Spanish-speaking countries was an establishment where travelers could seek lodging, and usually, food and drink, similar to an inn. In Spain since 1928, a Parador is a state-owned luxury hotel, usually loca ...

, hotel accommodations are generally in small family enterprises; as a UNESCO World Biosphere Reserve, El Hierro has limited construction to less than half of its total surface and buildings to two floors, maintaining its traditional look and social structure more than the other six major Canary Islands.

Political organization

The island is part of the

province A province is almost always an administrative division within a country or state. The term derives from the ancient Roman ''provincia'', which was the major territorial and administrative unit of the Roman Empire's territorial possessions outsi ...

Santa Cruz de Tenerife Santa Cruz de Tenerife, commonly abbreviated as Santa Cruz (), is a city, the capital of the island of Tenerife, Province of Santa Cruz de Tenerife, and capital of the Canary Islands. Santa Cruz has a population of 206,593 (2013) within its admi ...

, and includes three municipalities: Valverde is situated in the northeast and Frontera in the west, both contain several villages. The seat of the island government (''cabildo insular'') is in the town of Valverde, which houses approximately half of the island's population.

The "Meridian Island"

El Hierro was used in various parts of Europe for more than 500 years as the

prime meridian A prime meridian is an arbitrary meridian (a line of longitude) in a geographic coordinate system at which longitude is defined to be 0°. Together, a prime meridian and its anti-meridian (the 180th meridian in a 360°-system) form a great ci ...

, especially outside of the future

British Empire The British Empire was composed of the dominions, colonies, protectorates, mandates, and other territories ruled or administered by the United Kingdom and its predecessor states. It began with the overseas possessions and trading posts esta ...

. By the 2nd century CE,

Ptolemy Claudius Ptolemy (; grc-gre, Πτολεμαῖος, ; la, Claudius Ptolemaeus; AD) was a mathematician, astronomer, astrologer, geographer, and music theorist, who wrote about a dozen scientific treatises, three of which were of importanc ...

already considered a definition of the zero meridian based on the westernmost piece of land in the (known) world, giving a few maps with only positive, eastern longitudes. In 1634, in France, as ruled by

Louis XIII Louis XIII (; sometimes called the Just; 27 September 1601 – 14 May 1643) was King of France from 1610 until his death in 1643 and King of Navarre (as Louis II) from 1610 to 1620, when the crown of Navarre was merged with the French crown. ...

and his minister Richelieu, it was decided that Ferro's meridian should be used as a key reference of maps, in consideration of the island's historic meridian and status as the westernmost-known land of peoples of the 'Known World'. Flores Island is the westernmost Azore discovered by the

Portuguese navigators Portuguese maritime exploration resulted in the numerous territories and maritime routes recorded by the Portuguese as a result of their intensive maritime journeys during the 15th and 16th centuries. Portuguese sailors were at the vanguard of Eu ...

in the early 15th century—after the First Voyage of Columbus in 1492 scholars and cartographers sometimes grouped them among the new world. The Paris elite considered El Hierro to be exactly 20° west of the

Paris meridian The Paris meridian is a meridian line running through the Paris Observatory in Paris, France – now longitude 2°20′14.02500″ East. It was a long-standing rival to the Greenwich meridian as the prime meridian of the world. The "Paris meridi ...

(th of its relevant

parallel Parallel is a geometric term of location which may refer to: Computing * Parallel algorithm * Parallel computing * Parallel metaheuristic * Parallel (software), a UNIX utility for running programs in parallel * Parallel Sysplex, a cluster of IB ...

of the globe). Old international maps (outside of Anglo-North American realms) often have a common grid with Paris degrees at the top and Ferro degrees (offset by 20 from Paris) at the bottom. Louis Feuillée also worked on this problem in 1724.

Festivals

The most important festival of El Hierro is the ''Bajada de la Virgen de los Reyes'', held every four years, on the first Saturday of July (the last occasion was in 2017, and the next will be in 2021). During the festival, the Virgin of the Kings (''Virgen de los Reyes'', patron saint of the island of El Hierro) is taken from her sanctuary in La Dehesa (in the municipality of La Frontera) and carried to the capital of the island, Valverde, making a tour of 44 kilometres and running through all the towns of El Hierro. The annual festival of the Virgin is celebrated every September 24.

Natural symbols

The official natural symbols associated with El Hierro are '' Gallotia simonyi machadoi'' (El Hierro giant lizard) and ''

Juniperus phoenicea ''Juniperus phoenicea'', the Phoenicean juniper or Arâr, is a juniper found throughout the Mediterranean region. Description ''Juniperus phoenicea'' is a large shrub or small tree reaching tall, with a trunk up to in diameter and a rounded ...

'' (Sabina). File:Lagarto Gigante de El Hierro, Canarias, España.JPG, '' Gallotia simonyi machadoi'' File:El Hierro Sabinar.JPG, ''

Energy

According to the Ministry for Industry, Tourism and Commerce, El Hierro hopes to become the first island in the world to be self-sufficient for electrical energy. This will be achieved through a €54 million project combining a greater than 11-

megawatt The watt (symbol: W) is the unit of power or radiant flux in the International System of Units (SI), equal to 1 joule per second or 1 kg⋅m2⋅s−3. It is used to quantify the rate of energy transfer. The watt is named after James Watt ...

wind farm A wind farm or wind park, also called a wind power station or wind power plant, is a group of wind turbines in the same location used to produce electricity. Wind farms vary in size from a small number of turbines to several hundred wind turb ...

and two hydroelectric projects. This hydro and wind-power project, created by the local Gorona del Viento El Hierro consortium with financial aid from the

European Union The European Union (EU) is a supranational political and economic union of member states that are located primarily in Europe. The union has a total area of and an estimated total population of about 447million. The EU has often been ...

, and officially inaugurated in 2015, consists of five E-70

wind turbine A wind turbine is a device that converts the kinetic energy of wind into electrical energy. Hundreds of thousands of large turbines, in installations known as wind farms, now generate over 650 gigawatts of power, with 60 GW added each year. W ...

s capable of producing 11.5 megawatts of

wind power Wind power or wind energy is mostly the use of wind turbines to generate electricity. Wind power is a popular, sustainable, renewable energy source that has a much smaller impact on the environment than burning fossil fuels. Historically, w ...

to supply electricity for approximately 11,000 residents, an additional number of tourists, and three water

desalination Desalination is a process that takes away mineral components from saline water. More generally, desalination refers to the removal of salts and minerals from a target substance, as in soil desalination, which is an issue for agriculture. Saltw ...

facilities. The hybrid wind/pumped hydro storage system stores surplus

by pumping water up 700 metres (approximately 2,300 feet) to the crater of an extinct volcano. When winds are calm or when demand exceeds supply, water is released from the crater to generate 11.3 MW of electricity, filling a smaller artificial basin created at the bottom of the extinct volcano. Water in the lower basin is then pumped back up again to the upper reservoir when there is excess wind power. The closed-loop hybrid wind/hydro system is expected to save approximately US$4M per year (calculated with January 2011 oil prices) previously spent on about 40,000 barrels of crude oil imported annually, attempting to make the island completely self-sufficient for electrical energy. 2016 was the first whole year for the power plant and it reached 40.7% of the total demand, reducing consumption of diesel by 6,000 tonnes. In 2017, the share climbed to 46.5%. The installation also powers a desalination plant that provides fresh water. In early 2018, El Hierro covered its entire electricity demand between 25 January and 12 February with its renewable resource base, avoiding the use of polluting energy sources for more than 560 hours in 2018—and a total of almost 2,000 hours since it started operating.

Bimbache openART Festival

The Bimbache openART Festival and Global Initiative for Arts and Sustainability, founded in 2005 by German-born guitarist Torsten de Winkel and other community activists, is a non-profit effort at creating an interdisciplinary platform which seeks to bridge traditional divides, both on a musical and human level, in a globalizing world. The festival is a contribution of the international artist community to El Hierro's "Sustainable Island" program and collaborates with scientists and sustainability-oriented organizations from around the world.

El Hierro in literature

The island of Hierro is mentioned (1) in

Umberto Eco Umberto Eco (5 January 1932 – 19 February 2016) was an Italian medievalist, philosopher, semiotician, novelist, cultural critic, and political and social commentator. In English, he is best known for his popular 1980 novel ''The Name of the ...

's novel '' The Island of the Day Before'' (', 1994), about a 17th-century Italian nobleman trapped on an island on the

International Date Line The International Date Line (IDL) is an internationally accepted demarcation on the surface of Earth, running between the South and North Poles and serving as the boundary between one calendar day and the next. It passes through the Pacific O ...

; (2) in

Christopher Isherwood Christopher William Bradshaw Isherwood (26 August 1904 – 4 January 1986) was an Anglo-American novelist, playwright, screenwriter, autobiographer, and diarist. His best-known works include '' Goodbye to Berlin'' (1939), a semi-autobiographical ...

's short story "The Turn Round the World", collected in his ''Exhumations'' (1966); and (3) in the first chapter of Steven Callahan's (1986) maritime chronicle "Adrift", in which El Hierro is his final port of departure for an ill-fated Atlantic crossing.

Notes

External links

El Hierro – official tourism website of the Canary Islands
* * http://euanmearns.com/el-hierro-fourth-quarter-2018-performance-update/ * {{Authority control Islands of the Canary Islands Volcanoes of the Canary Islands Meridians (geography) Biosphere reserves of Spain Protected areas of the Canary Islands