Montalbán de Córdoba is a town in the province of Córdoba in

Andalusia Andalusia (, ; es, Andalucía ) is the southernmost Autonomous communities of Spain, autonomous community in Peninsular Spain. It is the most populous and the second-largest autonomous community in the country. It is officially recognised as a ...

, southern

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 ...

. The town is 42 km from Córdoba, the capital of the province. Montalban de Cordoba 2

History

Prehistory Prehistory, also known as pre-literary history, is the period of human history between the use of the first stone tools by hominins 3.3 million years ago and the beginning of recorded history with the invention of writing systems. The use of ...

: Remnants of pottery were found 4 km to the south of the town. At present they are in the archaeological museum of Cordoba. *3rd century BC: Near Montalban was an old Roman city known as Segovia. *210 BC: Romans and

Carthaginians The Punic people, or western Phoenicians, were a Semitic people in the Western Mediterranean who migrated from Tyre, Phoenicia to North Africa during the Early Iron Age. In modern scholarship, the term ''Punic'' – the Latin equivalent of the ...

fought in a battle in the

Second Punic War The Second Punic War (218 to 201 BC) was the second of three wars fought between Carthage and Rome, the two main powers of the western Mediterranean in the 3rd century BC. For 17 years the two states struggled for supremacy, primarily in Ital ...

. *45 BC:

Julius Caesar Gaius Julius Caesar (; ; 12 July 100 BC – 15 March 44 BC), was a Roman general and statesman. A member of the First Triumvirate, Caesar led the Roman armies in the Gallic Wars before defeating his political rival Pompey in a civil war, and ...

and

Pompey Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus (; 29 September 106 BC – 28 September 48 BC), known in English as Pompey or Pompey the Great, was a leading Roman general and statesman. He played a significant role in the transformation of ...

's sons fought in a battle in

Caesar's civil war Caesar's civil war (49–45 BC) was one of the last politico-military conflicts of the Roman Republic before its reorganization into the Roman Empire. It began as a series of political and military confrontations between Gaius Julius Caesar and ...

. Segovia vanishes from the historical record. *4th century to 5th century AD: Ruins and a catacomb are found in Tentecarreta 2 km from the town. *1530: Fernandez of Cordoba established Montalban. *1668: Montalban had a population of 1040. *1808-1812: French invaders burn the municipal file of Montalban and the history of the town is lost. *1880: Montalban had a population of 3000. *1910: Montalban had a population of 3300. *1960: Montalban had a population of 4700, but shrunk to 3800 due to emigration.

Demographics

Representative buildings and places of interest

El Calvario

El Calvario is in the south part of Montalbán, inside the town limits. The original Calvario hermitage, built during the first half of the 17th century, was a small church on the outskirts of Montalbán, near the old castle ruins. The building construction used poor quality material and it was soon found to be in a state of near ruin. Construction of a new chapel at the site of the first began in 1773 and was completed in 1776. This chapel, though stronger than the previous one, unfortunately was also built with inferior materials, so that, at the end of March 1852, the lantern and the dome of the chapel collapsed. After consultation with competent builders, the second Chapel was torn down and rebuilt from the ground at its new location in town. The work was completed in July 1856, and the image of ''Nuestro Padre Jesús del Calvario'' was returned to the new chapel on August 25, upon which the village celebrated with the ringing of bells, illuminations, temporary triumphal arches, and buntings hung on edifices. The building is decorated in Neoclassical style; its exterior is rather plainly finished in white stucco, while the dome and

roof lantern A roof lantern is a daylighting architectural element. Architectural lanterns are part of a larger roof and provide natural light into the space or room below. In contemporary use it is an architectural skylight structure. A lantern roof wil ...

cupola In architecture, a cupola () is a relatively small, most often dome-like, tall structure on top of a building. Often used to provide a lookout or to admit light and air, it usually crowns a larger roof or dome. The word derives, via Italian, from ...

are tiled. The church is consecrated to ''Nuestro Padre Jesús del Calvario'' (Our Father Jesus of Calvary); his image is in the

altarpiece An altarpiece is an artwork such as a painting, sculpture or relief representing a religious subject made for placing at the back of or behind the altar of a Christian church. Though most commonly used for a single work of art such as a painting o ...

, which is worked in the

Sevillian Seville (; es, Sevilla, ) is the capital and largest city of the Spanish autonomous community of Andalusia and the province of Seville. It is situated on the lower reaches of the River Guadalquivir, in the southwest of the Iberian Peninsula ...

style. The building's ground plan is

cruciform Cruciform is a term for physical manifestations resembling a common cross or Christian cross. The label can be extended to architectural shapes, biology, art, and design. Cruciform architectural plan Christian churches are commonly described ...

, in the shape of a Greek cross. The archway by the artist Francisco Suarez was preserved in the chapel. The guesthouse was built in 1866 in order to accommodate pilgrims who arrived daily in fulfillment of their sacred vows. In the same year the House of the Santeros (image-carvers) was raised with the fencing and arched gates of the entrance court. The dedication of the new chapel was given by Major Master Ecija, D. Corrales Jose Martinez, who explained its relationship to the architecture of Seville. The building has been maintained in recent years by minor works such as the paving of the courtyard entrance, roof-work and the restoration of the guesthouse and the House of the Santeros.

Madre de Dios Hermitage

This church was declared a historic artistic monument in 1981, and a historical heritage of Andalusia in 1996. Located on the corner of Madre de Dios Street and Ancha Street, it is a three

nave The nave () is the central part of a church, stretching from the (normally western) main entrance or rear wall, to the transepts, or in a church without transepts, to the chancel. When a church contains side aisles, as in a basilica-type ...

church. It was called ''Nuestra Señora de los Remedios'' from the 16th century to 1850. Presently the building is closed, although Mass is occasionally celebrated.

Santa María de Gracia Church

This is a parish church situated in the Andalusia square, facing the town hall. The church is made of brick and built in oval form. The interior has a small altar dedicated to the Immaculate Conception, a baroque

and ruins of the old church, which was demolished in 1964. It has pieces of

metalsmith A metalsmith or simply smith is a craftsperson fashioning useful items (for example, tools, kitchenware, tableware, jewelry, armor and weapons) out of various metals. Smithing is one of the oldest list of metalworking occupations, metalworking o ...

ery from the old building incorporated in the golden parish cross, the silver

monstrance A monstrance, also known as an ostensorium (or an ostensory), is a vessel used in Roman Catholic, Old Catholic, High Church Lutheran and Anglican churches for the display on an altar of some object of piety, such as the consecrated Eucharistic Sa ...

and the shrine's door. The church appears to be built in the style of the 14th century, of

Gothic Gothic or Gothics may refer to: People and languages *Goths or Gothic people, the ethnonym of a group of East Germanic tribes **Gothic language, an extinct East Germanic language spoken by the Goths **Crimean Gothic, the Gothic language spoken b ...

architecture. It is 25 m long, 17 m broad and 10 m high, and has three

s. The walls are

vaulted In architecture, a vault (French ''voûte'', from Italian ''volta'') is a self-supporting arched form, usually of stone or brick, serving to cover a space with a ceiling or roof. As in building an arch, a temporary support is needed while ring ...

and the central nave has a

coffered A coffer (or coffering) in architecture is a series of sunken panels in the shape of a square, rectangle, or octagon in a ceiling, soffit or vault. A series of these sunken panels was often used as decoration for a ceiling or a vault, also c ...

ceiling. The church has more than a dozen altars; the main altar (1724) is the work of the sculptor Gaspar Lorenzo de los Cobos. The church has two entry portals, one in the front and another in back, both with

ogival arch An ogive ( ) is the roundly tapered end of a two-dimensional or three-dimensional object. Ogive curves and surfaces are used in engineering, architecture and woodworking. Etymology The earliest use of the word ''ogive'' is found in the 13th c ...

es. It also has a belltower with four bells and a rich Treasure of fine goldsmithery.

Culture House

This building was built on La Paz Street in 1984, when the democratic

town hall In local government, a city hall, town hall, civic centre (in the UK or Australia), guildhall, or a municipal building (in the Philippines), is the chief administrative building of a city, town, or other municipality. It usually houses ...

arrived. It has two floors, with a total area of 250 m². It served as the town hall while a new one was built. Cultural activities including lectures and social gatherings, public and official ceremonies, and general presentations take place here. At present the first floor is an adult education center and the main hall; the second floor houses the municipal library.

Library

The present town library was inaugurated in 1986. Until 1990 it was situated on the second floor of the old medical center, now the Office for Youth Information (''Oficina de Informacion Juvenil''). At that time, the library had 1300 volumes. In 1990 it was moved to the second floor of the Culture House; at this writing the library has over 7000 volumes.

Tentecarreta Catacombs

Tentecarreta is 2 km from Montalban. Large underground galleries were found here which served as a

necropolis A necropolis (plural necropolises, necropoles, necropoleis, necropoli) is a large, designed cemetery with elaborate tomb monuments. The name stems from the Ancient Greek ''nekropolis'', literally meaning "city of the dead". The term usually im ...

during the 4th and 5th centuries. These galleries form

catacombs Catacombs are man-made subterranean passageways for religious practice. Any chamber used as a burial place is a catacomb, although the word is most commonly associated with the Roman Empire. Etymology and history The first place to be referred ...

which were rare in most localities of the

Roman empire The Roman Empire ( la, Imperium Romanum ; grc-gre, Βασιλεία τῶν Ῥωμαίων, Basileía tôn Rhōmaíōn) was the post-Republican period of ancient Rome. As a polity, it included large territorial holdings around the Mediterr ...

; the catacombs of Montalban are the only such catacombs in Spain. Tentecarreta has two galleries, crossed and oriented to the cardinal points. The galleries are narrow, tortuous, and heavily eroded due to humidity, collapses and avalanches of mud. The south gallery housed a collective burial.

El Mesto

The Mesto was an old tree, a hybrid between one species, evergreen oak, and another, cork oak, located about 7 km from Montalban. During the 8th century it provided shade, shelter and rest for peasants and travellers. The ancient tree measured 15 m in circumference, but it was severely damaged when someone built a fire in a hollow in its trunk. In 1980, an association was founded for its preservation, as the Mesto had long served as an inspiration to poets, writers and artists, arousing a special sensibility of appreciation for the beauty of nature. The Mesto was destroyed in the summer of 1995; yet it remains a symbol, and evokes a feeling for this beauty and a memory of something deeply meaningful being lost.

Festivals

August Fair

The fair is celebrated during August 6–8, in honour of ''Nuestro Padre Jesús del Calvario''; this is harvest time for area farms and the end of the season for agriculture generally.

Romería

The pilgrimage is celebrated on May 15 in honour of Saint

Isidore the Laborer Isidore the Labourer, also known as Isidore the Farmer ( es, San Isidro Labrador) (c. 1070 – May 15, 1130), was a Spanish farmworker known for his piety toward the poor and animals. He is the Catholic patron saint of farmers and of Madrid, El ...

. Almost everyone in town goes to Huerta Dios, a distance of around one kilometre. For around half the morning there is a procession headed by the coach of Saint Isidore's devotees, followed by other coaches, horsemen, and people in traditional costumes.

Notes

External links

Page of City Council of Montalbán de CórdobaPage of Campiña Sur's comarca
Multiterritory Information System of Andalusia
International Fair of Garlic of Montalbán de Córdoba
{{DEFAULTSORT:Montalban De Cordoba Municipalities in the Province of Córdoba (Spain)