Richard Frisbie
La Alberca in Castilla y León, Spain
It was as if Gilgamesh, or, to use a more modern analogy, the Transformer Optimus Prime, walked the path long before us, leaving the boulders that blocked the way piled high along the route for someone else to build upon. And build upon it they did.
Plaza Mayor of La Alberca
Over the centuries, the narrow, twisting paths became lined with houses built upon impossibly huge foundations, until, today, ancient houses sit atop monstrous stones lining narrow streets this is the National Historic Landmark of La Alberca.
Called one of the most authentic of Spanish villages, La Alberca is an isolated mountaintop community where few tourists visit, and practically no one speaks English. It boasts the origin of some of the finest Iberian Jamón Bellota, air-cured in the dry mountain breezes.
Carved from a mountainside high above the plains of Castilla y Leon, Spain, perched upon the impossibly massive rock foundations, are the old timber structures whose lines and materials reflect the medieval Jewish and Moorish roots of this isolated outpost of Spanish culture.
Its streambeds of streets, mountain torrents in the spring that become pedestrian walks in the dry season, all lead to a village square a Plaza Mayor where commerce, tourism, and bullfights meet. It is the center of the community.
We stopped for refreshments, my companions and I, sitting at tables devouring some cold beer and tapas on this unevenly cobbled square that seemed too steeply sloped for congregating, yet the photos and mounted bull’s heads in the tavern told a different tale. This was the heart of the community the place where its history was made.
La Alberca is a National Historic Site that dates back to before the Romans, when the Visigoths laid the large stone foundations visible today. As an outpost on the frontier between Muslim and Christian Spain, the architecture reflects a mix of Jewish and Moorish influences that remained unchanged for centuries.
Almost every structure in the oldest section of town still features the ancient timber-and-stone construction, some with stucco covering the stone. Later additions (after the Inquisition, when Jews were not welcome in Spain) include a Christian symbol carved in stone over most doorways. The rest is intact, the history there for all to see.
For more information about traveling to Spain, see http://www.turismocastillayleon.com/ and www.spain.info.
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