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What to see and do in Sasamón

What to see and do in Sasamón (Odra-Pisuerga, Burgos): 6 places across monuments, nature, activities and curiosities, with a photo and a Google Maps location.

1 Villages · 2 Monuments · 1 Curiosities · 1 Historical milestones · 1 Food and drink

Towns near Sasamón

Spain › Castile and León › Burgos › Odra-Pisuerga › Sasamón

What to see and do in Sasamón

Sasamón
Village
Sasamón is a town in the Odra-Pisuerga district, in the province of Burgos, raised on a small hillock and bathed by the Brullés river, south of Villadiego; it has 898 inhabitants and its old quarter was declared a historic ensemble in 2020. Heir to the Roman Segisamo, it was born when Augustus installed there, between 29 and 19 BC, the camp of the Legio IV Macedonica to subdue the Cantabri and Astures, and it was then renamed in his honour Segisama Iulia; it was a communications hub through which Roman roads passed towards Bordeaux and towards Tarragona. In the 11th century King Sancho II made it an episcopal see. It preserves the church of Santa María la Real, the largest temple in the province after Burgos Cathedral, an arch of the old town wall and a small sheep's-cheese industry.
The Sarmental portal of Santa María la Real
Monument
The great Gothic temple, built between the 13th and 16th centuries, repeats on its main doorway the model of the Sarmental at Burgos Cathedral: a Christ in Majesty with the tetramorph and musicians on the archivolts. It is the third-largest temple in the province, after Burgos Cathedral and the church of the Asunción de Melgar de Fernamental, and it was an episcopal see in the early Middle Ages, which is why for a time the bishops of Burgos were also called bishops of Sasamón. The cloister, from the 15th century, is attributed to Juan de Colonia; around 1504 the south nave and the San Miguel doorway, in flamboyant style, were added. Inside, notable features include the chapel of Santiago, with a plateresque altarpiece, and that of San Bartolomé, with an ogival baptismal font.
Augustus's headquarters at Segisama
Historical milestone
From the Celtiberian and Roman Segisama, Augustus directed in person, in the year 26 BC, the start of the Cantabrian Wars. The Legio IV Macedonica camped there and from that site came the city of Segisama Iulia.
The 15th-century arch and wall
Monument
Of the late medieval defences an entrance arch and several stretches of wall are preserved intact, consolidated and restored in 2014. They surrounded a town that the Camino de Santiago kept prosperous for centuries.
The cross of the hermitage of San Isidro
Curiosity
The hermitage holds a fifteenth-century cross considered among those of the finest artistic quality in Spain, with carved scenes from the cycle of salvation on a piece that rarely leaves this village of the páramo.
The churro lechazo of the Odra plateaus
Food and drink
The churro sheep is the second agricultural activity of this cereal comarca, and its milk-fed lamb, protected by the geographical indication Lechazo de Castilla y León, is roasted in a wood-fired oven with only water and salt.