Logbook · 5 places

What to see and do in Dueñas

What to see and do in Dueñas (El Cerrato, Palencia): 5 places across monuments, nature, activities and curiosities, with a photo and a Google Maps location.

1 Villages · 1 Monuments · 1 Activities · 1 Curiosities · 1 Historical milestones

How far each place is from the centre of Dueñas

Church of Santa María de Dueñas 200 m

Towns near Dueñas

Spain › Castile and León › Palencia › El Cerrato › Dueñas

What to see and do in Dueñas

Dueñas
Village
Dueñas is a town of about 2,600 inhabitants on the banks of the Pisuerga, in the Palencia district of El Cerrato. It was resettled in the late 9th century by Alfonso III the Great as a fortified stronghold at one of the river's fords, within the defensive line of the middle Duero, and its position as a crossroads on the royal road from Burgos made it a crown town for much of the Middle Ages. In the 15th century it passed to the Acuña family, counts of Buendía, who made it the seat of their seigneurial estates. It preserves houses and cellars dug into the hillside and the church of Santa María de la Asunción, and was declared a conjunto histórico-artístico (a category of protected heritage site in Spain) in 1967. On its outskirts stands the Trappist monastery of San Isidro.
Church of Santa María de Dueñas
Monument
The church of Santa María de la Asunción, the main church of Dueñas (Palencia), forms part of the historic-artistic ensemble of the town centre, a title it has held since 1967. Construction began in the late 12th century in a style transitional between Romanesque and Gothic, a late Romanesque of Cistercian tradition; it is dedicated to the Assumption of Mary, a feast celebrated on 15 August. Inside it holds carvings by artists such as Gregorio Fernández and Diego de Siloé, a Hispano-Flemish main altarpiece, choir stalls and the pantheon of the counts of Buendía. Here, in 1474, the Order of the Golden Fleece was conferred on Fernando de Aragón, who had resided at the palace of the counts of Buendía before marrying Isabel.
Cave houses and wine cellars of Dueñas
Curiosity
The hill on which the town rests is riddled with troglodyte dwellings and with an extensive network of bodegas cut into the rock, an underground architecture that defines the urban profile of Dueñas.
Birth of Infanta Isabella of Aragon
Historical milestone
The firstborn of the Catholic Monarchs, the Infanta Isabel, was born in Dueñas in 1470, a year after her father stayed in the town on his way to the wedding that would unite the crowns of Castile and Aragon.
Botijeras Festival
Activity
On 15 August the town celebrates its Fiestas Botijeras in honour of the Virgin, a name that comes from the legend that gave the residents the nickname of botijeros and that still marks the summer in Dueñas.