Logbook · 6 places

What to see and do in Frades de la Sierra

What to see and do in Frades de la Sierra (Guijuelo, Salamanca): 6 places across monuments, nature, activities and curiosities, with a photo and a Google Maps location.

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

Towns near Frades de la Sierra

Spain › Castile and León › Salamanca › Guijuelo › Frades de la Sierra

What to see and do in Frades de la Sierra

Frades de la Sierra
Village
Frades de la Sierra is a municipality in the province of Salamanca, in the sub-comarca of Entresierras, within the comarca of Guijuelo and the route of Jamón Ibérico with designation of origin. Its origin goes back to Roman times, when Tholomeo recorded it as Tulciae Salmantinae; Alfonso IX of León definitively reconquered it and incorporated it into the quarter of Corvacera under the name Fradres. The Catholic Monarchs granted it the Fuero Real, which freed it from all lordship and incorporated it into the crown. In 1870 the poet José María Gabriel y Galán was born here, and in 1916 the village took its present name. With 163 inhabitants together with Navarredonda de Salvatierra, it preserves and shows the poet's birthplace.
The birthplace of Gabriel y Galán
Monument
The house where the poet José María Gabriel y Galán was born on 28 June 1870, son of the agricultural landowners Narciso Gabriel and Bernarda Galán, is preserved in Frades de la Sierra and can be visited; it is the main cultural attraction of a municipality of little more than 160 inhabitants. Gabriel y Galán spent his childhood here before moving to Salamanca and then to Madrid to study teaching (Magisterio), and worked as a teacher in Guijuelo and in Piedrahíta before marrying in 1898 and settling in Guijo de Granadilla, in Cáceres, where he died in 1905. He wrote both in Castilian and in the Extremaduran dialect known as castúo, the language in which he composed, among other poems, El Cristu benditu.
The birth of Gabriel y Galán
Historical milestone
José María Gabriel y Galán, the poet who brought the speech and life of the Salamancan and Extremaduran countryside into literature, was born on 28 June 1870 in Frades de la Sierra, into a family of agricultural landowners, the son of Bernarda Galán, who was fond of poetry. He studied teaching (Magisterio) in Salamanca and Madrid, and at nineteen travelled to Galicia, an experience that inspired his first poems. He worked as a teacher in Guijuelo and in Piedrahíta, where he signed his letters as El Solitario because of his melancholic character, until his marriage in 1898 to Desideria Vila Gascón changed his life: he gave up teaching and settled in Guijo de Granadilla, in Cáceres, where the poetry that made him famous matured. In his honour, the town changed its official name from Frades to Frades de la Sierra in 1916.
The source of the Alagón River
Nature
The Alagón River rises in the district of Frades de la Sierra, in Salamanca, and is a right-bank tributary of the Tagus; after passing Monleón, it crosses into the province of Cáceres, passes through Coria and delivers its waters to the Tagus near Alcántara. Already in Cáceres territory, its waters are impounded in three reservoirs: Gabriel y Galán, the largest in capacity, which regulates flow and generates electricity; El Pontón, in Guijo de Granadilla; and Valdeobispo, for irrigation. The PRSA1 trail, the Ruta del Alto Alagón, follows the river's course through its Salamancan stretch over twelve stages and eighty kilometres, from its source in Frades to its entry into Cáceres territory, passing through Endrinal, Monleón, San Esteban de la Sierra, Valero, Garcibuey and Sotoserrano, on the way to the Sierra de Francia.
The church of San Vicente
Monument
The parish church, under the dedication of San Vicente, presides over the houses of a town that Alfonso X rewarded with franchises and a title of loyalty for the help its households gave him in the conquest of the kingdom of Murcia.
The Iberian ham of the Guijuelo area
Food and drink
The municipal district is included in the area covered by the Guijuelo denomination of origin, where the dry winter cold allows the slow curing of Iberian ham; the settlement keeps its own slaughterhouses and butchers' shops despite its small population.