Logbook · 7 places

What to see and do in Oncala

What to see and do in Oncala (Tierras Altas, Soria): 7 places across monuments, nature, activities and curiosities, with a photo and a Google Maps location.

1 Villages · 3 Monuments · 1 Nature · 1 Historical milestones · 1 Food and drink

How far each place is from the centre of Oncala

The church of San Millán 50 m
The Flemish tapestries of San Millán 50 m

Towns near Oncala

Spain › Castile and León › Soria › Tierras Altas › Oncala

What to see and do in Oncala

Oncala
Village
Oncala is a Sorian municipality of 61 inhabitants that also groups El Collado, Navabellida and San Andrés de San Pedro, in the north of the province. The village is divided into two quarters joined by a bridge over the río Linares, which rises at the nearby Oncala pass, at 1454 metres. Situated on the transhumance route of the Cañada Real Soriana Oriental, it devotes a museum, housed in an old manor house, to pastoral life along the 700 kilometres of the cañada as far as the Alcudia valley, in Ciudad Real. Its church of San Millán holds ten large 17th-century tapestries, eight of them from the series of the Eucharistic Apotheosis based on paintings by Rubens, woven in Brussels and donated by the Oncala-born Juan Francisco Jiménez del Río, bishop of Segovia and archbishop of Valencia.
The Flemish tapestries of San Millán
Monument
The church holds ten large seventeenth-century tapestries, eight of them from the series of the Eucharistic Apotheosis woven after cartoons by Rubens, with the BB mark of Brussels and the initials of the master tapestry-maker.
The bishop who donated the tapestries
Historical milestone
In the 17th century Juan Francisco Jiménez del Río, a native of Oncala who rose to Bishop of Segovia and Archbishop of Valencia, donated to his parish the ten Flemish tapestries preserved there today, and also financed the hermitage built in the same period.
The Museum of Transhumance
Monument
Installed in a restored mansion, it documents the seven hundred kilometres that the flocks travelled along the Cañada Real Soriana Oriental to the Valle de Alcudia; it is considered one of the main pastoral museums in Spain.
The church of San Millán
Monument
Declared a monument in 1983, it guards the tapestries and presides over a village that also preserves a fronton built in 1890 and still in use, and a stone bridge raised at the end of the eighteenth century without mortar.
The Oncala mountain pass
Nature
At 1,454 metres of altitude, this saddle between the Sierra de Alba and that of San Miguel is the gateway to the Tierras Altas and the place where the river Linares rises; by it the flocks climbed on their way to the winter pastures.
The shepherds' stew
Food and drink
The dish of the flocks on the move was stewed with lamb, onion, pepper and bread, in the cauldron that hung over the fire; the village museum preserves the utensils with which the transhumant shepherds cooked on the road.