#apostle of hate: romeo moore | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

salytierra · 7 years

Note

Hello there! :D I'm a huge fan of mythologies from various different cultures, so I was wondering if you could tell a bit about Spanish mythology? Anything from mythical creatures to popular legends. Thank you in advance! ^^

SPANISH LEGENDS AND MYTHOLOGY

Hello! Sorry for taking so long to answer. Unfortunately, this theme is not my specialty at all, but I’ll try my best to give you a decent answer :’D

PRE-ROMAN IBERIANS

Little is known about Iberian customs and beliefs. They had a very rich and flourishing culture and social life, but all the written testimony had been lost due to the fact that their writing has not bee de-codified yet. Apparently they were polytheists and, according to the late chronicles of roman historians during the invasion, had received a lot of religious influence from Phoenicians and Greeks, their permanent trade partners for centuries. There had been some discoveries like The Lady of Baza and the Lady of Elche that suggest a strong leadership by Priestesses in the religious life.

As for mythology, it had been heavily inspired by the Helenic beliefs about this part of the world. According to Carthaginian chronicles there used to be a temple where the “Columns of Heracles” were supposed to be, at the edge of the Strait of Gibraltar. Hannibal Barca is said to have sworn eternal hate to Rome in that temple. One of the theories also say that he gave name to the city of Barcelona and the Columns of Heracles are still present in the Spanish Crest of Arms.

Still, most of the known Iberian mythology is like: “here supposedly be a rock where something happened according to other people.”

A myth/legend/weird history thing worth mentioning though is Tartessos:

TARTESSOS

Tartessos is, crudely said, the Iberian Atlantis. Although to be fair Atlantis was probably made up by Plato but Tartessos has been definitively proven to have been real in the recent research. The problem is that nobody knows where the heck it was.

Supposedly it was a great coastline civilization miles ahead of its surrounding regions and of their time, with a rich culture and technology, that just disappeared without leaving any trace. It’s fall is mostly consistent with the fall of Phoenicia, around the Vth century BC.

Some theories say that Tartessos had been wiped out by a Tsunami, since its a region of heavy seismic activity, others that it just died out with the end of the Phoenician commerce or that the surrounding cultures caught up and they stopped being special, thus just mixing around and disappearing.

In any case, it’s a mystery!

THE CELTIC NORTH-WEST

Their legends and mythology are far clearer, more documented, and survive to this day. However, I don’t think I can surprise you with any of them because (according to my tour guide in Santiago) most of them can be found in other regions of Celtic descend, specially in Ireland.

Of the most “recent” (middle ages) The Holy Procession (the procession of the dead dressed in white that you can find walking around at midnight) comes to mind, also the meigas, sort of witches, and bruixas, their nice, cool equivalent that people liked.

St. JAMES THE MOOR-SLAYER

This is an individual legend but it’s very important. So, in Galicia they say rest the bones of the Apostle St. James (Santiago), which turned it into the hotspot for pilgrimage, specially after the Muslims in the east cut the christian pilgrimage routes to Jerusalem and started killing the pilgrims. So like, the next best option, and way safer, was the restplace of St. James, crossing the territories of the Catholic Kingdoms of Hispania.

PS: Leaving aside the fascinating legend of how his rests got there (it involves a stone boat, a couple of bulls and a truckload of scallops), the first touristic-guide in the world is believed to be a guide to the way of St. James, the Codex Calixtinus, written around the year 1135.

According to the Legend, the Asturian King Ramiro I was visited by the Apostle Santiago clad in battle wear the night before a big battle with the moors, and the next day, at the battlecry of “Santiago!” the troops of Ramiro won a seemingly impossible battle. From then on and through the centuries variations of “For Spain and for Santiago!” (Santiago and charge, Spain!, For Santiago and the Spains!, etc…) became the official cry of the Spanish Army and the apostle Santiago is the patron Saint of Spain.

PS: Around the same period we also find a lot of legends and lore related to the Templars and the military orders of the Peninsula (Santiago, Calatrava, Alcántara, Montesa in Spain and Avis in Portugal)

THE LOVERS OF TERUEL

Sometimes called “the Spanish Romeo & Juliet” it’s in my opinion a way better story, not only it has been proven to have elements of truth in it, but because nobody is fucking 13!

Funnily enough for a short while this legend had been accused of being a copy of one included in the Decameron of Boccaccio until it had been discovered that the first instances of it date back to a whole century before the Decameron was written, so it may have been actually the other way ‘round.

Anyway, the events were supposed to have happened in the city of Teruel in the year 1217. A young boy Diego (sometimes called Juan) of the Marcilla family and the girl Isabel of the Segura family, grew up playing together and when their teenage hormones hit hard, fell in love.

However, even though the Marcilla family was important, it was not as important as the Segura family and Diego was the second son, meant to inherit nothing. There was no way he could marry the only daughter and heiress of the Segura family. So he struck a deal with her father: he’d go to war (meaning la Reconquista) fight hard, rise in rank and earn a world of wealth in five years. If in that time he returned rich, he’d marry Isabel.

So he left. Passed some years, Isabel’s father started insisting in her to get married but, and here comes my favorite part, she refused on the premise that she had to remain a maiden until 20, because no woman should get married before she learned how to manage a household. And her father, as any good middle-ages dad, that loved and respected his daughter, agreed with her.

However, when the five years passed and Diego didn’t return, Isabel believed him dead and agreed to marry Don Pedro of Azagra. However, right after the ceremony, Diego returned with great riches! Too late tho. His beloved was already married.

So he sneaked up into her and her husband’s bedroom at night and asked her for a kiss: “kiss me, for I’m dying!”. She refused on the terms that she would not be unfaithful to her husband, he asked her again and she refused again.

So Diego just dropped dead of heartache.

Isabel woke up her husband and told him what happened. He was like “but why didn’t you kiss him?!” so she told him she hadn’t wanted to betray her husband, so he was “you truly are a woman worth of praise.”

They sneaked him out of their home in the middle of the night and left him in a local church, so the husband wouldn’t get blamed for his death.

The next day the funeral ceremony took place and Isabel came, dressed in her wedding gown, and leaning over Diego’s body gave him the kiss that she had refused him in life.

And then she also fell dead.

The husband then told everyone in the church their story and the town agreed to bury them together, so at least in death they would be side by side.

Their inexplicably mummified bodies were discovered in 1555 during repair works at the San Pedro church, in Teruel, next to a document dating to the formerly stated year, corroborating the popular legend.

Since with time the fame of this story spread around Spain. The mummies now lay in a chapel and in marble tombs with exquisitely sculpted lids by the artist Juan de Ávalos y Taborda.

Written as a part of the @aphaskevent

Country embassy: Spain (in case it wasn’t clear… xD)

Sorry for not being able to tell any better stories, and this probably doesn’t answer your question, but I just thought it better not to talk too much on stuff I didn’t know about and focus on what I did.

#hetaliafandomhub #aphaskevent #aph spain #spain #spanish mythology #aph #aph ambassador #embassy board #kimanda #answers #pictures from wikimedia

64 notes · View notes