History and Art

The history of Villabragima can be told through its monuments:

    * The Arch: this arch was said to represent a gate which divided the village into two parts, the Christian village and the Jewish village. This doorway was closed all days and was only opened on Thursdays because it was the market day. That day Jewish people crossed it and exchanged their products with Christian people. There is a hole on this arch through which the sun lights come through only on Saint John´s Day.

    * St. Mary´s church : it was built at the beginning of the XVI century and three stonemasons worked in the tower.Diego de Aguilar, García del Castillo and Diego de Ochoa, as it is written on the accounts book of the church from 1513.

   In 1521 Giralte de Bruselas and Gonzalo de Maza, great sculptores, worked on the main altarpiece, the same as Martín Fonseca, who painted the so mentioned altarpiece which was destroyed on a fire in 1790. It was replaced by a great painting fitted into a Baroque framework and represents the Virgin with the Offering of the sheepers and the Epiphany on both sides.

    In 1570 Juan de Nantes, one of the main followers of Herrera, worked in the church to repair the old foundations and was paid 40,447 reales.

    It is also known that in St.Mary´s porch was the first meeting of Juan de Austria with his stepbrother Felipe II, who stopped there for resting on his way to St Espina for hunting. Both of them met there at the porch that was before a staging post.

    Moreover, there was a tunnel in St Mary´s sacristy which led to the nunnery that was beyond the Arch (nowadays it is the cinema). This tunnel linked the castles in Medina de Rioseco and Tordehumos with the palace in Villabrágima. The three Castillian rebels walked through this tunnel before being captured in Villalar.

    * The Saint Christ´s chapel was founded by the Earl of Rivadavia.There is a complicated fan vaulting and a Baroque altarpiece where there is a crucifix from the XVI century. The facade´s doorway is in a Plateresque style.

    * Saint Gines´s facade was declared National Monument and has been restored recently.It is believed that the same people who worked in St Mary´s church built it. It has got balustrade columns which divide the altarpiece into three vertical levels.On its sides there are five reliefs with the Passion scenes separated by friezes with fine Renaissance elements. The central altarpiece is of great value, with reliefs and fine wood hardworks and with the Assumption and the Calvary sculptures.Over the Sacrarium there is a small image of Saint Ginés, the Saint who gives name to the parish and who wears a martyrdom palm.

    The carved works, mainly the reliefs are carved in a delicate way, showing movement and displayed in a right way, whose author was an important artisan, but the author is unknown because there are no data in the parish registry and in no other places too.It is from 1538 more or less, its style follows that of Francisco Giralte, when he had his workshop in Palencia.

    In the baptistery chapel there is an excellent alabaster relief of Christ Christening in an Italian way.