Speak the Culture: Spain: Be Fluent in Spanish Life and Culture

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1. Identity: the
   building blocks of
   2. Literature
   and philosophy
   3. Art and
   architecture
   4. Performing
   arts
   5. Cinema
   and fashion
   6. Media and
   communications
   7. Food and drink 8. Living culture:
   the details of

iv. Extremadura

In Spain you rarely have to search too hard to find the

old country, but in Extremadura it simply envelops you.

Blanketed by calm, the region clearly enjoyed its heyday

some time ago and few visitors make it out this way

today. But the good old days live on in Extremadura’s

wealth of aged remains. Regional capital Mérida, with

its aqueduct and theatre, has some of Spain’s best

Roman architecture, while Cáceres melts your heart

with its rambling Jewish quarter. Elsewhere, the

whitewashedpuebloof southern Spain takes root in

medieval Zafra. In the north of Extremadura the green

sierras, valleys and lakes conceal some of Spain’s best

wildlife, undisturbed except for a handful of languid

villages.The natural beauty is most intense in the

Parque Natural de Monfragüe where if you hang around

long enough you might even glimpse an Iberian lynx.

Almost a third of
Extremadurans, known
for their hardy nature,
still work in agriculture.

Land of the
conquistadores
Faced with only a
handful of career
choices, nearly all of
them involving sheep,
it’s hardly surprising that
so many Extremadurans
set sail for the New
World in the early 16th
century. Many of Spain’s
infamousconquistadores
came from the region.
Hernán Cortés was
from Medellín and
Francisco Pizarro, who
defeated the Incas, from
Trujillo where his house
still stands. New World
travellers returned
to Extremadura with
sizeable fortunes and
threw their cash into the
grand new townhouses.
Many a famous city in
the Americas bears the
name of its Extremaduran
antecedent, not least
Albuquerque in New
Mexico and Medellín,
Columbia’s second city.

Dark arts: three gritty

Extremadurafiestas

You might want to

leave the little ones at

home for some of

Extremadura’s traditional

festivals. In Aceúche,

local folk dress in

hideous masks and

animal hides for Las

Carantoñas each

January. The contrite

folk of Valverde de la

Vera are bound by the

torso to a beam, arms

splayed, given a crown

of thorns and marched

through town every

Maundy Thursday in the

Los Empalaosfiesta.

Finally, at the nearby

village of Villanueva de

la Vera, the town’s men

taunt and beat a large

effigy of Pero Palo until

his head falls off and

the annual February

party can begin.