Showcase — Santa Bárbara de Casa
A village-scale walk through one Andévalo municipality: the Dolmen de La Zarcita above town, the merged hamlets of El Hornacho + Los Palacios, the patronal cult of Saint Barbara, and the 1916 renaming.
Part of Andévalo
9 moments in this segment.
- — Plaza de la Constitución. The village's main square — Plaza de la Constitución in democratic-era nomenclature — anchored by the town hall, the parish church, and the bar. The morning market and the patronal-feast processions all start here.
- — The Iberian Pyrite Belt. an arc of pyrite and copper-rich rock stretching from Aljustrel in Portugal through Tharsis, Riotinto, and Sotiel to Aznalcóllar near Seville — is rediscovered by 19th-century geology. Investors from London, Paris, and Glasgow begin buying concessions.
- — Tharsis under British control. The Tharsis Sulphur and Copper Company (Glasgow) takes over the historic Roman site immediately south of Santa Bárbara de Casa. By the late 1860s it is the largest pyrite producer in Europe; its 50-mile mineral railway to the port at Huelva is operating before Riotinto's.
- — Riotinto sold to the British. On 14 February 1873 the Spanish state sells the Riotinto mines for 92.8 million pesetas to a consortium led by Hugh Matheson (Matheson & Co., London) and the Deutsche Bank. The mines pass out of Spanish ownership for the next 81 years; the company-town era begins immediately.
- — Riotinto-Huelva railway inaugurated. The mineral railway from Minas de Riotinto to the port of Huelva is inaugurated on 26 July 1875 — La Ilustración Española y Americana publishes the engravings that summer. Eighty kilometres of British-built track, locomotive-hauled ore wagons, and a deep-water dock at the Huelva ría.
- — Bella Vista — British company town. Bella Vista, just outside Minas de Riotinto, is built by the British company as a residential suburb for British engineers and managers — bungalows, a tennis club, a Presbyterian church, an English-language school. The architectural anomaly is still visible.
- — Año de los Tiros — Riotinto massacre. On 4 February 1888 the army opens fire on a crowd of miners and townspeople protesting the open-air sulphur roasting ("teleras") that was poisoning the surrounding valleys. Dozens are killed — the official figure has never been agreed. Spanish-language environmental and labour history dates from this incident.
- — Feria de Santa Bárbara. The patronal feria, around 4 December (Saint Barbara's day), brings the village together for processions, a parish mass, traditional dance, and a communal meal in the square. Like most Andévalo ferias the modern celebration combines liturgy, folklore, and a livestock fair.
- — The Andévalo empties. The Riotinto and Tharsis company towns concentrate ~30,000 workers between them by the 1890s; the wages, the company stores, the company hospitals, and the company schools all pull from the surrounding villages. Santa Bárbara, Paymogo, Cabezas Rubias — the population peaks early and starts declining as the mines absorb the young.
