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Last modified: 2020-11-05 by ivan sache
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Flag of Aldeanueva del Camino - Image by Ivan Sache, 19 March 2020
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The municipality of Aldeanueva del Camino (791 inhabitants in 2015, 1,970 ha; municipal website) is located 110 km north of Cáceres, on the border with Castilla y León (Province of Salamanca).
Aldeanueva del Camino emerged as a Roman camp located on the Silver Way, as evidenced by remains of dwellings, bridges, engraved stones and funerary steles.
After the Christian reconquest, the village was divided into two parts separated by the Silver Way: Casas de Aldeanueva (The New Village's Houses) was allocated to Castile while Aldeanueva del Camino (The Way's New Village) was allocated to León. The Castilian village was incorporated to the Duchy of Béjar and the Diocese of Plasencia, while the Leonese village was incorporated to the Duchy of Alba and the Diocese of Coria. Accordingly, the village has two churches, locally known as the upper and the lower church, respectively.
The village was administratively reunited by a Royal Decree signed in 1834. For religious matters, the two parishes were merged in 1959, being incorporated to the Diocese of Coria-Cáceres.
Aldeanueva del Camino was chartered in 1438 by Queen Mary of Aragón, John II's wife. The charter was confirmed in 1492 by the Catholic Monarchs and in 1518 by Joanna the Mad. The expelling of the Jewish community caused the decline of the village.
Located in a strategic location on the Silver Way, the village was burned down on 8 April 1808 by the French troops stationed in Puerto de Béjar. Aldeanueva was burned down again in 1835 by the Carlists, who were eventually repelled to BBéjar by the national militia of the village.
Aldeanueva del Camino peaked in 1875, in the aftermath of the inauguration of the railway station. Its weekly market, dating back to the 17th century, was then the biggest cattle market in Extremadura.
The village is now famous all over Spain for chili pepper - more than one million kg is produced every year by four factories.
Aldeanueva del Camino is the birth place of the chemist Tomás Batuecas Marugán (1893-1972; biography), appointed in 1932 Professor of Physics and Chemistry at the University of Santiago (and the first in Spain to hold this title). Batuecas proposed an accurate method of determination of atomic weight of gaseous elements, based on the carbon-12 nuclide, and of crystallized pure elements (Al, Mg, Si, Na, K, As, Pb). In the 16th IUPAC Conference, held in Montreal, Batuecas, then President of the International Atomic Weights Commission, presented a standard scale of evaluation of these weights, subsequently adopted as the international scale of atomic weights.
Aldeanueva del Camino is the birth place of the sculptor Angel Duarte y Jiménez (1930-2007; biography). Originally interested in visual expressionism, Duarte was jailed during the Civil War and emigrated to Paris in 1954, where he was initiated to kinetic art. He founded in 1957 the Equipo 57 collective, together with Agustín Ibarrola, Juan Serrano and José Duarte. Angel Duarte settled in Sion (Switzerland) in 1961, where he carried on signing his works under the name of the collective, until its dissolution in 1965. Several of Duarte's works are based on geometric structures, especially the hyperbolic paraboloid.
Duarte was awarded the Picasso Prize, the Medal of Extremadura and the Golden Medal of Arts. His giant sculpture called E.26 AI (photos) stands in the neighborhood of Aldeanueva del Camino, close to the Silver Way.
Ivan Sache, 19 March 2020
The flag and arms of Aldeanueva del Camino, adopted on 30 June 1992 and 27 April 1993 by the Municipal Council and validated on 24 November 1992 and 15 February 1993 by the Assessing Council of Honors and Distinctions of the Government of Extremadura, are prescribed by an Order issued on 2 June 1993 by the Government of Extremadura and published on 15 June 1993 in the official gazette of Extremadura, No. 70, pp. 1,740-1,741 (text).
The symbols are described as follows:
Flag: Rectangular, in proportions 2:3, made of a white diagonal stripe running from the lower hoist to the upper fly, the triangle at hoist, red, and the triangle at fly, yellow.
Coat of arms: Quarterly, 1. Argent a lion rampant purpure, 2. Azure a bridge or, 3. Vert a cotice argent, 4. Gules a castle or masoned sable port and windows azure. The shield surmounted by a Royal crown closed.
Ivan Sache, 19 March 2020
