Last modified: 2018-10-06 by ivan sache
Keywords: belbimbre |
Links: FOTW homepage |
search |
disclaimer and copyright |
write us |
mirrors
![[Flag]](../images/e/es-bu-be.gif)
Flag of Belbimbre - Image by Ivan Sache, 30 August 2018
See also:
The municipality of Belbimbre (64 inhabitants in 2017, 1,023 ha) is
located 40 km of Burgos.
Belbimbre was named for the Latin words vallis, "a valley", and
vimen ("a willow", in Spanish, mimbre or bimbre), therefore
Willow's Valley. Willows indeed grow profusely on the banks of rivers
Arlanzón and Cogollos. A document dated 952 lists the place as "val de
vimen" and 'valle de vimen". The popular etymology referring to villa
del mimbre, Willow's Town, is not supported by historical data. Neither
are etymologies based on the verbs vivere, "to live", or bibe, "to
drink", and the adverb bene, "well". The medieval form Benevivere was
probably euphoniously derived; other forms used in the Middle Ages are
Benbie (978), Benvire (1248 and 1380), and Benbibre.
[L. Zúmel Menocal. 1977. El complejo arqueológico de Belbimbre (Burgos), testimonio de una intensa labor romanizadora en el Bajo Arlanzón. Boletín de la Institución Fernán González, 56, 189, 215-227].
The village was built on the lower slopes of Cerro del Castillo (Castle's Hill), which is still topped by the ruins of a medieval fortress.
Ivan Sache, 30 August 2018
The flag and arms of Belbimbre are prescribed by an Agreement adopted on
30 January 2018 by the Municipal Council, signed on 19 March 2018 by the
Mayor and published on 26 March 2018 in the official gazette of Castilla
y León, No. 60, p. 12,243 (text).
The symbols, supported by a memoir submitted on 24 October 2017 by the
Spanish Vexillological Society, are described as follows:
Flag: Rectangular, in proportions 2:3. Composed of a red panel, charged with a white isosceles triangle, with the base along the hoist and the height reaching the flag's center. The white triangle charged with the coat of arms of Belbimbre, in height half of the flag's width.
Coat of arms: Argent a bush of willow withes vert (green) in chief two crosses gules (red) chaussé gules (red) dexter a castle or masoned sable port and windows azure sinister a double Roman stele or. The shield surmounted by a Royal Spanish crown.
The willow withes refer to the etymology of Belbimbre. The castle is
represented as on the arms of Castile, and may also refer to the old
fortress of Belbimbre.
The Roman stele was found by chance in August 1975 by Emeterio Peña
Pascual, a farmer from Barrio de Muño, in the archeological complex of
Belbimbre. The complex includes a pre-Roman fortified camp (castrum),
the Roman villa of Cotarro del Monje, a section of a Roman road, remains
of a Roman settlement and a necropolis, from which the stele was excavated.
The stele (75 cm x 50 cm x 25 cm) is a funerary monument dedicated by a
father to his son. The Latin inscription was reconstructed as
"Consecrated to the Manes, Æmilius Clemens, father, dedicates this stele
to his most Christian son, Æmilius Stelenius, died when 35 years of
age". Based on a stylistic analysis, the stele was dated to the 4th century.
[L. Zúmel Menocal. 1977. El complejo arqueológico de Belbimbre (Burgos), testimonio de una intensa labor romanizadora en el Bajo Arlanzón. Boletín de la Institución Fernán González, 56, 189, 215-227].
Ivan Sache, 30 August 2018