Last modified: 2020-11-14 by ivan sache
Keywords: cedillo |
Links: FOTW homepage |
search |
disclaimer and copyright |
write us |
mirrors
![[Flag]](../images/e/es-cc-ce.gif)
Flag of Cedillo - Image by Ivan Sache, 20 March 2020
See also:
The municipality of Cedillo (458 inhabitants in 2017; 6,156 ha; municipal website), the westernmost municipality in the province, is located 120 km west of Cáceres, on the border with Portugal.
Cedillo was established in the 16th century by fishers who operated a boat on river Tagus in a place known as Puerto Viejo (Old Port). Their customers were travelers heading to the Portuguese town of Castelo Branco. Subsequently moved away from the river to a place called Cabezo Chozo, the village that emerged, composed of ten huts, was known to the Portuguese as Casalinho (lit., "a very small settlement").
The modern name of the village was coined at the end of the 18th century, as Monte de Zedillo, renamed in the early 19th century to Cedillo as ceded (cedido) by Portugal to Spain when the delimitation of the border was achieved.
Cedillo was dependent on Herrera de Alcántara until made an independent municipality in 1838.
An hydro-electric plant and a dam were built in the 1960s by Hidroeléctrica Española on the municipal territory of Cedillo, providing a main source of income for the village.
Ivan Sache, 20 March 2020
The flag and arms of Cedillo, adopted on 2& January 2000 by the Municipal Council and validated on 9 November 2004 by the Assessing Council of Honors and Distinctions of the Government of Extremadura, are prescribed by an Order issued on 15 November 2004 by the Government of Extremadura and published on 4 December 2004 in the official gazette of Extremadura, No. 141, pp. 14,548-14,549 (text).
The symbols are described as follows:
Flag: Quadrangular, in proportions 2:3. Vertically divided into two equal parts, blue at hoist and white at fly. Charged in the center with the crowned coat of arms of the municipality of Cedillo.
Coat of arms: Per fess, 1a. Or a holly oak vert on a base of the same, 1b. Gules a dolmen argent, 2. Argent a boat gules on waves azure and argent. A bordure argent charged with eight crosses flory vert. The shield surmounted by a Royal crown closed.
The dolmen recalls the megalithic funerary complex excavated in Cedillo by Jorge Oliveira (University of Évora). The complex is composed of 23 small dolmens built with slates, of hardly 1-2 m in high, which were incorporated into a bigger tumulus. This structure is quite different from the bigger dolmens found in Valencia de Alcántara and Alentejo (Portugal).
[Municipal website]
The "crosses flory vert" are the crosses of the Order of Alcántara.
Ivan Sache, 20 March 2020