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Casasimarro (Municipality, Castilla-La Mancha, Spain)

Last modified: 2019-10-06 by ivan sache
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Flag of Casasimarro - Image by Ivan Sache, 22 June 2019


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Presentation of Casasimarro

The municipality of Casasimarro (3,072 inhabitants in 2018; 4,960 ha) is located 90 km south of Cuenca.

Casasimarro appears to be a relatively recent town, being first documented in 1598 in Philip II's Relación Topográfica; the census relates that the hamlet established in 1470 and named Casa de los Simarro (Simarro's House), for his founder, had grown in 1591 to a village counting 800 inhabitants.
Casasimarro was granted in 1653 the status of villa, separating from Villanueva de la Jara.

Casasimarro is self-styled the Guitare's Capital. The Guitare Monument, composed of five bronze figures and designed by Agustén de la Herrán, stands on the Plaza Mayor in front of the parish church; the erection of the monument was pushed by Casasimarro-borne Luis F. Leal Pinar, a writer and chronicler specialist of Spanish guitars. The monument's upper flagstone, pierced of a guitar-shaped hole, features a guitarist playing zamba, a South African folk music style; the stone is engraved with the lyrics of La Nochera, a zamba composed in 1954 by the Argentine (Salta) musicians Jaime Dávalos (score) and Ernesto Cabeza (lyrics) (performances by Los Chalchaleros and Los Nocheros; by "La Maravillosa" Silvia Pérez Cruz).
[España Bizarra, 27 September 2016
]

Guitar workshops were established in the middle of the 18th century in Casasimarro; their number peaked at 20 in the late 19th century. The tradition is still maintained by a few families.
Vicente Carillo (official video), "born with a guitar in his arms" and representing the 8th generation of manufacturers in Casasimarro since 1744, manufactures guitars of unique sound balance, using wood left drying for 15 to 20 years. He designed guitars for the most famous Spanish flamenco guitarists, such as Paco de Lucéa (1947-2014), Tomatito (b. 1958), El Niño Josele (b. 1974), Vicente Amigo (b. 1967), Pepe Habichuela (b. 1944) and his brother Juan Habichuela (1933-2016), and Pablo Alborán (b. 1989).
In 2007, Keith Richards, the legendary Rolling Stones guitarist, who is fond of Spanish guitars, ordered a Carrillo guitar. Two years later, Richards asked him to create a special, five-corded model for him, which was delivered to him in September 2017. Carillo is working on a third model for Richards.
[Las Noticias de Cuenca, 13 November 2017; El Pais, 22 February 2018]

Casasimarro is also self-styled the Champignon's Capital. A monument erected at the entrance of the town recalls that champignon cultivation is the main source of income for the town. Some 8,000 t are produced each year, accounting for 14% of the total national production.
[España Bizarra, 30 November 2014]

Ivan Sache, 22 June 2019


Symbols of Casasimarro

The flag of Casasimarro is prescribed by an Order issued on 16 November 2005 by the Government of Castilla-La Mancha and published on 30 November 2005 in the official gazette of Castilla-La Mancha, No. 241, p. 22,651 (text).
The flag is described as follows:

Flag: Rectangular, in proportions 2:3. Composed of two equal vertical stripes, at hoist, white with a red house [casa], at fly, red.

The coat of arms of of Casasimarro is prescribed by an Order issued on 16 November 2005 by the Government of Castilla-La Mancha and published on 30 November 2005 in the official gazette of Castilla-La Mancha, No. 241, p. 22,651 (text).
The coat of arms is described as follows:

Coat of arms: Per pale, 1. Argent a house gules masoned sable, 2. Gules a guitar argent. The shield surmounted by a Royal crown closed.

The Royal Academy of History rejected a previous proposal of coat of arms. Among other oddities, the fourth quarter is assigned a color that does not exist in heraldry while the third quarter is charged with the inappropriate association of a palm and a sword. Finally, the shield is surmounted with an odd, meaningless crown.
Nowhere in the memoir is stated which of the 12 related proposals was selected and approved by the Municipal Council.
[Boletín de la Real Academia de la Historia 199:1, 152. 2002]

Ivan Sache, 22 June 2019