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Peñalver (Municipality, Castilla-La Mancha, Spain)

Flag of Peñalver - Image by "Nethunter", Wikimedia Commons, 7 September 2019

Presentation of Peñalver
Symbols of Peñalver

See also:

Presentation of Peñalver

The municipality of Peñalver (187 inhabitants in 2015; 8,131 ha; presentation) is located 40 km of Guadalajara.

Peñalver is said to have belonged to Queen Berenguaria (1180-1246), the mother of King Ferdinand III the Saint (1199-1252), who was from Guadalajara. Together with Alhóndiga, Peñalver formed a Commandery of the Order of St. John, established in the 13th century. The vilagers first obeyed the Law of Guadalajara until properly chartered in 1272 by the Chapter of the Order. The Commander stayed in the castle erected atop the hill, at the highest point of the village.
Peñalver was granted the status of villa in the middle of the 16th century, as recalled by the pillory erected on the road to Tendilla. In 1552, the town was purchased by Juan Juárez de Carvajal (1485-1584), Bishop of Lugo (1539-1561), who was succeeded by his son, Garcia Juárez de Carvajal. The villagers tabled several legal complaints against their despotic regime. Subsequent lords of Peñalver were the Marquesses of Almenara and the Dukes of Híjar.

Ivan Sache, 7 September 2019

Symbols of Peñalver

The flag of Peñalver is prescribed by an Order adopted on 13 July 2006 by the Government of Castilla-La Mancha and published on 24 July 2006 in the official gazette of Castilla-La Mancha, No. 150, p. 16,116 (text).
The flag is described as follows:

Flag: Quadrangular in proportions 2:3, made of a red panel charged with a white Cross of St. John. The cross shall be in width 70% of the flag's width.

The coat of arms of Peñalver is prescribed by an Order adopted on 13 July 2006 by the Government of Castilla-La Mancha and published on 24 July 2006 in the official gazette of Castilla-La Mancha, No. 150, p. 16,116 (text).
The coat of arms is described as follows:

Coat of arms: Spanish shield. Gules an eight-pointed Cross of St. John, plain white, centered. The shield surmounted by a Royal crown closed.

The flag is a banner of the municipal arms; Philip II's Relaciones Topográticas state that "the town never used another coat of arms than the Cross of St. John, in the time the town belonge to that order".
[Jorge Hurtado Maqueda. 2008-2010. Vexilología local en Guadalajara. Wad-al-Hayara: Revista de estudios de Guadalajara 35-37, 475-505; ]

The Royal Academy of History rejected the proposed symbols. It is not acceptable that a municipality borrows the distinctive cross of the Knights of the Order of St. John for its proper use, designing arms bearing only this charge. Moreover, the Academy recalled "once more" that the "eight-pointed" cross was used on cloth and shields, but is not approriate as an heraldic charge. The Masters and Commanders of the Order never used it in the times of good heraldic practice, but rather used a plain cross throughout, which constitutes the distinctive emblem of the Order.
The flag cannot be approved either since it reproduces the rejected arms.
[Boletín de la Real Academia de la Historia 203:2, 193. 2006]

Ivan Sache, 7 September 2019