Last modified: 2015-01-17 by ivan sache
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![[Flag]](../images/e/es-p-vel.gif)
Flag of Velilla del Río Carrión - Image by "Goldorak" (Wikimedia Commons), 25 May 2011
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The municipality of Velilla del Río Carrión (1,520 inhabitants in 2010; 19,894 ha) is located in the northwest of Palencia Province, on the border with the Cantabria, 100 km from Palencia. The municipality is made of the villages of Alba de los Cardaños (31 inh.), Camporredondo de Alba (98 inh.), Cardaño de Abajo (17 inh.), Cardaño de Arriba (4 inh.); Otero de Guardo (88 inh.), Valcobero (1 inh.), Valsurbio (deserted) and Velilla del Río Carrión (1,282 inh.; capital).
Velilla is believed to be the site of the Cantabrian, pre-Roman town
called Tamarica, famous for its fountains (Latin, fontes tamaricum).
The Tamarica fountains (presentation) are intermittent, filling with water after a
"warning" rumbling and emptying as quickly, without warning. The
filling-emptying cycles are so irregular that they have prevented any
scientific interpretation of the phenomenon up to now. Already
described by Ptolemy and Pliny the Elder, the fountains were for sure
a place of worshipping of aquatic gods by the Cantabrians and,
possibly, of ritual bath and immersion. Later one, water intermittence
was used to pronounce oracles: the one who visited for the first time
the fountain filled up and came back to see the fountain dry was quite
sure to die in the near future. The San Juan de las Aguas Divinas (St.
John the Baptist of the Divine Waters) chapel was built in the 13th
century near such a fountain - the only one preserved up to now,
locally known as La Reana, a probable corruption of La Romana -,
probably to christianize a place of pagan worshipping.
Forgotten for
centuries, the fountain was rediscovered in 1768 by the local
historian and geographer Enrique Flórez. Quickly forgotten once more,
the site was excavated in 1960-1961 by the archeologist Antonio García
y Bellido; only one arch of the original fountain was found, so that
the two missing arches were rebuilt in the 1980s on the model of the
genuine one.
Ivan Sache, 25 May 2011
The flag (photo, Town Hall) and arms of Velilla del Río Carrión, adopted on 25 March 1986
by the Municipal Council and validated by the Royal Academy of
History, are prescribed by a Decree adopted on 7 August 1986 by the
Government of Castilla y León, and published on 18 August 1986 in the
official gazette of Castilla y León No. 93 (text).
The symbols are described as follows:
Flag: Horizontally divided by a serration made of four white pieces and three blue pieces; the staff topped by a Royal Crown or by a sphere; in the middle of the flag is placed the municipal coat of arms.
Coat of arms: Per fess, 1. Azure on waves argent and azure a fountain argent ensigned with an arch or masoned sable, 2a. Azure on waves argent and azure a two-arched bridge or masoned sable, 2b. Azure a two- peaked mount argent. The shield surmounted with a Royal crown closed.
Ivan Sache, 25 May 2011
