Bourbon Enlightenment & Industrial Reform

Castile and the unified Spanish monarchy.

1 chapter

1614 - 1700

After the Morisco expulsion completed in 1614, Castilla-La Mancha entered a Baroque festival culture shaped by Counter-Reformation spectacle. The Corpus Christi procession became the primary stage for communal identity: in Camuñas, the Pecados y Danzantes evolved as a ritual drama where masked "Sins" attack the Custodia before repenting, followed by the Danzantes' choreographed dance. A "Judío Mayor" figure presides—officially an Auto Sacramental allegory, but anthropologist Molinié reads it as crypto-Jewish code. The meaning remains contested; what is certain is that the ritual structure encodes a dialogue between suppression and survival. The Corral de Comedias in Almagro—the only surviving 17th-century theater structure in Spain—hosted the plays that fed this Baroque imagination. The auto sacramental, performed outdoors during Corpus Christi, became the dominant dramatic genre for public religious performance. Stand in the Corral's courtyard and you occupy the exact space where Golden Age audiences experienced the theatrical machinery that shaped festival culture until the Bourbon prohibition of 1765.

1936 - 1978

The Franco regime reoriented regional festivals toward a folkloric narrative of "Spanishness"—regional variety displayed as proof of national unity rather than local distinctiveness. After World War II, the regime rebranded fiesta as apolitical folklore, stripping it of subversive potential while showcasing colorful costumes and dances for tourism. Festival calendars were reshaped to align with national-Catholic norms. In this climate, the Medieval Theater Festival of Hita was founded in 1961 by Manuel Criado de Val, reviving the Arcipreste de Hita's medieval literary world as cultural performance—the oldest such festival in Spain. The botarga traditions of Guadalajara's Serranía—masked winter figures presiding over Nochebuena, Navidad, Año Nuevo, and Carnaval—survived as "picturesque folklore," their ritual logic reframed as entertainment. The Ruta de las Botargas now connects these dispersed winter festivals across the province, but the question remains: what did the folklorization process erase from their original communal function?

1492 - 1614

The year 1492 saw both the expulsion of the Jews and the fall of Granada, ending Muslim political power in Iberia. In Toledo, the Sinagoga del Tránsito—built by Samuel ha-Leví in 1357—was confiscated and converted; today it houses the Museo Sefardí, preserving the material memory of a community that shaped the city for centuries. The Morisco expulsion (1609–1614) hit La Mancha unevenly: in Villarubia de los Ojos, approximately 250 Moriscos resisted three expulsion orders, with many returning and Felipe IV eventually ratifying their privileges—proving that integration could challenge even state-driven removal. This era also produced the earliest documented syncretic festivals. La Endiablada (documented from 1500) encodes a ritual structure where diablos with cencerros must "ask permission" to begin—Christian institutional control layered over potentially older ritual forms. The Caballada de Atienza commemorates the 1162 liberation of child-king Alfonso VIII by arrieros, whose cofradía still conducts auctions in wheat measures (celemines de trigo) rather than money, preserving an agrarian economic logic from the medieval frontier.

From 1978

Spain's democratic transition brought heritage legislation and international recognition. The 1978 Constitution enabled autonomous cultural policy; Castilla-La Mancha's Law 4/2013 established a comprehensive framework for conserving, protecting, and enriching cultural heritage. The Tamborada de Hellín—where peñas of drummers produce unbroken rhythmic sound day and night during Semana Santa—was inscribed on UNESCO's Intangible Heritage list as part of the broader tamboradas network. Cuenca's historic walled city, a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1996, anchors the region's architectural patrimony. The Mondas of Talavera, declared Fiesta de Interés Turístico in 2009, continues its 2,000-year arc from Roman Ceres cult to modern celebration—rams still pull the Carrito de Mondas through the streets, as they did in the Ludi Ceriales. The Gitano community of Albacete, documented since the 15th century, maintains cultural visibility through International Roma Day celebrations at the city hall. What you experience today is a heritage landscape where BIC declarations, UNESCO inscriptions, and community custodianship intersect—sometimes reinforcing, sometimes competing over which layers of the past deserve protection.