The Alcarria

Flower lavender fields in Brihuega

The Alcarria is a natural Castilian region located in the southern sub-plateau, which includes most of the center and south of the province of Guadalajara, the northwest of the province of Cuenca and the southeast of the province of Madrid, and some municipalities in the region of Tarancón (Cuenca) and the table of Ocaña (Toledo) can also be considered from Alcarria. It is a transitory region between the mountains of the Iberian system and the La Mancha plain.

Geographically, it is formed by a tabular relief crowned by the structural surface of the limestone páramo that is continuously cut from north to south by rivers and streams that form narrow glacis and marly slopes and deep fertile valleys. This generates a geomorphology that produces a notable contrast between the holm oak groves and dryland agriculture of the páramo, and the small orchards, olive groves and aromatic herbs of the slopes and valleys.

Precisely, the abundance of aromatic plants such as rosemary, thyme, lavender or lavender make possible the beekeeping that produces honey from La Alcarria. Other products given in the region are the lamb of the Alcarreña breed, the oil of the Alcarria and the wines of denomination of origin of Mondéjar and Sacedón y Arganda.

The anthropogenic landscape of the Alcarria has been the contextual framework of several famous literary works, among which Journey to the Alcarria by Camilo José Cela stands out.

Etymology

The name alcarria comes from the Andalusian Arabic and modern Arabists identify it with the term al-Qaryat, the same as alquería, a name given to small farmhouses and that, some, have evolved into small towns. In fact, there are many constructions of this type that have been and are in this region or are present in place names. Today the term alcarria is given the meaning of "high, low ground and with little grass". The adjective proper to the region is alcarreño.

Extent and limits

Approximate extension of the Alcarria, between the provinces of Madrid, Guadalajara and Cuenca.

As it is a natural region, there is no clarity on the geographical limits of the Alcarria in its northeast and eastern part, where it connects with the Sierra Ministra and the moors of Molina. In addition, the Alcarria, in its definition as a geological peculiarity, does not coincide with the historical Alcarria, somewhat broader, with towns such as Cifuentes and Brihuega and part of the land located to the north of the Tagus. From north to west it is delimited by the polygon formed by the Henares, Jarama and Tagus rivers, as the geological and morphological limit of the Alcarria moor. To the south, the Cuenca Alcarria is institutionalized through the PRODER 2 program of the Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Environment that includes CEDER Alcarria Conquense.

The 187 municipalities currently considered as members of La Alcarria add up to 8456 km², of which 4488 km² administratively belong to the province of Guadalajara; 2480 km² to that of Cuenca; and 1488 km² to Madrid.

Usually several zones are distinguished within the Alcarria region itself depending on each of the provinces where it extends. Thus, in the province of Guadalajara, where the Alcarria has the greatest extension, a distinction is made between the Alcarria Alta, in the northernmost area, on the right bank of the Tajuña River, where the Alcarreño páramo reaches its highest altitude, and the Alcarria Baja, in the southernmost area, on the left bank of the Tajuña and around the Tagus plain. Also in the Community of Madrid, the Tajuña serves as a separation between the páramos of Alcarria de Alcalá, to the north, and Alcarria de Chinchón, to the south. In the southernmost part, from the left bank of the Tagus and Guadiela rivers, they speak of the Cuenca Alcarria because it extends into the province of Cuenca.

The region is described in the first volume of the Geographical-statistical-historical dictionary of Spain and its overseas possessions by Pascual Madoz as follows:

ALCARRIA: terr. ant. of Spain which occupies most of the prov. of Guadalajara and confine by N. with Jadraque, Cogolludo and Sigüenza; by E. with the part of Molina and kingdom of Aragon; by S. with land of Cuenca and by O. with Alcalá de Henares, prov. of Madrid. The field understood in this circumference is rough, for it presents a multitude of hills being in some parts so high that they cause admiration to the traveler. The airs crash in the cuts of the mountains and produce a sharp and prolonged sound that repeating the echo makes it disappear to great dist. After becoming a deaf noise that easily frightens a dull soul. They contribute more to producing this noise the many oak and holm oak mountains that are where scelentes woods for artifacts are gathered. There is also no shortage of pastures that are of excellent quality, which is why a large number of cattle that make up the country's main wealth are grown in their countryside. Honey is found in abundance, because producing the soil many aromatic flowers flock huge flocks of bees that leave the fruit of their afans to the natural. Looks like a terr. He must be uninhabited, but it is not so, because he has 14 peoples in his womb, the other consideration being Guadalajara, whose people he had. they take advantage of the amenable vegas that lie between the hills and make quite fruitful with the waters that descend from them and those of the r. Tajo, Tajuña, Guadiela and Henares, crossing the term. This is from mineral sources and baths, the most appreciated in Sacedon and Trillo (V. these art.) are found quite olive groves, vineyards, fruit trees, orchards and many medicinal plants. The waters of the espressados r. besides being used in irrigation, are used to put in motion flour mills and several sheets of paper. It is part of the ind of these habs. the charcoal of wood that is not used for the construction of artifacts, of which it is a usefulness as great as honey, which gather in abundance, so all are in a mediumship.

(Madoz, 1845, p. 429)

Geology

Geomorphology

Landscape in the municipality of El Valle de Altomira.

The tabular relief, with the intercalation of moors and valleys such as the Henares, forms the landscape of the Alcarria.

The geomorphology of the Alcarria is dominated by a tabular relief where the páramo surfaces are interspersed by valleys of the Henares, Tajuña and Tajo rivers, and minor tributary troughs of these, opened by water action on a substrate whose petrological genesis It is due, fundamentally and, in general, to a prolonged process of endorheic sedimentation of all the denuded materials of the main mountain ranges that flank the region, that is, the Central system to the north and west and the Iberian system to the east and the South.

This endorheism was interrupted on several occasions throughout the Cenozoic, for reasons of a tectonic nature, generating drainage networks on the resulting terrain that, depending on the situation, have flowed in different directions, dragging and depositing sediments whose nature can be explained. to a large extent, due to the water regimes of the collectors. The strata present a very slight general dip towards the south and southwest depending on the area, a fact that, together with other causes, once led one to think that the entire complex was an aclinal relief hardly affected by any type of tectonics.

The Alcarria slum is the structural surface of the tabular relief of the region.

The Alcarria páramo is fairly uniform, although it slopes gently from northeast to southwest. In some cases, this erosion has completely diluted the old limestone wasteland, leaving remains of what was formerly a flat platform in the form of witness hills that preserve the altitude of the rest of the wasteland with respect to the valley where they are located. Some of them are:

• The Tits of Viana (1144 and 1143 m. n. m.),
• the Wing School (961 m. n. m.),
• the Wing Colmillo (953 m. n. m.),
• the hill of Hita (981 m. n. m.),
• or the hill of Huete (928 m. n. m.)

The morphological unit of the páramo de la Alcarria finds its continuation immediately to the south of the Tagus in the Mesa de Ocaña.

In some areas of the southeast of the region, the greater proliferation of rivers and streams that form deep canyons cause them to break the limestone plain more frequently, leaving hardly any space for the extension of the páramo and forming some small transitional mountains with the mountains of Cuenca as in the case of Umbría Negra and La Solana. On the other hand, the strong erosion caused by the rivers Tagus and Guadiela have given rise to the Sierra de Altomira, with a very abrupt and steep formation that stands out from the wide surrounding valleys.

Stratigraphy

The páramo is made up of limestone and on the slopes and glacis there is an abundance of marls and gypsum of marine origin, deposited during the Upper Miocene and Pliocene, and in the valleys red sandstones and conglomerates of fluvial origin, also of intra-Miocene formation. On these layers of sedimentary rocks, the rivers (mainly the Tajuña, the Ungría, the Badiel, the Dulce, the Arlés, the Tagus and the Jabalera) have excavated deep and often wide karstic valleys that currently run with a main direction northeast-southwest and that connect with the culminating moorland levels through topographies with more or less pronounced slopes and a concave profile that usually host glacis-type morphologies.

Hydrography

The Ungría, like other rivers, breaks the wasteland of the Alcarria leaving a deep valley.

What defines the personality of the landscape of the Alcarria are the rivers that form the valleys and break the páramo. Except in the Cuenca Alcarria, where tributaries of the Guadiela such as the Jabalera or Mayor follow a south-north orientation, in the center and north of the region the rivers follow a northeast-southwest arrangement. The main rivers that cross the Alcarria and leave deep valleys in some cases and somewhat wider valleys in others are:

• The Henares, the northern end of the region and which serves as a limit with the Henares countryside, a transition zone between the Alcarria and the Central system. Except the river Badiel, the Dulce, downstream of the town of Aragosa, and small streams and ravines, such as the stream of the Vega de Torija, do not have other important tributaries that configure the paramo in a remarkable way.
• The Tajuña, which, together with its tributaries Matayeguas, Ungría, San Andrés, forms the greatest depression of the paramour from its birth near Maranchón to its mouth in the Jarama near Titulcia.

The reservoir of Bolarque stretches the valley formed by the Tajo and Guadiela rivers in the Sierra de Altomira.

• The Tagus, after a winding tour in its upper part, opens a more open valley from Trillo, where it receives the waters of the Cifuentes River. From then on, he draws huge and suggestive meanders before stopping their flow in the reservoirs of Entrepeñas, Bolarque, reservoir of Zorita and Almoguera, which make up part of the so-called sea of Castile. Since then, its inclination is definitely smooth and forms a wide and fertile vega. In the Tagus, other important rivers for the configuration of the Alcarria relief such as the Ompolveda and the Arles.
• The Guadiela in the main tributary of the Tagus River in the area of the Alcarria, where it pours its waters in the reservoir of Bolarque. It is a wide vein that is denied by the Buendía reservoir, the largest artificial lake in the region.
• The Jarama forms the western end of the paramo with a north-south orientation and in it the two other main rivers of the region, the Henares and the Tajuña, in addition to being in turn tributary of the Tagus at the border of the Alcarreño paraamo.

Habitat

Flora

The aromatic plants such as rosemary are very abundant in the region and are the fruit of the honey of the Alcarria.

Regarding the vegetation cover, the Alcarria is a region strongly influenced by anthropic action that is concentrated in the valleys, in the form of irrigated crops such as corn and other intensive crops, in the páramos, where they dominate rainfed crops such as cereals, and on the slopes with olive groves and vines.

In the páramos the vegetation is resistant to the harsh climatic conditions to which it is subjected. Among the cereal fields of the páramos, white junipers and junipers coexist with woody shrubs, and there are numerous forests of holm oaks, gall oaks and kermes oaks. As a result of the repopulation, there are also samples of Aleppo pine, Black pine and Stone pine.

The slopes and gullies are populated by scrubland composed of patches of gall oak, such as those of Barriopedro and Brihuega, given the rather xeric characteristics of the area, as well as the dominant lithology in them, alternating with lavender and gorse, which in the Alcarria are of great importance due to their abundance, extension and good state of conservation. In the colluvium located in the lower parts of the slopes, if the orientation of the slope is optimal, fruit crops are found, as well as vines and irrigated olive groves.

The Alcarria has, especially on slopes and valleys, a great wealth of aromatic and floral plants, such as lavender, lavender, lavender, rosemary, thyme or sage, which have provided the settlement of beehives that they produce the honey of the Alcarria.

Wildlife

Most of the rivers and streams of the Alcarria with permanent flow are inhabited by the common trout.

The fauna that inhabits the landscape of the Alcarria is typical of Mediterranean environments. Among the mammals, the presence of the wild boar stands out, whose extension has been favored by the progressive depopulation of rural areas, the genet, the marten and the fox, the rabbit and the hare.

Among the birds present are the partridge, quail, turtle dove and various corvids, to which must be added various waterfowl in rivers and lagoons such as the mallard, the red duck, the shoveler, the common pochard, tufted pochard, common teal, coot and kingfisher. The white stork is present in nests at the top of groves, towers and bell towers.

As for birds of prey, a good part of the species present in the Iberian Peninsula appear, especially in the valleys. The golden eagle, the black vulture, the Bonelli's eagle, the peregrine falcon, and the kestrel nest in the rocky areas. On the trees nest the short-toed eagle, the booted eagle, the goshawk, the hawk, the red kite and the hooter. The eagle owl, the long-eared owl, the tawny owl, the little owl, the scops owl and the barn owl appear as nocturnal birds of prey.

Among reptiles, the bastard snake and the ladder snake are very common.

For its part, the ichthyofauna enjoys special importance due to the proliferation of rivers and large reservoirs. The autochthonous common trout, common barbel and barbel stand out, and the incorporated rainbow trout, tench and cachuelo. In addition, the Entrepeñas and Buendía reservoirs form an ideal habitat for carp, pike and black bass.

Human Geography

Demographics

Aerial image of Guadalajara, the largest town in the Alcarria.

The population of the Alcarria settles mainly on the slopes and in the valley beds, or near water sources. Less frequent is the development of localities in the páramos, given in deserted areas and in new urbanizations.

There are enormous population differences taking into account two variables: on the one hand, a greater population density is concentrated in the western part of the Alcarria, within the Community of Madrid and in the west of the province of Guadalajara, on the great influence caused by the proximity to the capital. They are also areas that have experienced greater economic and urban development through large urbanizations with a population mainly coming from the Madrid metropolitan area. Municipalities such as Loranca de Tajuña, Nuevo Baztán, Pioz, Pozo de Guadalajara, Los Santos de la Humosa or Villalbilla have established macro-urbanizations outside the urban centers that have multiplied their populations, both first and second residences. On the other hand, the eastern and southern areas of the Alcarria maintain their rural physiognomy to a greater extent, as well as a much lower population density.

As a whole, the 186 municipalities that make up La Alcarria add up to 333,957 inhabitants (191,092 in the Community of Madrid, 134 104 in the province of Guadalajara and 8 761 in Cuenca). As an example, the five largest municipalities by population in each subregion of the Alcarria are:

Aerial image of Mondéjar, the largest town in the Lower Alcarria.

Aerial image of Torres de la Alameda.

On the other hand, regardless of the area, there are towns with a larger population surrounded by small towns within their area of influence, which generally coincide with the old jurisdictional señoríos and the greater development that their capitals suffered. Thus, for example, towns such as Guadalajara, Brihuega, Pastrana, Almonacid de Zorita-Albalate de Zorita, Mondéjar, Sacedón, Alcalá de Henares, Chinchón or Huete, have a significantly higher population than most of the other towns close to each one of them. they.

Economy

Olive cultivation represents one of the most important traditional economies of the Alcarria, which has given rise to the D.O. Oil of the Alcarria. In the image, the olive groves the Alcarria de Chinchón.

La Alcarria has historically based its economic development on agriculture and livestock. Agriculture has diversified between the dry land, given in the extensive moors with crops of all kinds of cereals, mainly wheat, and small irrigated orchards in the valleys of rivers and streams.

In particular, together with cereal and horticultural agriculture, there is a special presence of olive cultivation, viticulture and beekeeping. The olive tree is very abundant, especially in areas where the glacis is not very pronounced and where the river valleys are not excessively steep, especially to the south of Tajuña, in the low, Cuenca and Chinchón alcarrias. The cultivation of olives of the Verdeja or Castilian variety, typical of the Alcarria, has given rise to the production of Alcarria oil, with a Protected Designation of Origin in that produced in six mills that exploit olive groves in one hundred and thirty-seven municipalities of the provinces of Guadalajara and Cuenca. In addition, the Camporreal variety is cultivated in the Campo Real area, dedicated above all to the sale of the raw and bulk product.

Although wine production is widespread in a good part of the Alcarria municipalities, the most extensive production has been generated mainly in the corridor between Mondéjar and Sacedón, in the area of Arganda del Rey and between Uclés and Huete. As a result of these production areas, the wines of the Alcarria are grouped into three denominations of origin: Mondéjar, Vinos de Madrid and Uclés.

Beekeeping has been a benchmark in the region thanks to the abundance of bushes and aromatic plants such as rosemary, thyme, lavender or lavender, which is produced by a favorable orography characterized by the orography, between 600 and 1100 meters of altitude formed by moors, valleys and mountains, and the continental Mediterranean climate. Honey from La Alcarria is the first beekeeping designation of origin established in Spain.

On the other hand, sheep and goat farming has been another important economic source of support for the Alcarria. Livestock farms, of greater or lesser size, occur in a large part of the Alcarreño municipalities. Coupled with this economy is the production of lamb from La Alcarria.

The largest municipalities close to industrial and business corridors, such as the Henares corridor, have developed the industrial and tertiary sectors more. Guadalajara and Arganda del Rey have become important industrial centers that have generated an extensive business network associated with the economic activity of the Madrid metropolitan area. Likewise, in Brihuega a notable tile and flooring industry has developed, in Mondéjar furniture production and Torija develops an important logistics economy taking advantage of its location next to the A-2 motorway.

Lastly, tourism forms another important economic source in many municipalities of the region, especially those that have an important historical-artistic heritage and in those areas with conditions for active and nature tourism, such as the Sea of Castilla, between the provinces of Guadalajara and Cuenca, for the practice of nautical activities or the Muela de Alarilla for paragliding and hang gliding.

Crafts

The forging has been one of the most important traditional industries in the Alcarria. In the image, part of the gate of the ducal palace of Pastrana.

In the towns of the Alcarria, crafts have also had a notable importance. In Brihuega, the cabinetry of Castilian furniture characterized by the use of panels and its inspiration in Spanish Renaissance furniture. Horche is also distinguished by its artisans dedicated to the carving and production of furniture, in addition to those dedicated to leather.

Ceramics have evolved from a traditional and utilitarian character to a more creative and decorative one. It is distinguished by the use of different clays and enameling with different minerals, with blue tones predominating.

In Pastrana, the iron forge is worked to make railings, balconies and bars, of which the golden bars of its ducal palace are an example. In addition to Pastrana, there is also a forging tradition in Durón.

Also in Durón, as well as in Moratilla de los Meleros and Yélamos de Abajo, they work on wicker and cane basketry.

In Cifuentes, the carving of sculptures, fountains, fireplaces and stone shields stands out.

Historical heritage

La Alcarria is made up of small towns where its church stands out, with a more or less modest architecture, and some stately mansions; but also by larger populations that at the time were the head of some manor or some community of town and land or have gained importance due to other historical vicissitudes and that have developed a certainly rich architecture throughout various periods, especially between the centuries. XI and XVIII.

The historical-artistic heritage of the Alcarria is very rich in both religious buildings, as well as civil and military buildings. In all towns there are churches built at different times and in different styles. Monasteries and convents are quite abundant throughout the region, both in the towns and in the most remote and solitary areas. Among the most important are the monastery of Sopetrán (VII century) between Hita and Torre del Burgo, the convent of La Salceda (XVI century) between Tendilla and Peñalver, the monastery of San Bartolomé (XIV) in Lupiana and the Cistercians of Óvila, Trillo, and Monsalud (XII), in Córcoles, which constituted two of the most important Cistercian monasteries in all of Castile. There are also several castles of different uses, periods and magnitudes. In most of the largest towns there are large squares with arcaded buildings. The sources are also very abundant in all the localities of the Alcarria, and they usually form monumental works.

To all this we must add the railway heritage, in which the remains of the old Tajuña railway stand out and of which a good part of the stations remain standing, all made with a similar design using limestone masonry in a modest small size modernist style. Also in the Alcarria is the Jadraque station, on the Madrid-Barcelona line, designed in a modernist style that is reproduced in many of the stations on this line between Guadalajara and Zaragoza.

Literature

The landscape of the Alcarria has been present in many literary works over time. The region was already described by Tomás de Iriarte in the XVIII century on a trip made between Madrid and Gascueña and which he captured in the work Journey to the Alcarria (1781). Iriarte also placed The four cripples in La Alcarria, a poem included in his Literary Fables (1782).

But the work that has given the Alcarria the greatest prominence has been Journey to the Alcarria (1948) by Camilo José Cela, in which the author describes rural life in Spain in the 1940s through his trip through some Alcarreño towns. The book was published in a large number of languages and marked the rebirth of travel literature in Spanish and the beginning of a series of works by Cela on the subject. In the 1980s, the author made a new trip through the region that he captured in the work New trip to the Alcarria (1986).

In 1968 José Luis Sampedro published The river that takes us, which narrates the last timber harvest in the 1940s along the Tagus River, from the Alto Tajo to Aranjuez, crossing the Alcarria, through a meticulous psychological study of the characters, and a topographical and ethnographic study of the places through which the Tagus flows along the route of the gancheros. The novel was published in several languages and made into a film in 1989 by Antonio del Real.

Accesses and communication routes

The N-320 vertebrae the Alcarria from south to north. In the image, the Sotillo viaduct saving the slope to the Alcarria depot from Guadalajara.

• Road. Most of the roads that unite the localities of the Alcarria are small secondary roads of first and second level and local autonomic areas, which run through the complex orography of moors, slopes and valleys of the region. However, the Al-Carreño paraamo is crossed by its northern area by the North-West motorway and is flanked west, by the Jarama valley, by the East Highway. It's the two major channels of communication in the region. In the interior of the region there are the N-320, which links the highway of Alicante with the motorway of the North by Cuenca and Guadalajara, vertebrating the Alcarria, and the N-204, which runs entirely through the region between Almadrones and Sacedón. Within the autonomic pathways, the M-300 connecting the Barrio de la Poveda in Arganda del Rey with Alcalá de Henares and Torrejón de Ardoz would stand out in the Madrid part, and that much of its route belonged to the historic C-300 connecting Chinchón with Alcalá de Henares. In the province of Guadalajara the CM-101, which connects the easternmost towns of the Campiña with the northernmost of the Alcarria and the Sierra de Ayllón, being partly the old C-101 route that connected Guadalajara with Tafalla. Among the provinces of Guadalajara and Cuenca would highlight the CM-200 that connects manchegas localities with alcarreñas by populations such as Pastrana and Almonacid de Zorita. In the province of Cuenca it would highlight the CM-310 with a journey similar to that carried out by the Quixote in the second part of the work of cervantina. In addition, the Alcarria Highway, which would join Guadalajara with Tarancón by Mondéjar, is on the project.
• Railroad. Paralela a la Autovía del Nordeste por el carreño traverses the high speed line Madrid-Zaragoza-Barcelona-Frontera Francia, to which the station of Guadalajara-Yebes belongs next to Ciudad Valdeluz. By the vega of the Henares, north of the páramo, runs the Madrid-Barcelona railway in Iberian width, which has several stations throughout the province of Guadalajara such as Guadalajara or Jadraque. In the south it runs the Madrid-Valencia railway, also in Iberian width, which has stations and attachments in several locations of the Alcarria conquense like Huete, Caracenilla and Cuevas de Velasco. Likewise, the valleys of the Tajuña and the Tajo were toured by the railway of the Tajuña, a narrow railway project through the Alcarria that was dismantled. Part of its layout has been taken advantage of for line 9 of the Madrid Metro that unites Arganda del Rey with Madrid.

Cartography

• Map of crops and uses of Chinchón. Sheet 606, 1:50000. Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food. 1979.
• National Geographic Institute. National topographic map of Spain (MTN50). Sheets 486, 487, 488, 511, 512, 513, 536, 537, 538, 560, 561, 562, 563, 583, 584, 585, 586, 605, 606, 607, 608; 1:50000. National Geographic Information Centre. 2006.
• National Geographic Institute. "Cuenca." Provincial map (MP200). 1:200,000. National Geographic Information Centre. 2007.
• National Geographic Institute. "Guadalajara." Provincial map (MP200). 1:200,000. National Geographic Information Centre. 2005.
• National Geographic Institute. "Madrid." Provincial map (MP200). 1:200,000. National Geographic Information Centre. 2011.