The Association for the Conservation of the Heritage of the Huerta de Murcia (Huermur) denounced before the public administrations the landslides suffered in the old Fuente Santa located in the Sanctuary of the Virgen de la Fuensanta in Algezares.
This fountain, built on a small stream and which collects the waters of some ancient springs in this part of the mountains, gives its name to the patron saint of Murcia, the Virgen de la Fuensanta, and is built at the foot of its Mount Sanctuary, next to the Cueva de la Cómica.
Precisely some time ago, serious landslides were known about this cave, linked to the secular devotion to this Marian image, landslides that were also denounced by Huermur before the Ministry of Culture, since the sanctuary is protected as a Historical Monument and, therefore, is Well of Cultural Interest (BIC).
The new collapses that were known affect the cornices and old structures of the Fuente Santa, a construction in the form of a façade-altarpiece that adorns the secular fountain, and which is protected both in the Catalog of the General Urban Planning Plan of Murcia and it is also part of the Monument protected as BIC.
Huermur sent separate letters both to the General Directorate of Cultural Heritage of the Region of Murcia, which must process its Historical Heritage Service, and to the Murcia City Council, as the Sanctuary is in its municipal demarcation.
On the other hand, the conservation entity also highlighted the worrying accumulation of garbage and all kinds of remains on various slopes, walls and terraces of the Sanctuary, a few days after the descent of the Virgen de la Fuensanta in a pilgrimage to the city of Murcia, to start the fair Huermur recalls that the Sanctuary is located in one of the best-known natural and forest landscapes in Murcia, so this situation is not acceptable.
Likewise, the group warns of some landslides and damage detected in the walls, terraces and slopes of the patron saint’s sanctuary, urging both the Ministry of Culture and the City Council to immediately inspect this situation and take the appropriate measures for its due solution and repair.
The Holy Fountain
The Holy Fountain, which was recovered and intervened in the refurbishment and restoration project of the Sanctuary and its surroundings after the Civil War, is in an eclectic Italianate style, with a mixed masonry and stone ashlar fabric, and is decorated with palmettes, corbels, blinded arches and cornice with denticulate.
It is protected with Grade 1 in the General Plan for Urban Planning of Murcia and expressly has protection for “all its architectural values”, only “its conservation, restoration, consolidation or rehabilitation” being authorized, “the environment, avoiding actions that alter their environmental and landscape values”.
Finally, Sergio Pacheco, president of Huermur, pointed out that “the Sanctuary of the Virgen de la Fuensanta is one of the most emblematic monuments of our land and the state of Fuente Santa, like that of the Cueva de la Cómica, It is intolerable, and the administrations must intervene immediately for its recovery and value.
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