The old bridge throughout history: landslides and curiosities of a symbol for Talavera

“If the pool and Tagus are friends, Talavera, God assists you”. Thus says the traditional saying, which has been passing mouth over the centuries through the Talaverana region, when the pool is grown by rains and thaws and the pit also carries high flow, which makes the water flood the city of ceramics, running through the old cane.

A saying that in recent days is heard, if possible, with more force than ever, the same force that both rivers carry and for what lived in the city of Talavera de la Reina in the past morning, with the collapses from the old bridge because of the excessive flood of the Taguswhose flow has already reached 1,400 cubic meters per second.

However, this is not the first time something similar happens. This has been explained to ABC the Talaverano historian and professor at the University of Castilla-La Mancha, Ángel Monterrubiowhich recalls, in the first place, that the old bridge of Talavera, “is not Roman, but is medieval era and took advantage of the Roman era basement in some of its sections, since its trace is also a curve.” Declared well of cultural interest, it is the oldest in the city and connects the urban center with the southern Vega.

The first mentions of this infrastructure are from the beginning of the thirteenth century. Specifically, in 1227, when the KING FERNANDO III THE SANTO It orders to control the passage of people and won by the bridges that divide the Castilian table in two, possibly in order to collect a tax for its toll, Monterrubio points out, which points out that the large avenues of water and facts such as the one happened at dawn on Saturday have been very common in Talavera de la Reina throughout the centuries, until in 1908 the iron bridge was over in the city ».

In fact, it says that there have been several landslides that occurred in the Old Bridge due to its sandy settlement, which has suffered several damages of which there are traces of the subsequent remains in its structure. Episodes that left incommunicado on numerous occasions to Talavera of the queen of its old land, of the region of the Jara and the roads of Extremadura and Andalucía, since this was the passage of the road that linked Ávila with Córdoba to cross the Tajo river.

Who pays the work of Cardinal Mendoza?

Already in the fifteenth century it was Cardinal Mendoza who commissioned a great repair of the bridge along a strong avenue of the Tajo That there were at that time, which, as the historian recounts by citing documents of the time preserved in the Municipal Archive of Talavera de la Reina, gave rise to a conflict to see who paid the works for their high cost.

This has happened several times, as we said before, and even closed in the 70s of the twentieth century, putting a series of planks and catwalks, until in the 90s a more important arrangement was made to consolidate it and that could happen without danger. The situation has remained calm in recent years, because of drought and numerous water transfers of the header reservoirs of the Tajo Río al Segurauntil the collapse of this last night.

To reflect facts like this, Professor Monterrubio has cited numerous historical graphic documents, such as the Flamenco Antón Van Den Wyngaerde artist engravingwho in 1567 drew a Talavera de la Reina perspective with the old bridge to the right, where one of those reconstructions suffered by the bridge for one of the avenues of the Tajo River. A work that is part of the more than sixty detailed views of cities and villas that he made, commissioned by Felipe II, in his tour of the Kingdom of Spain. However, it has also appeared in other works of art like those of the Dutchman Brueghel the oldwhich painted two paintings that are preserved in the Louvre Museum in Paris.

Unfortunately, now the Old Bridge is now news again, not because of the symbol that it is for Talavera de la Reina, which is a unique walk for the Talaveranos, who go daily to walk, run, ride a bicycle or once to bathe at their feet in the Tajo river, in addition to its military and economic importance, by the passage of cattle through the city.

Even there are those who say that under the bridge there is a passage that leads to the other side of the river from the old town, where he would have hidden a treasure from the same Atlantis and stored by mythical beings as little pale little mans. A story that sounds more like a legend than reality, but, who knows, perhaps you can pay with him the reconstruction that all politicians have already promised during their interventions this Sunday.