O Burgo (Lugo) (0)

Did you know that... O Burgo

And Carrigueiros, which are part of the parish of San Vicente do Burgo, San Lázaro, a suburb of the city of Lugo located on the banks of the Miño, and Seoane of the parish of San Xoán Alto, belong to the council of Lugo located to the west of it. Located in the middle of the Primitive Way, they are villages with an ancient history linked to that of the council to which they belong. San Lázaro is a historical suburb of Lugo that keeps in its memory that once it had a hospital of lepers under the protection of its patron who gives name to the place. On the façade of the house fitted out for the parish priest, which was one of the old dependencies of the leprosarium, there is this inscription ESTE HOSPITAL SE HYZO REINANDO CARLOS III... YEAR OF 1779. Mº FVLGº DVRAN. The chapel of this hospital, according to documents, was assuming parish functions in the seventeenth century but had to wait until the nineteenth to be a full parish.

A little more history

In Seoane it is known that its church was built on top of another existing temple in 747, when Bishop Odoario restored the city and its adjacent countryside, after Alfonso I reconquered it from the Muslims. The temple was donated in 897 by Alfonso III El Magno to the Church of Lugo. Years later, in the same place, was founded a monastery of monks and nuns that was governed jointly by an abbot and an abbess and in the stop pilgrims. In Carrigueiros, in the place where the Carrigueiro Manor House is today, there was a defensive tower guarding the passage through this old 19th century road on the route of Antonino on which Lugo forged the Primitive Way. Of this pazo, whose oldest construction seems to be from the 15th century, there are documents that testify that it was a prison in the Partido de Mera. O Burgo is already mentioned in the Middle Ages in relation to a sanctuary, on which the church of San Vicente do Burgo was later built, and which is named Sancto Vicentio de Muros, the mother church of Poutomillos and San Xoán do Alto, it is also known that O Burgo also had a pilgrims' hospital.

To discover What to see in O Burgo, San Lázaro, Seoane and Carrigueiros?

Entering the Way in the district of San Lázaro you can see on the facade of a house an old image, sculpted in stone, of the patron saint of lepers with his dog. The church of San Lázaro da Ponte, dating from the 18th century, also attracts attention. In Seoane a cross welcomes the pilgrim who, between the houses, discovers beautiful gardens and a hórreo and then can stop to rest in the curious portico separated from the parish church of San Xoán Alto. From here, in the field of the feast, in the shade of a centennial carballo, you can enjoy beautiful views of the valley of Mera. In Carrigueiros, an external wall with a heraldic coat of arms guards a historic place where the Carrigueiro Big House stands today. The village of O Burgo shows us its beautiful parish church of San Vicente do Burgo built in the eighteenth century in baroque style, its bell tower houses three bells whose ringing is very particular not leaving indifferent to those who listen.

Festivities

In San Lázaro, festivities are celebrated during the first fortnight of March. The parish of San Xoán Alto celebrates its patron saint fiestas in the first fortnight of September and one of the events has become a tradition: the beret throwing competition. And in San Vicente do Burgo it is at the end of August when the Virgen del Carmen is honoured.​

Traditions

Nobles and religious orders, both kings and prelates, competed to protect a greater number of the hospitals and malateries that populated the Way as well as to donate properties and rents to them, as they considered this to be one of the greatest acts of Christian charity. As a curious tradition, the feast of san Lázaro is linked to the tasting of tasty doughnuts, the doughnuts of San Lázaro.

Curiosities

In this beautiful valley of the Mera, in which an important number of streams cross its lands, many curious mills can be seen, that in the streams and hidden between the exuberant vegetation, resist to the inactivity and the passage of time.

The Legend

Legend has it that the Apostle himself passed through these places when he came to Lugo, the ancient capital of Gallaecia, to confirm as bishop one of his first followers, San Capitón.