page_title: Las Hurdes
section_title: Efforts to change the image of the region
hierarchical_section_title: Las Hurdes / History / Efforts to change the image of the region
caption_attribution_description: Español: Grupo de jurdanos ante la cámara fotográfica, obra del fotógrafo Venancio Gombau, recogido en la revista española La ilustración española y americana.
context_page_description: Las Hurdes is a comarca in the Sistema Central, at the northern end of the province of Cáceres in the Autonomous Community of Extremadura, Spain. A well-known historical region, Las Hurdes is currently a Site of Community Importance of the European Union.
context_section_description: At the end of the 19th century, however, las Hurdes was ushered into an unprecedented era of patronage and scholarly attention. Some people began to express publicly genuine concern for the extreme poverty, as well as the resulting abject living conditions, of the people in Las Hurdes. In 1892 French doctor J. B. Bidé travelled to Las Hurdes researching the region, drawing a map and  publishing a report in the Boletín de la Sociedad Geográfica de Madrid.
  In 1904 José María Gabriel y Galán composed the poem "A Su Majestad el Rey" in Salamanca, asking the crown for help in favor of his forgotten subjects in las Hurdes. This poem was published in "Las Hurdes", a magazine issued for the first time that same year in order to create awareness about the needs of the region.
  Finally Francisco Jarrín y Moro, then bishop of Coria, established a philanthropic society,  "Sociedad Esperanza de Las Hurdes", in 1908. This first organized move attracted many participants in certain key cities keen to take initiatives in order to alleviate the backwardness and superstition of the region's inhabitants. Maurice Legendre, French Catholic intellectual and head of the French Institute in Madrid, visited Las Hurdes in 1912 and denounced the historical neglect of the region. In 1914 he invited his friend and fellow intellectual Miguel de Unamuno to travel through las Hurdes. Legendre visited the region again in 1922 with an official Comisión Sanitaria; led by his friend Doctor Gregorio Marañón the latter prepared the ground for the royal visit the same year.
  King Alfonso XIII visited Las Hurdes in 1922 in order to display the concern of the crown. Gregorio Marañón accompanied the young king as guide. The king and his retinue lived in military tents planted near the town of Casares de las Hurdes. During the king's visit a famous awkward incident took place: A local village chief, concerned that the king was drinking only black coffee (a consequence of the king's aides distrusting the quality of the local milk owing to unsanitary conditions in the area) served the king a small jug of milk saying "Your Majesty rest assured that this milk is totally trustworthy", which turned out to be milk from his wife who had recently given birth. The king became aware of this fact only after having had his café con leche.
  In 1927 Legendre published an ethnographic study about Las Hurdes. This study was read by Luis Buñuel, who continued the gloomy legend that cast a pall over the area by means of the modern media. In a short but famous 1933 film about the hurdanos, Las Hurdes: Tierra Sin Pan, that Buñuel shot around the town of La Alberca, Las Hurdes was portrayed as an isolated spot full of darkness. Buñuel exaggerated some scenes of the film by staging them beforehand in order to create strong impressions in the public. Screening of Buñuel's movie was banned by the authorities at that time, the Government of the Second Spanish Republic, for allegedly exploiting the misery in which the local people lived.
caption: Group of Hurdanos at the beginning of the 20th century
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