Eunate
Camino Francés · Camino Aragonés
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Here Camino Francés and Camino Aragonés converge. It is one of the points where the pilgrim shares the way with those arriving by another route.
From the Basque ehun ate 'hundred doors', referring to the hundred arches that form the octagonal outer cloister of the church of Santa María de Eunate — a singular 12th-century Romanesque temple linked to the Order of the Temple or of the Hospital.
Evolution of the name
- Eunate Basque from the 12th century
Reflections, to the letter
A few kilometres from Cizur Menor, step off the main path to visit Santa María de Eunate, Romanesque of the 12th century, one of the few octagonal churches in Europe. Eunate comes from the Basque ehun ate: ehun, “a hundred”, + ate, “door” — “a hundred doors”. The church actually has thirty-two arcades in its outer ambulatory, not a hundred; the name captures popular wonder at a silhouette that, pierced by arches on every side, must have looked like nothing but openings. The octagonal form —rare in Iberian Romanesque— has been linked to the Temple of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem and to the Templar tradition, although no medieval source documents a direct connection to the Order. The adjoining cemetery holds the tombs of pilgrims who never reached Santiago.
Glossary
- Assimilation
- A phonetic change by which one sound becomes more similar to an adjacent one.
Sources
- Ayuntamiento de Muruzábal · sección de patrimonio (muruzabal.com)
- Fundación Iglesia de Santa María de Eunate · documentación del santuario
- Martínez de Aguirre, J. — Eunate y los enigmas del románico navarro (Pamplona: Cátedra Príncipe de Viana, 2003)
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Camino Francés