Liñares

Camino Francés

LugoGalicia

Toponym derived from the Galician-Portuguese liñar ('flax field'), from the Latin linum ('flax', textile plant) with the suffix -ar of cultivated field. The plural form Liñares documents several flax fields, the historical crop of inland Galicia until the introduction of industrial cotton in the 19th century.

Flax (Linum usitatissimum) was the dominant textile plant in Atlantic Europe before the spread of American cotton. Galicia, with its humid climate and deep soils, was among the principal peninsular flax-growing areas —⁠Galician flax supplied the looms of the entire Crown until the 18th century. The liñares were the parcels devoted to the crop, generally near a watercourse because flax requires retting (submerging the harvested plants for weeks so the pectin breaks down and the fibre separates from the stalk). The substantivised plural fixes the collective character of multiple fields. The hamlet is the first after passing O Cebreiro, in the heart of the Ancares range, at around 1300 metres of altitude. Flax cultivation here was marginal due to the altitude —⁠the toponym probably commemorates medieval repopulating attempts rather than significant production.

Evolution of the name

  1. linum / linare Latin before the 9th century
  2. Liñares medieval Galician-Portuguese from the 10th century

Reflections, to the letter

The name means flax, and the flax is on record: the Codex Calixtinus calls this hamlet Linar de Rege, the king's flaxfield. The Crown granted these fields to the monastery of O Cebreiro, three kilometres away, and for centuries Liñares was the parish that supplied its flax for cloth. The pilgrim climbing to twelve hundred metres treads the one flaxfield named in the oldest pilgrim guide of all.

Languages of origin

Themes

Origin status

confirmed

Glossary

Retting
Medieval and modern agricultural technique for processing flax: the harvested plants were submerged in watercourses or pools for two or three weeks so the pectin of the stalk would decompose by bacterial fermentation and the textile fibre would separate from the woody bark. Retting left an unmistakable smell on the banks of the liñares.
Substantivised plural
A device by which an adjective or noun in the plural is fixed as a place name without the noun that governed it: fontanas = "[lands of the] springs", ferreiros = "[place of the] smiths". Frequent in medieval repopulation.

Sources

  • Navaza, G. — Toponimia de Galicia

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Camino Francés

  1. ··· toward Santiago
  2. Sarria
  3. Samos
  4. Triacastela
  5. Fonfría
  6. Padornelo
  7. Hospital da Condesa
  8. Liñares
  9. O Cebreiro
  10. Las Herrerías
  11. Ruitelán
  12. Vega de Valcarce
  13. La Portela de Valcarce
  14. Trabadelo
  15. ··· toward the start