Los Huertos

Camino de Madrid

SegoviaCastilla y León

Descriptive toponym of medieval Castilian, locative plural of Latin hortus ('garden, vegetable plot, enclosed cultivated space'). It designates the small Segovian hamlet settled on the irrigated meadows of the Eresma river, already documented in the 12th century as vegetable gardens dependent on the Segovia cathedral chapter.

Hortus, in Roman agrarian Latin, designated the enclosed cultivated space attached to the dwelling, dedicated to vegetables, legumes and minor fruit trees. The toponymic application in plural —⁠Los Huertos⁠— was common in intensive irrigated cultivation zones as opposed to extensive dry-land cultivation. The current hamlet, dependent from the Middle Ages on the Segovia mitre, maintained its horticultural character until 20th-century agricultural mechanisation. It preserves irrigation channels and hydraulic waterwheels from the 15th–17th centuries.

Evolution of the name

  1. hortus Latin 1st centuries BC–4th
  2. Los Huertos medieval Castilian from the 12th century

Reflections, to the letter

Modest stop in the Eresma meadow. The Romanesque 13th-century parish church of San Martín, with 18th-century Baroque tower, preserves the original baptismal font. The traditional vegetable gardens around the village remain active with cultivation of vegetables, beans and potato. The Camino exit follows the Eresma meander towards Añe.

Languages of origin

Themes

Origin status

confirmed

Glossary

Descriptive toponym
A place name describing a function or feature of the site (as opposed to anthroponyms, which commemorate a person). Viana = "place of the road"; Fromista = "of wheat"; Hornillos = "of the ovens".
Eresma meadows
Irrigated land system of the middle valley of the Eresma river, main southern tributary of the Adaja, traditionally irrigated with channels derived from the river bed since the Middle Ages. The meadows comprise some two thousand hectares between Segovia and Coca, historically dedicated to vegetables (beans, potato, onion) and to chicory —⁠root crop introduced in the 19th century for roasting as a coffee substitute⁠—⁠.

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Camino de Madrid

  1. ··· toward Santiago
  2. Alcazarén
  3. Villeguillo
  4. Coca
  5. Nava de la Asunción
  6. Santa María la Real de Nieva
  7. Añe
  8. Los Huertos
  9. Zamarramala
  10. Segovia
  11. Puerto de la Fuenfría
  12. Cercedilla
  13. Mataelpino
  14. Manzanares el Real
  15. ··· toward the start