Passages of value of Villafáfila

VALUABLE PASSAGES OF VILLAFÁFILA

Roman bronze piece with the figure of a horse from Villafáfila, known as the Pasarriendas de Valorio, which I have used as.

Pasarriendas of Valorio, Villafáfila, Museum of Zamora

On the hot morning of August 13, 1988, when I was prospecting a plot of land in Valorio to see if there were any vestiges of Roman ceramics or tegulae , a piece that looked like metal peeking out next to some Roman bricks caught my attention. I cleaned it up a bit and discovered a figure of a little bronze horse. I had with me my two-year-old son who could barely stand up because of the clods.

Pago de Valorio, where the Pasarriendas appeared

The payment of Valorio in Villafáfila constitutes one of the areas of the term populated in ancient times, where remains dating back to the Bronze Age appear, being those of Roman times the most abundant because a large Roman villa settled in these parts, which later It was occupied by a Visigothic population, which has left us traces of its ceramics, and which led to one of the medieval villages that dotted the surroundings of the Lagunas de Villafáfila, called San Clemente, and which was depopulated at the end of the Middle Ages.

Overjoyed by the find, I got home, washed it under the tap and immediately realized that it could be a valuable piece. As a few days of celebration were coming up, I put it away in a drawer, and to avoid temptations to keep it, I barely told those closest to me about the discovery with the intention of taking it to the Zamora Museum, which at that time was virtual, since its pieces were kept in storage while waiting to enable the Palacio del Cordón as a venue.

Before its restoration

The delivery was made on San Roque's day, which was already working, before a manager in the absence of its director, who was on vacation.

Subsequently, formalize the delivery certificate together with other ceramic and numismatic materials from Villafáfila.

It is one of the decisions that has given me the most satisfaction, since it allowed me to establish friendships with two exceptional people, with whom we Zamorans owe a great debt of gratitude for their commendable work for so many years in defense and promotion of the historical heritage of Zamora: Rosario García Rozas, Director of the Zamora Museum, and Hortensia Larrén Izquierdo, Territorial Archaeologist

The piece, after being cleaned and restored, became part of the Museum's permanent collection, and has been taken to various exhibitions outside the province, always carrying the Villafáfila reference.

The first of these was the exhibition set up at the Palacio de Cristal del Retiro in Madrid in 1990, at whose inauguration by Minister Semprún, I was invited as a donor of one of the pieces.

It is a Roman bronze piece, from the 4th century, which was part of a luxury carriage, which in addition to its ornamental function and distinguishing the status of the owner of the carriage, had a practical function, not so much as holding the reins of draft horses, harnesses , as the consolidated name seems to indicate, but as an anchor piece for suspension straps to cushion the ups and downs of the roads.

For its description, no one better than the authors García Rozas and Abásolo in the communication presented at the aforementioned conference of Roman Bronzes:

The authors and other experts consider that the manufacture of the piece had to have been produced in an extrapeninsular workshop due to the fineness of its elaboration.

In recent years different pieces of this type have been found in Spain, some with an iconography very similar to that of Villafáfila such as those preserved in the National Archaeological Museum:

Or this other horse from Burguilos del Cerro in Badajoz:

Closer is this one from Cimanes de la Vega that is preserved in the León Museum, which represents a scene of wild hunting, a feline, possibly a lion capturing a bovid:

Or this one from Zaragoza that represents the Capitoline wolf suckling Romulus and Remus, which is preserved in the Louvre Museum in Paris.

Museum	Zamora Museum
Inventory	MZA 88/28/1.1
Generic Classification	roman bronzes
Object/Document	Pasarriendas
Material/Support	Bronze
Technique	Foundry
Dimensions	Height = 9.60 cm; Width = 10.90 cm; Depth = 4.10 cm
Description	Taking as reference the Proceedings of the XI International Congress of Ancient Bronzes (see bibliography). Bronze piece known as "pasarriendas", made with lost wax and in good condition. It is made up of two clearly differentiated sectors, the lower one, more functional, provided with a frustopyramidal box and S-rings; and the upper one, of a decorative nature, constituted by a figure of a horse on a rectangular platform. The box is hollow and its front face is decorated with a plant motif formed by two lines of palmettes with decreasing lobed leaves. On it, there is a rectangular platform -on which the horse sits- decorated by oblique strokes incised on its edge; Said base rests on the head of two feline protomes -with open jaws, bulging eyes, well-differentiated ears and chevroned beards that are detailed in a rough modeling- (which are joined to the box by means of two small spheres. The rings are symmetrical and they start from the lower part of the box, making an S-shaped path to the upper part (where they end in the heads of felines); in the middle area, some stems stand out, slightly faceted and finished off by a cord with incised decoration, of which Three round leaves sprout. The set is crowned by an equine figure that rests on the platform, marching to the right. He presents a majestic attitude and is harnessed. The main face presents great detail in its anatomy, as well as in the representation of the harnesses. Head upright, jaws open, bulging eyes, upright ears, mane separated into tufts, and well-defined legs and hooves. The surroundings of the Villafáfila lagoons offer important ancient materials, from Neolithic remains, Chalcolithic settlements, at the beginning of the Bronze Age numerous deposits (dedicated to salt exploitation) proliferate. Worst known is the Iron Age, a time when high places of easy defense were occupied, with materials from "El Soto de Medinilla" and Celtiberian. The Romanizing moment is intense, highlighting different enclaves, including Valorio, with pieces of great singularity, which indicate a time of high-imperial occupation. Piece obtained through archaeological prospecting and delivered by an individual on August 19, 1988, therefore, decontextualized. In April 2015, a chance find (1993) was delivered to the museum, which corresponds to a piece similar to this one, at the Villaobispo site, in Fuentes de Ropel.
Cultural Context/Style	High Roman Imperial
Usage/function	Decorative piece of the railing of a car.
Place of origin	Villafafila
Specific Place/Deposit	value
History of the Object	He participated in the exhibition Zaragoza and Aragón. Crossroads of Cultures, held at the Lonja de Zaragoza between June 15 and September 15, 2008.
Reasoned Classification	The surroundings of the Villafáfila lagoons offer important ancient materials, from Neolithic remains, Chalcolithic settlements, at the beginning of the Bronze Age numerous deposits (dedicated to salt exploitation) proliferate. Worst known is the Iron Age, a time when high places of easy defense were occupied, with materials from "El Soto de Medinilla" and Celtiberian. The Romanizing moment is intense, highlighting different enclaves, including Valorio, with pieces of great singularity, which indicate a time of high-imperial occupation. Piece obtained through archaeological prospecting and delivered by an individual on August 19, 1988, therefore, decontextualized. In April 2015, a chance find (1993) was delivered to the museum, which corresponds to a piece similar to this one, at the Villaobispo site, in Fuentes de Ropel.
Bibliography	ABÁSOLO ÁLVAREZ, JA CSIC. Roman bronzes from the Zamora Museum. Proceedings of the XI International Congress of Ancient Bronzes. Madrid (1990). 1990, pp: 184-188; pp: 195. Text and illustration. CARRETERO COWBOY, Santiago; et alii. A Roman Pasarrienda from Petavonium (Rosinos de Vidriales, Zamora). Florián de Ocampo Institute of Zamorano Studies Yearbook. 1991. Pp: 225-234. REGUERAS BIG, Fernando. Villafáfila (Zamora). Exhibition Catalogue: The Time of the Barbarians. Survival and transformation in Gaul and Hispania. (SS. V-VI AD). pp: 617-618. RODRIGUEZ, E.; et alii. The Archaeological Chart of Villafáfila. Yearbook Institute of Zamorano Studies. 1990. Pp: 65-67.
Cataloging	Zamora Museum

Author:

Elijah Rodriguez Rodriguez.

historiadevillafafila.blogspot.com

https://historiasdevillafafila.blogspot.com/2015/02/el-pasarriendas-de-valorio.html

Ceres collections online

http://ceres.mcu.es

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Photography:

Elijah Rodriguez Rodriguez.

Transcription and montage:

Jose Luis Dominguez Martinez.

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All text and photography has been authorized for storage, treatment, work, transcription and assembly to José Luis Domínguez Martínez, its dissemination on villafafila.net, and any other means that is authorized.