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Aldehuela de Yeltes (Municipality, Castilla y León, Spain)

Flag of Aldehuela de Yeltes - Image by Ivan Sache, 23 May 2011

Presentation of Aldehuela de Yeltes
Symbols of Aldehuela de Yeltes

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Presentation of Aldehuela de Yeltes

The municipality of Aldehuela de Yeltes (217 inhabitants in 2010; 6,046 ha) is located in the south of Salamanca Province, 60 km from Salamanca.

Lake of El Cristo (Laguna del Cristo), a lake located north of the village, has been immortalized by the writer Miguel de Unamuno (1864-1936) in the first of his two "Moon Sonnets"; known in Spain as "The Universal Basque", Unamuno was hired in 1891 as a Professor of Greek at the Salamanca University, of which he was appointed Rector in 1901.

Junto a la Laguna del Cristo en la Aldehuela de Yeltes, una noche de luna llena (1912)
Noche blanca en que el agua cristalina
duerme queda en su lecho de laguna
sobre la cual redonda llena luna
que ejército de estrellas encamina

vela, y se espeja una redonda encina
en el espejo sin rizada alguna;
noche blanca en que el agua hace de cuna
de la más alta y más honda doctrina.

Es un rasgón del cielo que abrazado
tiene en sus brazos la Naturaleza;
es un rasgón del cielo que ha posado

y en el silencio de la noche reza
la oración del amante resignado
sólo al amor, que es su única riqueza.

Translation by Michael Smith

At Aldehuela de Yeltes by the Lake of El Cristoa night of full moon.

White night wherein the crystal water
sleeps still on its lake bed
while a round full moon
that guides a host of stars

keeps watch, and in the terse
mirror a round ilex is mirrored,
white night wherein the water
cradles the highest, deepest counsel.

It is a shred of heaven Nature
holds embraced in its arms,
a shred of heaven that came to rest

and in the night's silence prays
the prayer the lover says who yields
but to that love, his only wealth.

Ivan Sache, 23 May 2011

Symbols of Aldehuela de Yeltes

The flag (municipal website) and arms (municipal website) of Aldehuela de Yeltes, adopted on 8 September 1989 by the Municipal Council and validated by the Royal Academy of History, are prescribed by a Decree adopted on 22 July 1991 by the Government of Castilla y León, and published on 1 August 1991 in the official gazette of Castilla y León, No. 146 (text).
The symbols are described as follows:

Flag: Rectangular, blue with a yellow cross. The staff topped with a Royal Spanish crown or with a sphere.
Coat of arms: Azure a Latin cross couped or over waves argent and azure. The shield surmounted with a Royal Spanish crown.

The symbols were designed by Vicente de Cadenas y Vicent (1915-2005), Chronicler King of Arms of the Kingdom of Spain.
A survey of historical archives showed that Aldehuela de Yeltes never used specific municipal arms, therefore brand new arms had to be designed. No particular historical, geographical or economical fact was found that would distinguish the municipality from its neighbours. Accordingly, it was decided to show on the arms a reference to the main village's festival, celebrated at the Cristo de la Laguna chapel and dedicated to the Exaltation of the Holy Cross. The arms, therefore, symbolize Laguna del Cristo (waves) and the Cristo de la Laguna chapel (cross).
The flag reflects the arms in a "very stylized and sketchy manner", using the colors of the shield. The original proposal includes the possibility of adding the municipal arms in the middle of the flag, which does not seem to have been kept in the official version. The drawing attached to the proposal shows the cross' width as 1/4 of the flag's hoist.

Ivan Sache, 23 May 2011