Rueda de Jalón

Rueda de Jalón municipality
	Rueda de Jalón - Castle (castillo)
Basic data
Autonomous Community :	Aragon
Province :	Zaragoza
Comarca :	Valdejalón
Coordinates	41 ° 38 ′ N , 1 ° 16 ′ W Coordinates: 41 ° 38 ′ N , 1 ° 16 ′ W
Height :	300 msnm
Area :	107.37 km²
Residents :	310 (Jan. 1, 2019)
Population density :	2.89 inhabitants / km²
Postal code :	50295
Municipality number ( INE ):	50228
administration
Website :	Rueda de Jalón

Rueda de Jalón is a place and a municipality ( municipio ) with a total of 310 inhabitants (as of January 1, 2019) in the center of the province of Saragossa in the autonomous region of Aragon in northeastern Spain .

Location and climate

The place Rueda de Jalón is located on the east bank of the Río Jalón a good 50 km (driving distance) west of the provincial capital Saragossa at an altitude of approx. 300 m . The climate is temperate to warm; the rather sparse rain (approx. 385 mm / year) falls over the year.

Population development

year	1857	1900	1950	2000	2017
Residents	856	898	946	353	316

Due to increasing drought, the mechanization of agriculture , the abandonment of small farms and the resulting lower demand for labor in rural areas, the number of inhabitants has declined sharply since the middle of the 20th century.

economy

For centuries, the town's residents were essentially self-sufficient ; There were no grocery stores or markets, or only rarely. Even the few traders, craftsmen and service providers essentially provided themselves with everything they needed for life. The situation only improved with the improvement of the infrastructure in the second half of the 20th century.

history

In Roman times the place was on the connecting road from Emerita Augusta ( Mérida ) via Augusta Bilbilis ( Calatayud ) to Caesaraugusta ( Saragossa ). In the 8th century the area was overrun by Arab-Moorish armies; later the Berber tribe of the Banu-Hud, based in Rueda, made themselves virtually independent. Around the year 1119 the Moors under Alfonso I of Aragón could be pushed south ( reconquista ) . In 1366, Rueda was made a vice-county by Peter IV of Aragón . In the High and Late Middle Ages, the small town repeatedly changed landlords.

Attractions

Rueda de Jalón - Peirón de San Vicente

A fortress (hisn) probably already existed in Moorish times. The ruins of a medieval castle (castillo) rise on a rock about 50 m above the village. Over the centuries, changing landowners repeatedly carried out modernizations or additions. The two remains of the tower on the top of the rock are called Dos Hermanas ("two sisters") and can be found in the local coat of arms.
The single-nave church of Santa Ana is an inconspicuous building from the 16th and 18th centuries with a polygonal broken apse . The undivided bell tower (campanar) is completely atypical of the time . The nave and apse are covered with star vaults.