Rosal de la Frontera

A town on the border with Portugal to the northwest of the province, in land devoted to the growing of cereals and olives, and keeping livestock.

It is one of the most recently created towns, dating back to 1838. It was born from an attempt to repopulate the Aldea El Gallego, nucleus of the Reconquest, which disappeared in 1648. However archaeological remains from the Bronze Age have been found on the outskirts.

It is a town that lives off livestock, supplemented by agriculture and trade. Forestry is also important, allowing hunting activities, with an abundance of wild boars, deer, thrushes and pigeons. There is also beekeeping, and work for mushroom pickers, as the area has a variety of mushrooms.

Livestock production is extensive, the main types being pigs, sheep and goats.

In the service sector, because of its situation as a border town, trade is one of its best assets, alongside rural tourism.

Currently, Rosal is in a steady, even, demographic state, despite the elimination of the border and the trade advantages the customs barriers brought. This closure has been offset by a sharp increase in the number of vehicles.

There are important facts that point to the recent history of this town, and that have marked subsequent actions in the cultural evolution of this population. We refer to the arrival in the town, from Portugal, of the poet from Alicante, Miguel Hernandez, who was in the then municipal jail. The poet of pain and grief secretly passed to the neighboring country at the end of the civil war and there, once taken prisoner, was taken to the Spanish border and imprisoned in Rosal, where he stayed for a few days. So the prison in Rosal became the first in a string of prisons through which the poet had to pass before his death in Alicante. This was in April '39. In his confinement, Miguel managed to subsist on food that was given to him by a Rosal woman named Manuela rosaleña, and in return for this Samaritan gesture, he gave her a drawing of the ship thought to be made in Lisbon, and an unpublished poem, now missing.

On May '90, and in cooperation with Portugal, a tribute of regret was held for the poet. It was attended by his daughter, Lucia Izquierdo, his grandson, Manolillo, and the daughter of Manuela, and was held at the newly created "Miguel Hernandez" House of Culture, where previously stood the prison where the poet was first incarcerated. Currently, every year, they hold a cultural week that bears his name, and a poetry contest in the summer months. In the House of Culture they have recreated the cell where the poet was imprisoned, and have installed a Centre of Interpretation for his life and his work.
Rosal de la Frontera is also home to one of the big Andalusian writers, Carlos Muniz Romero, who has a beautiful street in the town named for him.

Monuments

Church of San Isidro Labrador.

Megalithic monuments from la Pasada Abad

Medieval water mills.

Gastronomy

It is a cuisine of the sierras and Andeval: migas, gazpacho de culantro, caldillo de matanza, sopa de peso, etc.

Desserts include las rosas de miel

Directions

By car: from Huelva, at 105 km, take the highway A-472 to La Palma del Condado and then the A-493, through Valverde del Camino. From Seville, at 150 km, take the N-433 (Sevilla-Lisbon).
By bus: The Damas Company has a service from Monday to Friday at 15.30 from Huelva. Saturdays it is at 13:30

Distances

Huelva 102 km
Cortegana 39 km
Almonaster la Real 45 km
Aracena 66 km
Encinasola 63 km
Aroche 26 km
Sevilla 153 km