Hotel – Hospes Palacio de Arenales & Spa, Cáceres

We have mentioned the Golfin family, but who were they? There was a hint in the hotel, with a free entrance offered for a visit to the Palacio de los Golfines de Abajo in the historic centre of Cáceres. This site is considered one of the 10 most important historical places to visit in Extremadura, along with the Museo de Cáceres, the Concatedral de Santa María de Cáceres, and more generally the casco antiguo (old town) de Cáceres.

It was Tatiana Pérez de Guzmán el Bueno y Seebacher (1923-2012), VIII Countess of Torre Arias, who being the last of the line, established the “Fundación Tatiana Pérez de Guzmán el Bueno“. Tatiana left a fortune valued at €500 million to be managed by the foundation, a fortune including properties in Ávila, Cáceres, Córdoba and Madrid. One of the things the foundation has done is to open the Palacio de los Golfines de Abajo as a museum to show “the sobriety and elegance of the Spanish nobility that evolved over five centuries“. The palace was built between the 15th and 16th centuries. Construction began by Alfonso Golfín and was completed by his son, Sancho de Paredes Golfín, camarero to Isabel la Católica (1451-1504). The jewel of the palace is said to be its weapons room, which preserves original paintings from the 16th century. The Countess also owned 4,500 hectares of rural land around the city, including the ‘summer palace’ (country estate) now converted into the Hospes Palacio de Arenales.

This is the legend of the surname Golfín, as provided by Jesús Sierra Bolaños on his website. He suggests that the name may be of Gallic origin, or possibly of old Saxon extraction.

The more credible option is that the surname Golfín seems to come from Flanders or France, however there is no unanimity among historians who have studied the subject. It is believed that they arrived in Catalonia and from there they moved to Cáceres. Originally they were called Holken, which in French was Holquin and in Spain it was latinised in Holguin, which later producing a phonetic deviation in Golfín.

The story of Bolaños is that after the crusade against the Moors promoted by King Alfonso VIII of Castile in 1212 AD, many foreign warriors from central Europe decided to stay and settle on the peninsula. Some of these warriors, lacking a trade and without means of support, took advantage of this time of insecurity caused by the disputes over the succession to the throne, to pillage roads and steal cattle, and especially merino sheep, sowing terror over lands between the Tagus and Sierra Morena. These gentlemen, skilled in arms, became immensely rich and founded numerous strong houses, which were called golfínes and came to have their own king “Carchena”.

At that time, the Town Council, the main governing body of the town of Cáceres, met after morning mass, in Plaza de Santa María, at the doors of the church, where it resolved lawsuits and daily disputes in the town. It also treated matters concerning the Honourable Council of the Mesta, a very powerful organisation of ranchers at that time. They defended their members when cattle was moved through the royal lands to the pastures around Cáceres.

In one of those meetings to try to remedy the continuous pillaging of merino sheep, Mr. Gómez Tello, Mayor of Cáceres and one of the twelve Good Men who made up the Town Council, was present and said:

“Faced with so many actions by the so-called golfines, disturbing order on our roads, fields and mountains, looting and stealing the cattle of our shepherds and migratory herds, we must therefore mobilise and prosecute these crimes and with the help of the Brotherhood of the Mountains (Hermandad de los Montes) give them capture and worthy justice according to ancient custom”

However, one of the captains of the so-called golfínes, named Alfón Pérez, spied on the open meeting, and after the meeting followed Don Gómez Tello. He saw Gómez Tello speak with his daughter María, and was captivated by her beauty. The thief and highway robber continued to return frequently to the village, and through chance encounters he courted the beautiful maiden with large eyes and black hair. Little by little, love blossomed between the bandit captain and the mayor’s daughter. Until one day Maria confesses to her father, “Father, it is a joy for me to give you the news that I am in love, but I feel sadness for you because that young gentleman is called Alfón Pérez”.

The father, realising he was a golfín, went into a rage, and replied “My daughter, I forbid you to see this golfín again, that man you say you love is a thief and a ruffian and he only seeks your downfall, your dishonour”.

The bandit captain promised María that he would never give up on her, and showed up one morning at the mayor’s house ready to ask for her beloved’s hand. “Before you I present myself with my hands open and my heart as the only weapon, I hope not to offend or overwhelm you by my audacity, especially when I come sincerely and pure to ask you for the hand of your daughter, and if you did not give her to me, dead or imprisoned, I have to lie down, God willing”.

Faced with such an unpredictable event, Gómez Tello, as a sensible person and out of love for his daughter María, although believing that the bandit would not comply, he blurted out “I give you my consent and blessing to court my daughter, but first you must clear your name, recognise authority and ennoble your blood, earning the respect of the king, the nobility and the people. For this, she has my prestige and social rank, and once those requirements have been met, you will become part of my family through said betrothal”.

So the story goes, the captain of bandits became Alfón Pérez Golfín, a respected man, an honourable fighter who won for his courage on the battlefield many titles and goods.

Don Alfón Pérez Golfín, the first Golfín from Cáceres, and Doña María Gómez Tello married in the town of Cáceres, established their residence on the former home of the Gómez Tello family, today the Palacio de los Golfines de Abajo, and had several children, thus beginning one of the most illustrious lineages of the Cáceres nobility.

Experts have suggested that there is no documentation that supports this legend.

It would appear that Spanish kings would grant favours to those who made war on the Golfínes. Based on this, Alfonso X the Wise (1221-1284) granted certain privileges to the Order of Calatrava (an order that would be strongly related to the House of Guzmán). With the same condition, Sancho IV the Brave (1258-1295) authorised a certain Fernán Pérez de Bati, a knight of Plasencia (Cáceres), to build, with thirty vassals, strong houses to defend themselves against the Golfínes and wage war on them. Kings continued to grant privileges on the condition that war was waged on the Golfínes. In 1293 Sancho IV stated “that they should not be afraid of the damages that the shepherds inflicted on the Golfínes when they passed by with their cattle”. The old chronicles also record that the Golfínes were powerful and had castles and strong houses throughout the region.

One record makes it clear that that at one time golfín was the equivalent of thief or highwayman, as in rustler and cattle thief, and medieval legislation equated the golfínes with the Castilian malandrín (miscreant) and the Aragonese malsín (unhealthy, evil). All agree that the golfínes were a social plague of those times, against which cities armed themselves, and created brotherhoods (hermandades) and council militias (milicias concejiles). There are strong suggestions that the Golfín’s of Cáceres, were in the beginning if not bandits, still acquired power in the region through violence and fear. What appears equally true is that the Alfonso X did reward the family, granting them the local pastures of Torres Arias in Madrid.

There are also two documents related to pasture concessions made by Alfonso X and Sancho IV in favour of Alfón Pérez Golfín and his son, his namesake. They were respectively, Torre Arias and Fuente de la Higuera in 1261, and to his son the Casa Corchada, in 1291. However, some experts see these documents as 16th century fakes, useful for justifying the family possessions. The problem is that the original form of land ownership came from an initial distribution by the king to settlers (a form of repartimientos), and the books justifying that distribution no longer exist. Purchase and inheritance came later, but already in 1289 estates were being bought and sold. What was distributed were properties, farm land for crops, but not the resources to exploit them. Grasslands remained subject to communal usufruct rights, but cattle ranching was on private property.

By the first half of the 14th century powerful families emerged holding well defended estates and pastures. Initially (ca. 1300) land dedicated to livestock could be passed from father to son, but such lands were simply defined by paths, streams, geographical features or the allusions to surrounding vegetation. It looks as if some people had land for cultivation whilst other pastures for livestock grazing, but there would have also been vacant spaces left for collective exploitation. By 1341, some local mayors demanded that residents show what pastures they held and what was the legal basis. Most of the letters from kings concerned land dedicated to cattle raising, but often the terminology used was confusing, but it was usually possible to deduce the exploration rights, e.g. usufruct rights or private property. One family declared that they had rights to enjoy 1320 houses, estates, pastures, orchards and meadows, and it is thought that to acquire such assets must have involved purchases made from small owners disposing of their assets.

There was the additional problem that some grasslands had to be shared with foreigners during the winter season (often justified by contradictory privileges). It was the Mesta that defended the right to exploit pastures, and fought against grazing rights of foreigners. The way forward was to change the rules of land ownership, only allowing grassland grazing to owners of land. This essentially sanctioned the privatisation of pastures, leaving mountains, streams, and cattle routes (entry and exist paths) as common rights. From as early as 1279 there were protests logged with kings complaining about the intrusion of foreign cattle on to local grazing pastures, but the real conflicts started to increase in the 16th century, when fencing became common.

It’s noted that in the Cáceres region, conflicts were limited because from the 13th century communal and private meadows were well defined. This did not stop boundaries being abused, and conflicts occurring about grazing and watering of cattle. This was particular true in places distant from towns and villages, whereas in population centres, land occupation was higher, and residents exercised more effectively their usufruct rights. In the case of Cáceres there were complaints about people usurping land using fake support documents, or in some cases the simple justification that the settlers had occupied the land peacefully for a ‘long time’. It was equally true that those living in small hamlets found it difficult to oppose urban gentlemen (caballeros urbanos) taking over communal land. At the time the king confirmed the communal nature of the grazing land, but did nothing to stop those gentlemen from Cáceres doing as they wished. It did not help that local and municipal councils were usually controlled by those who had usurped the most land.

One might have expected the Catholic Monarchs (los Reyes Católicos) to do more to protect ordinary people, and they did order town mayors to investigate cases where knights, aldermen, etc. had usurped common land. But few actions were actually recorded. According to the testimonies found, land usurpations are detected throughout the 14th, 15th and early 16th centuries. Although the documentation is sporadic, it looks as if usurping local land was not anecdotal, but rather a constant policy carried out by the big families that often occupied positions as aldermen in the local councils. By the 16th century the usurped lands were being leased to others, who then sublet the farms to landless men.

So Cáceres defended the exercise of communal rights when they were threatened by people outside the community, but favoured the violation of those rights by residents of the town. This attitude of the council clearly supported the control of power by local knights, based largely on the expansion of their privately owned pasture space. That ownership allowed them to participate in the benefits derived from the livestock development of the Castilian kingdom, but they did so by renting out land rather than as livestock owners themselves. This is how the important families in Cáceres came to own vast estates of grazing land, that had once been communal land.

Setting aside legendary origins and looking to what is documented with certainty since the 14th century, the Golfínes definitely gained considerable power thanks to the charismatic figure of Sancho de Paredes, camarero (waiter) of Isabel la Católica (1451-1504). Sancho de Paredes belonged to the illustrious family of the Golfínes, as he was the son of Alonso Golfín, an outstanding member of Cáceres life and a loyal servant of the Catholic Monarchs (Isabel and Fernando stayed with them when they were visiting the town). The last name Paredes came from his mother and was the result of a deception. His father, Alonso Golfín, married Mencía de Tapia, daughter of the Trujillo gentleman Sancho de Paredes. He promised to make Mencía’s son heir, and for this reason they gave him the name of Sancho and the surname of Paredes, in honour of his maternal grandfather. But he remarried again, and from this marriage the famous Diego García de Paredes was born, whom Cervantes called the Hercules and Samson of Spain.

Sancho de Paredes Golfín was first a councillor of Cáceres and later, through his father, he entered the service of the Catholic Monarchs. His closeness to the monarchs, his fidelity and his great qualities made them notice him and entrust him with positions of responsibility. Thus, in 1498 he was appointed lieutenant of waiters (“teniente de camarero“), and later he was given the tenure of several castles with the task to administering justice for them. Yet later he was the personal waiter to Isabel la Católica and was one of those who signed as witness her famous last testament, where he appeared as Sancho de Paredes.

With the death of Isabel la Católica, her husband Fernando el Católico was forced to raise and educate alone the future Ferdinand I (1503-1564). Golfín was also appointed waiter for the infante, and later senior butler (mayordomo mayor). In the same way, almost all Golfín’s sons and daughters were raised as pages and ladies of Isabel la Católica. In particular she left endowments to the Golfín’s daughters, ensuring for them good marriages.

What is also certain is that there are more than fifty examples of the Golfín shields that appear on buildings, tombs, tombstones or altarpieces. In addition the Golfín family possessed two palaces in Cáceres, and the name is mentioned on tombs and in the lauds in both Concatedral de Santa María de Cáceres and the localMonasterio de San Francisco el Real (indicating a real patronage at the time of building, i.e. 15th century). There are even suggestions that some signs and writings were made by Sánchez de Paredes Golfín, and date to ca. 1530.

One event that occurred between 1743 and 1744 highlights the well-founded history of the Golfín family in Cáceres. It was a lawsuit between Don García Golfín y Carvajal and the Prioress of the nuns of the convent of Santa María de Jesús (la Priora de las monjas del convento de Santa María de Jesús). The convent was located next to the main house of Golfín, between the house and the Church of Santa María. The different buildings were separated by Callejón de Jesús and from and Calle del Rey (callejón means alley whereas calle means street). These streets and what was once the convent are today included in what is now called the Provincial Council Palace (palacio de la diputación provincial). The convent was founded around the middle of the 15th century, but was so poor that they could only build a chapel three meters wide. At the end of the 15th century Alonso Golfín agreed with the prioress to reform in the church, and also agreed to exercise patronage over the chapel to be built (i.e. they were to be buried there). The work was paid by Don Alonso Golfín, and started in 1493. As far as I understand things, part of Calle del Rey was included, as was a house that the nuns owned adjoining Alonso Golfín’s house. The works was finished in 1503 or 1504, with emblazoned shields placed in the family chapels, and the altarpiece stamped with the same coats of arms. In fact the family coat of arms appeared on the vaults, the interior arches and even the exterior façade. The patronage of the the Golfín family was clear and evident.

In 1743 the nuns decided to replace the altarpiece originally paid for by Don Alonso Golfín. A nun in the convent was willing to pay for a new altarpiece on which the coat of arms of Bartolomé Xerez would appear. Don García Golfín y Carvajal opposed it, bringing a lawsuit, whereas the nuns denied the patronage. Mr. García Golfín, presented so much well-documented evidence that they could not fail to recognised the right of the Golfín family. However, in 1870 in order to build the Provincial Council Palace, the church and the convent were demolished. The Golfines remains were discarded, and all the shields from the altarpiece and walls were ripped off. However, the arms and lineage of the family can still be seen in the Palacio de los Golfines de Abajo.

Through the 18th century, different local families merged, bringing together stately homes scattered throughout the province of Cáceres, Castilla la Vieja and Andalusia, which made it possible for them to rise to titled nobility. The Counts of Torre Arias and Marquises of Santa Marta, at the dawn of the 19th century became one of the richest families in Extremadura. However, the last Golfín died in Madrid in 1829, and her only daughter (María de los Dolores de Salabert y Arteaga) took her immense wealth to her marriage with Don Ildefonso Pérez de Guzmán el Bueno y Gordon. They were the great-grandparents of Doña Tatiana Pérez de Guzmán el Bueno y Seebacher (1923-2012), legatee of all this lineage.