1.0Web de Turismo del Ayuntamiento de La Orotavahttps://www.laorotava.es/turismoadministradorhttps://www.laorotava.es/turismo/author/administrador/rich600338<blockquote class="wp-embedded-content" data-secret="RTc8UwahCi"><a href="https://www.laorotava.es/turismo/en/historical-background/">Historical Background</a></blockquote><iframe sandbox="allow-scripts" security="restricted" src="https://www.laorotava.es/turismo/en/historical-background/embed/#?secret=RTc8UwahCi" width="600" height="338" title="«Historical Background» — Web de Turismo del Ayuntamiento de La Orotava" data-secret="RTc8UwahCi" frameborder="0" marginwidth="0" marginheight="0" scrolling="no" class="wp-embedded-content"></iframe><script> /*! This file is auto-generated */ !function(d,l){"use strict";l.querySelector&&d.addEventListener&&"undefined"!=typeof URL&&(d.wp=d.wp||{},d.wp.receiveEmbedMessage||(d.wp.receiveEmbedMessage=function(e){var t=e.data;if((t||t.secret||t.message||t.value)&&!/[^a-zA-Z0-9]/.test(t.secret)){for(var s,r,n,a=l.querySelectorAll('iframe[data-secret="'+t.secret+'"]'),o=l.querySelectorAll('blockquote[data-secret="'+t.secret+'"]'),c=new RegExp("^https?:$","i"),i=0;i<o.length;i++)o[i].style.display="none";for(i=0;i<a.length;i++)s=a[i],e.source===s.contentWindow&&(s.removeAttribute("style"),"height"===t.message?(1e3<(r=parseInt(t.value,10))?r=1e3:~~r<200&&(r=200),s.height=r):"link"===t.message&&(r=new URL(s.getAttribute("src")),n=new URL(t.value),c.test(n.protocol))&&n.host===r.host&&l.activeElement===s&&(d.top.location.href=t.value))}},d.addEventListener("message",d.wp.receiveEmbedMessage,!1),l.addEventListener("DOMContentLoaded",function(){for(var e,t,s=l.querySelectorAll("iframe.wp-embedded-content"),r=0;r<s.length;r++)(t=(e=s[r]).getAttribute("data-secret"))||(t=Math.random().toString(36).substring(2,12),e.src+="#?secret="+t,e.setAttribute("data-secret",t)),e.contentWindow.postMessage({message:"ready",secret:t},"*")},!1)))}(window,document); //# sourceURL=https://www.laorotava.es/turismo/wp-includes/js/wp-embed.min.js </script> DISCOVER LA OROTAVA Historial Background Villa de La Orotava is the only town in the Canaries with an almost entirely intact historical centre, offering comforting walks by its streets. In the town, history meets the visitors and especially the foreign visitors who have wandered by its streets for many centuries, leaving behind some of the most beautiful pages of travel literature. In this sense, it is difficult to find a city of our archipelago that has received more enthusiastic testimonies. However, none of these narratives or the most beautiful stories of literary fiction are as fascinating as the very reality of Villa de La Orotava, a true jewel for those who love art, beauty and history. Its history begins when the kingdom of Taoro or Tahoro, the richest and most fertile area of the island and perhaps the largest of the nine zones in which Tenerife was divided, was distributed by the crown among the conquerors and their aides for their deeds on 5th November 1496, the year when the conquest was completed. It occupied the extension of the current municipalities of Puerto de la Cruz, La Orotava, Los Realejos, La Victoria de Acentejo, La Matanza de Acentejo and Santa Úrsula. It was the richest and most powerful Menceyato (aboriginal political division of the land with a Mencey as the main ruler) on the island. Here the conquest of Tenerife and, therefore, also of the Canary Islands ended, when the courageous Bentor committed suicide after being defeated by the troops of Alonso Fernandez de Lugo. But the best-known and most famous Mencey  was Bencomo, the most powerful and brave of the Guanche (name of the Tenerife aboriginals) Menceyes, from the valley of Arautapala in Taoro, killed in the battle of Aguere and leader of the aboriginal resistance against the invading Castilian troops. Taoro is also a name that the Orotava valley, as well as this region, receives. The new settlers immediately acquired all the rights to receive the profits generated and began the process of occupying the place, being this fact the origin of the municipality. They proceeded to the distribution of land and water among the men who had participated in the endeavour of the conquest and subsequent colonization: hidalgos (Spanish nobles), relatives of the Adelantado (Spanish dignitary) and creditors of the war feat. The distribution was carried out on 1st January  1502, being the most outstanding one by the large number of beneficiaries. The settlers benefited from the precious gift of water and with an uneven land that allowed them to easily use it for irrigation, as a hydraulic force to move the mills and as a driving force to establish sugar mills. Sugar was a very demanded product in the international market, and this fact, among other reasons, promoted the European expansion by the Atlantic territories as a mean to obtain it. Therefore, the owners of the sloping fertile land of La Orotava valley began to exploit it economically with the cultivation of sugar cane. Those who engaged in its cultivation were rewarded with more plots of land. Even those who declared that they were going to establish a sugar mill were supplied with more than twice as much land. Three sugar mills were established, under the direction of the Portuguese coming from Madeira, brought due to their knowledge of the trade.  They worked together with the labour of black people, mulattoes, Berbers, and Guanches. Gradually, the nucleus of Villa de La Orotava was configured as an expression of varied human activities, where the social classes were spatially delimited and socially hierarchical. The nobles, who were the beneficiaries of the Adelantado’s share, occupied the apex of the social scale and resided in Villa de Abajo (Lower Village), the heart of the future city. The most proud of them, of clear aristocratic mentality, will form a closed group in the following years, known as ‘Doce Casas’ (Twelve Houses), which in 1560 constituted a Confraternity. Then we found the craftsmen, the lower classes, emigrants and peasants, who lived in ‘Villa de Arriba’ (Upper Village) or ‘Farrobo’, mostly in houses provided by the gentlemen for whom they worked. We are in the origins of the urban structure of La Orotava municipality. Lastly, above the urban space, was the area inhabited by the poor peasants who lived in stone haystacks, on clay floors and with pine-needle or straw ceilings. According to Leopoldo de la Rosa, the number of inhabitants in 1506 ranged from 80 to 100. When in 1561 the Tenerife census was made, Villa de La Orotava had a population of 526 neighbours in the main urban nucleus, with a total of 2,575 people in the whole area. The sugar production gave way to the vine in the second half of the sixteenth century, whose cultivation was also encouraged in the distribution of land. In the 17th century, Villa de La Orotava, and the valley that bears its name, was marked almost entirely by wine production, not forgetting that Villa de La Orotava not only worshiped its wines, but also the water, that basic  natural resource of great importance for its economy. Two types of wines, considered to be the best of their kind, were harvested mainly in La Orotava valley and in the north-west of Tenerife (Buenavista, San Juan de la Rambla and the Daute region): malvasía and Canary sack. They were bought by the Dutch and English merchants and exported to Europe, mostly to England, the main consumer, from the Garachico port and La Orotava port, now Puerto de la Cruz, the most important one on the island, where there was a small English settlement, together with an English consulate. In those years, this port was an open gate through which the European culture of the time entered the island. It was in the 17th century when Villa de La Orotava acquired real prominence and economic prosperity as a result of wine production and trade, and underwent an extensive socio-economic transformation. As a consequence of the richness andhttps://www-pre.laorotava.es/turismo/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/Cuevas-del-Mencey-Bencomo.-300x232.jpg