Quicena: Castillo de Montearagón, Aqueduct and Trails

Quicena brings history vividly to life: the Montearagón castle-monastery is located in the village, while Castillo de Montearagón was founded by Sancho Ramírez in 1086. Both names represent the historical character of this small village.

Culture

Castillo de Montearagón is an extensive complex flanked by towers and surrounded by walls. Its architectural form therefore clearly differs from individual religious and everyday buildings and provides the village's history with a distinct architectural reference point.

Religious architecture also includes the Iglesia de la Asunción de Nuestra Señora. It is a Baroque building with a rectangular floor plan and three naves. The central nave is larger than the two side naves, clearly defining the building's internal arrangement. This building allows its style, floor plan and the relative sizes of the naves to be considered together, without reducing the church to a single architectural feature.

The centre of Quicena also features vernacular architecture. The houses are predominantly built of stone and rammed earth, with a smaller proportion made of brick. Different materials thus meet in the villagescape, while the church and Castillo provide their own historical accents. This change in materials in particular complements the monumental effect of the walled complex with the more immediate construction style of the houses.

Other traces include the few surviving remains of the Ermita de San Pedro de Verona. They lie 300 metres west of Quicena, near the old road to Quicena. Another structure reveals a technical aspect of the village's history: the aqueduct in Quicena has an upper channel supported by two 2.5-metre-high semicircular arches. The stated height refers to the two supporting semicircular arches; the upper channel is the functional structure above them. Thus, alongside religious and defensive buildings, the historic conveyance of water is also part of the villagescape.

Trails and Landscape

The area around Quicena has a network of signposted trails through the natural and cultural-historical landscape. The trail network does not automatically connect all the sights into a fixed route; instead, it provides its own access to the landscape around the village.

A signposted trail leads to Castillo de Montearagón. From the Castillo, there are views over the Hoya de Huesca, the Sierra de Guara, the Salto de Roldán and the Pyrenees. The trail experience and the expansive landscape view therefore stand alongside one another as two distinct aspects of the surroundings. The named landscape areas extend from the Hoya de Huesca via the Sierra de Guara to the Pyrenees; the Salto de Roldán is another explicitly mentioned element of this field of view.

Other places: Seira, Boltaña, Barbastro, Buera, Denúy, Fanlo, Siétamo, Sopeira.

Quicena's main festival is dedicated to the Apostle James. A separate tradition is the San Fabián bonfire with communal barbecuing, including meat and baked potatoes. The main festival and the San Fabián bonfire thus refer to two different elements of the local festival traditions: the dedication to the Apostle James on the one hand, and the bonfire with communal barbecuing on the other.

For the overarching travel overview: Huesca.