CASA DE ROSALÍA
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WELCOME
This is the house of Rosalia de Castro, in which she lived the last days of her life and in which she died on the 15th July, 1885. Here we set out a journey of the incidents that marked her life and work.
She never had her own house
Rosalía lived in many different places, in rented or borrowed houses. But she lived here the last years of her life and this one became the House of Rosalía after a popular initiative which culminated with the opening to the public in 1971.
A house for everyone
La Casa da Matanza (The Slaughter House) was converted into a museum thanks to the popular initiative promoted by the Rosalía de Castro Board of Trustees that received thousands of supporters in all of Galicia and in the emigration. At that time thousands of anonymous people participated starting from the proposal of the choreographer José Manuel Rey de Viana; collections were organised in many towns and in almost all of the Galician Centres of Emigration.The Rosalia Board of that time was a refuge for Galicianism who still remained in the interior in the Franco’s regime and they converted this into one of their principal causes. But moreover they united more than 60 town councils, various banks, the Federation of Savings Banks, multiple entities, from Celta de Vigo FC to the Federation of Galician Cycling and countless associations. In the end, they raised a total of 994,043 pesetas in 1971.
“Whoever owns a house is set for life!”
This quotation from Rosalía is illustrated by three small displays: an identity card, a ceramic piece which shows the house as a souvenir and a family photograph taken in the garden.
Opening day
The House opens to the public in 1971 and as a Museum-House in 1972. Maruxa Villanueva, an actress and singer who returns from emigration, is who looks after the House and attends to the public until her death in 1998.Maruxa Villanueva, whose real name was María Isaura Vázquez Blanco, was born in Barrela in 1906 and died in Santiago de Compostela in 1998. She dedicated all her life to the knowledge and exaltation of Galician culture. An emigrant in Argentina from 20 years old, she converted herself into a successful singer and actress, as well as in a cornerstone of Galician culture in Buenos Aires, where she involved herself very busily in activities in favour of the Republic.
Who was Rosalía?
Rosalía observes us, serious, self-assured and serene, from her portrait, an oil painting by Modesto Brocos. This artist painted a friend, an intellectual who by 1880 was already a recognised writer.
A female Galician intellectual
Rosalía is a critical intellectual, always on the side of the weakest and who condemns female submission. As a writer she is profoundly refreshing and as a Galician woman she displays pride in her country.
The houses of Rosalía
Here various photographs of houses connected to Rosalía are displayed, like that of Arretén, the old palace of the maternal family; or the house of the Castro de Ortoño, where her father was born; and the no longer standing house in the ‘Calle del Sol’ street in Padrón, where she lived as a girl.
Rosalía’s friends
“Let Lieders sing our holy freedom!” Around this exclamation from Benito Vicetto various images of friends and family of Rosalía y Murguía are displayed, such as Alejandro Chao, one of her editors; José Hermida de Castro, cousin; Camilo Álvarez de Castro; Benito Vicetto; Serafín Avendaño, Eduardo Pondal and Aurelio Aguirre.
The life of Rosalía de Castro
Rosalía is born in Santiago de Compostela in 1837, daughter of the Padrón resident noblewoman Teresa de Castro and the priest José Viojo, neighbours in the very town of Padron.Her life is a really passionate story, full of historic, cultural and intellectual interest. Through her life, from the perspective of a female child of a single mother and a priest, we can understand the social code of her epoch.For Galicia Rosalía de Castro is more than just a writer. Generation after generation, her figure is a reference beyond ideas and geography. For Galician people no other literary or cultural figure unites us as much around our feelings of belonging to a land. She has generated innumerable pages, images and songs.
Galician Songs
Published in 1863, Cantares Gallegos (Galician Songs) is the first work printed entirely in Galician, and would mark the beginning of the full Galician Resurgence (Rexurdimento, a historical rebirth in Galician culture).
Follas novas (New Leaves)
This new book is a monumental piece of work, of complex and powerful lyrical magnitude, which was to cement the literary recovery of the Galician language.
An unceasing writing
In 28 years of literary life, Rosalía published five collections of poems. The last of these is En las Orillas del Sar (On the Banks of the River Sar) in which the poetic voice is more than ever that of the author.
Rosalía’s “Daybreak”
Near the end of ‘Cantares gallegos’, Rosalía includes the poem Alborada (Daybreak), a lyric with a strong simbolic content composed to be sung along to a piece of music played by Gregorio Eiras, a bagpiper from Lestrobe.
An extraordinary discovery
This example of Cantares gallegos’ (Galician Songs), discovered in 2013, contains an unknown photograph of the writer, a text signed by Rosalía and the transcription of a thank you letter from Fernán Caballero.More information, [here](https://youtu.be/UjL_JqHGqvU).
Rosalía’s prose
Rosalía de Castro’s prose is voluminous and diverse, and pushes the boundaries of the existing literary models of her time. It also connects with the work of a range of writers of her period.
“Negra sombra”, the all-time most popular pieces of Galician music
“Negra sombra” (Black shadow) is one of the all-time most popular pieces of Galician music. Indeed, Rosalía is the Galician writer whose work has most often been put to music, from the 19th to the 21st century.
The pro-Galicianism speech
The Galician people as a political subject and Galicia as a nation is the systhesis of the intellectual effort of Manuel Murguía to create the pro-Galicianism speech, already summarised in 1865, in the “Preliminary Speech” of his History of Galicia. But in 1890 it is necessary to take action and the intellectual elite found the first Galician political party, the Galician Regionalist Association; in the following year, in towns and cities the first commitees emerge and the regionalists make Murguía their honourary president.Here we can see a portrait of Murguía painted by Ricardo Camino in 1923, the constitution of various local committees of the Galician Regionalist Association in 1891 and the Galician flag on the funeral ribbon of the pro-Galicianist, as well as a bust.
Front Door Trellis
This vine was the rest area for the Rosalía family and source of literary inspiration. Here we can invoke those verses of “Ouh, miña parra de albariñas uvas / que a túa sombra me dás” - “Oh, my albariño grape vine / how you give me your shade”.Vegetative formation made up of eight vines that burst out and work hard against so many other pilaster components of the arbour. They are young feet, of “Catalonian” wine, planted in the first half of the current decade, to substitute and give continuity to the old trellis, whose presence in the garden goes back to remote times.Since 2013 they have coexisted with albariño vines, that will be the ones that finally form the trellis, to the detriment of the “Catalonian” vineyard, recalling the famous poem of “New Leaves”.
Tree of Gernika
Memorable Tree. Daughter of the ‘Gernikako Arbola’ - “Gernika Tree”. Donation from the General Government of Bizkaia for Rosalía Day 2019, after the year before the first that had been brought by Avelino Posa Antelo in 1994 died.This new child of the legendary Basque tree was a gift from the General Government of Bizkaia, the organisation that maintains the Gernika Tree, that has symbolized the traditional freedoms of the Basques since the Middle ages when the Knight of Bizkaia swore to respect the forces below this oak. In the present day it is the place where the “lehendakari” - Basque President promises to fulfill his duties.
Audio 1 (Welcome)
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Portrait of Rosalía (Modesto Brocos)
Collaborate
You can collaborate with the Casa de Rosalía in different ways: becoming a volunteer, a friend, a protector or a patron. You can get more information [here](https://rosalia.gal/colabora/razons-para-colaborar/) (in Galician).You can also buy books, music and objects related to Rosalía's life and work, in our [online store](https://tenda.rosalia.gal/).
Rosalía de Castro Camelia
Its main distinction is marked by the fact it deals with a camelia that was created in honour of the poet and therefore carries her name. Of Portuguese origin, distinguishable for its prolonged blooming, between November and April, with attractive, semi-double, large, orange-red coloured flowers. It is a hybrid creation from the renowned Portuguese nursery Moreira da Silva and Sons, in Porto: the first specimen obtained was baptized with the name of the author and gifted in 1968 to the Museum-House.
The Rosalía House Fig Tree
This fig tree, already historic, has been heroically resisting the inclemency of the weather and the scarce longevity of its species. The specimen was losing the physiognomical elegance that it flaunted in its better times, but thanks to the care it has received in the last decades it continues being the main reference in the House of Rosalía Garden. Despite the belief that it was planted by Rosalía herself, and one of her most famous poems talks of planting a fig tree, we have no proof of it.
The Rosalía House Ombú Tree
Majestic tree and to make you admirable that it forms part of a collection of American trees (coral tree, ombú, silk floss and jacaranda, these last two disappeared for lack of environmental adaption, originating from Buenos Aires, brought in seedling state, in the year 1971 by the House of Galicia for the official inauguration of the House Museum.
