Jabugo, a Brief History

Jabugo has a population of 2,500 which includes the three outlying villages of El Repilado, Los Romeros and El Quejigo. Jabugo is one of the 28 municipalities included in the Parque Natural Sierra de Aracena y Picos de Aroche which covers 186,000 hectares. The Park is an UNESCO biosphere reserve and a special protection area for birdlife (ZEPA).

40% of the Park is covered with holm and cork oak woodlands. In the high rainfall zones chestnut orchards cover a little under 3% of the area. The river banks are populated by ash, willow and poplar. On the remaining areas pines, eucalypts, strawberry trees and scrub are interspersed with orchards of fruit and olives. The Park is also famous for its extensive variety of mushrooms.

The Park is home to over 130 species of birds of which the most notable are the Black and Griffon Vultures, Red Kites, Goshawks, Golden and Spanish Imperial Eagles, and Black Storks.

Jabugo has been populated since at least the Neolithic era according to remains excavated at Cueva de la Mora 2 kms from Jabugo. During the Muslim domination Jabugo was controlled from Almonaster la Real which still has one of the few remaining 10th century mosques built by Abd-al Raman III. Following its post muslim domination by Portuguese military orders Jabugo finally passed into Spanish control at the beginning of the 18th century under the Order of St James (Santiago). In 1961 Jabugo separated from Almonaster, having then a population of around 300.

In the 18th century its economy was dominated by cereal production and the family based rearing of black Iberian pigs which was to become the foundation of a global industry. There used to be two oil mills and one flour mill along with a number of small cloth dying workshops thanks to Jabugo’s proximity to water sources.

In August 1936 Jabugo, along with rest of the Sierra, fell into the hands of the military uprising in which thankfully only one person in Jabugo was killed. With the outbreak of civil war began a time of violence, hunger and misery. During the war and subsequent years there was a general shortage of supplies due to prohibitions and restrictions on crop storage and cereal and olive milling activities.

During these times of scarcity the importance of smuggling with Portugal grew and with it the bandit smuggler. Both men and women used the tracks of the Sierra to cross in and out of Portugal in search of food, clothes, towels, kitchen utensils, coffee, sugar, tobacco, flour, bread, chocolate, and lard. By foot or by donkey the smugglers risked being caught by the border guards who would take all the produce and beat or imprison those caught. On their return from a successful trip everything was sold on the local black market.

At the same time groups of ‘Maquis’, anti-fascist groups seeking to get to Nationalist controlled territory during the war who turned to armed opposition and others who feared reprisals, formed in the countryside. Along with them fled many women fearing the noted sexual violence of Franco’s Moroccan troops.

These people could only survive through the help of friends and collaborators. While some managed to escape north to Badajoz, and then to disappear into Madrid, many others were captured or turned themselves in to avoid reprisals against family members.

Today Jabugo is the cradle of Iberian ham production and synonymous with quality. History has it that Columbus took Jabugo products on his journeys to America and that during the Napoleonic invasion villagers gave the soldiers ham products to pacify them and avoid acts of vandalism. The beginnings of commercial production lie in the 18th century. But the great expansion of production coincided with the arrival of the Huelva to Zafra railway at the end of the 19th century.