Our Lady of Carrassejo

Patrona de Grañón · "neither bought nor sold, in an oak aparecida"

In a forest to the south of Grañón, near the Camino de Santiago, the Baroque hermitage of Carrassejo guards the patron of the village and one of the largest collections of painted devotees of La Rioja; to its construction contributed the old fellowship of Our Lady of the Rosary.

Origin and history

The current hermitage is a baroque work of the late 17th century, of silery and masonry, with a single four-section ship, cruise and rectangular header, dome over the cruise and canyon vault with lunetes. The Baroque altarpiece, the work of Diego de Ichazo and restored in 1989, houses the headline image. He rises in the forest where the hospital of Santa Cruz de Carrassejo was, an old place of assistance next to the Camino de Santiago. The parish archives document that the financing of the work involved local co-fradies, and specifically mention the co-fradia of Our Lady of the Rosary, who worked as a "so pious" work and as the image "universal sponsorship of all this earth."

The tradition of Grañón states that the Virgin appeared to a shepherd in the place of the hermitage, and hence the popular saying: "The Virgin of Carrassejo is not bought or sold, but is reduced from the heavens and in an oak that appears"; a story of a piadoso-legendary character. The hermitage has one of the most important collections of exvotes of La Rioja, especially pictorial, a testimony of a devotion grateful for favors and miracles. Devotional life is expressed in the feast of March 25 and in the transfer of the image with dancers to the parish on May 1.

Canonical coronation: not found in the sources.