Our Lady of Riansares

Tarancón (Cuenca)

Patrona de Tarancón, the Virgin of Riansares lives on a horse between her sanctuary by the river and the parish of the people: six months in each place, carried in procession on a boat-shaped walk.

Origin and history

The sanctuary, about four or five kilometres from Tarancón by the river Riansares, is an ancient center of local pilgrimage. It venerated a sedent Gothic image from the late 12th or early 13th century, destroyed in 1936. The present size is the work of the imaginary conquering Luis Marco Pérez, blessed on June 1, 1957: a Sitting Virgin with the Child, small in format, dressed in a cloak.

The devotion intimately unites the city and the sanctuary through the six-month transfers: the image rises to Tarancon on August 15 and returns to the sanctuary on January 28, the feast of Saint Julian, so that he spends six months in each place. Proclaimed patron towards the end of the 18th century, its main feast is on September 8, with a solemn procession, and it is carried in boat-shaped walks, a feature very rooted in the local festive iconography.

Canonical coronation: not found in the sources.