Wills and shares of the donkey: Cortegada, Gudes and Congostro

An Entroido will (testamento) is a text in verse, normally recited or read in public in the village, in which a will is "made" for an animal that has just died and its parts are shared out among the neighbours, named one by one, with kindly mockery or not so kindly. It is a form of local satire preserved in A Limia. Xosé Calleja López collected three and transcribed them on his blog As tradicións da Limia; this page tells what each one says ^[1][2][3].

The Will of Cortegada (17 February 1947)

Cortegada belongs to the concello of Sarreaus. The text, dated 1947 and known to Calleja for years, is an atypical will: the animal that dies is not a donkey but a dog, and the parts are not shared among the neighbours. It is a satire of a pig slaughter that swaps the pig for a dog: the poor dog promises a day of plenty for all, when at that time the only fat dogs were those fattened for a few months to make the cows’ mash, but when they want to roast it in the communal oven "everything goes wrong" because they bring a cart of broom and not firewood: the oven will not heat and the dog does not cook. "It is all a comedy" ^[1].

Calleja thinks there is no sharing of parts because those were the years of the "long night of stone", very hard; an informer’s denunciation, because a neighbour felt attacked, even as a joke, could bring a lot of trouble. In the first part there is mention of the attempted shooting of a prisoner and the ending includes verses in Spanish and Galician asking for forgiveness and a last quatrain recalling how close the war was. The text names many neighbours by nickname or full name ^[1].

The plot of the first verse tale is this: Uncle Venedicto runs a "prison" in the village house and another house serves as the barracks of the Rural Guard; the guards detained a gentleman with legal papers, who answered the four demanding them insolently; the colonel decided to send him to the prison and read him the death sentence on 11 February; the people protested because it was not for the Rural Guard to kill him, and then the colonel ordered a soldier to do it… The satire continues with details of names and places in the neighbouring villages (Folgoso, Meilás, Rebordondo, Tintelo, Vilar de Cas) ^[1].

The sharing of the donkey of Gudes

This "Reparto da burra" reached Calleja through Daniel López, of the Ferreiros de Parada. It is not known when it was written, but it is evidence that there was an Entroido in Gudes; today it hangs on the wall of the Gudes telecentre. Lelo’s donkey died one snowy day, heading for Mouril, and it was not his fault but his wife’s, who had made him go to the mill in such bad weather. Then each named neighbour takes a part, according to their character or attitude during the year, and sometimes they are the ones who ask ^[2]:

• Enrique do Caveiro took off its hide; old Felipe warned him it deserved some verses; Señora Carmen wants the hide for a coat, "so that everyone sees it and says: there goes the president’s wife".
• Felipe da Lucrecia, the first to see the donkey, asks for the teeth; the head goes to Plácido and Luisa.
• Don Bernardino and his wife keep the legs; Don Cotilla and his Amparo a knuckle of pork; Don Eduardo, "a man of few words", a piece of the spleen; Alfredo asks for the belly for his Asunción; Señora Josefa, the caul fat "to make a shawl"; Julio do tío Delfín, the heart; Don Vilar, the ribcage; Don Lisardo, "somewhat vain", a shin bone "to make a whistle"; Anuncia and her Francisco, a whole ham; Don Higinio, the bladder; Antonio do Roquiño, half the tail and the point of the muzzle; Sergio, the other ham; and Señora Baselisa, "for being such a hoarder", the other half of the tail and a little bit of pasmona.
• The last quatrain exonerates the author of the will: "the mayor ordered me and I had to obey" (another joke) ^[2].

The Brea donkey (Congostro)

Another will came from Congostro, which Calleja owes to Carlos de Congostro, who left it to him in the 1990s. It is an attempt by the young people to recover a tradition they knew existed among their elders; the last verse dates the text to September 1996, "clearing the dung from the stable". The Brea family’s donkey, a very handy one, died last spring, after its hooves grew and its intestines swelled. The neighbours rush to ask for a part and for others the part comes by obligation; there are also those who ask about the harness, such as the packsaddle or the headstall. As in other wills, they try to keep the neighbours from finding out about the death ^[3]:

• Carmen, the owner, cared for it a great deal: she gave it hot water in the morning and flour with drops of aguardiente, and according to Vicenta she washed its ears and cleaned its teeth.
• Conchita arrived from Ourense saying that the autopsy was no problem because she had spoken to the forensic doctor; Maruja, "educated and clever", offers to be the dentist; Pepe Ogando helps throw it on the cart; and the donkey was buried in the mud, "so that it would not smell bad".
• Francisca asks for the skin to make a little coat; Concha tells her niece to ask for the guts to make a callada; Uncle José Braulio wants the tail for a shaving brush; Celso de Reboreda, the chamois horn for a tiroliro; Florita, the hooves to make slippers; José Antonio do Revira, who studied Psychology, the brain; Rosita wanted to teach it to laugh as in Venezuela; and the three Brea girls, who want to be seamstresses, the little ribs ^[3].

What these texts tell us

The three texts show that the Entroido in A Limia was and is a festival in which the neighbours take an active part, that the villages had their own way of making satire and that each neighbour’s name and nickname entered the verse. That is why Calleja cautions that these are texts that should not merely serve for laughter, but be read for what they are: a satire of village life ^[2].

Links

• Entroido of Xinzo de Limia
• Craftspeople and historic pantallas
• Xinzo de Limia
• Sarreaus

Sources

1. Xosé Calleja López, «Testamento de Cortegada. 17 de febreiro de 1947», As tradicións da Limia, 18/12/2023. https://tradicionsdalimia.es/testamento-de-cortegada-17-de-febreiro-de-1947/
2. Xosé Calleja López, «O reparto da burra. Entroido de Gudes. Xinzo de Limia», As tradicións da Limia, 25/12/2023. https://tradicionsdalimia.es/o-reparto-da-burra-entroido-de-gudes-xinzo-de-limia/
3. Xosé Calleja López, «Do famoso testamento da burra do Brea. Congostro», As tradicións da Limia, 01/01/2024. https://tradicionsdalimia.es/do-famoso-testamento-da-burra-do-brea-congostro/