Hornillos del Camino: what's the difference?

[Bert45]

I took a photo of the Hospital de Peregrinos Santo Espíritu in Hornillos del Camino. I googled for some information and found this:

Hospital de Peregrinos Santo Espíritu​

"Durante la época medieval fueron creados aquí tres hospitales para atender a los peregrinos. Dos de estos lugares llevaban el nombre de San Lázaro, destinado a leprosos y peregrinos, y el Hospital de Peregrinos Santo Espíritu en Hornillos del Camino, es el único que se ha mantenido, creado para romeros y peregrinos. Actualmente este recinto tiene un área separada como lugar de encuentro de la peregrinación moderna." [/viajecaminodesantiago.com/camino-frances/hornillos-camino/]

"... para romeros y peregrinos." My small Spanish-English dictionary translates 'romero' as 'pilgrim'. 'peregrino' is also translated as 'pilgrim'. So the Hospital was created for pilgrims and pilgrims. An automatic translation gave me 'created for rosemary and pilgrims', which seemed an unlikely alternative.

My question is, therefore, what's the difference between a romero and a peregrino?

 

[Kiwi-family]

could it be this?

 

[dbier]

Weren't Romeros pilgrims to Rome?

 

[dick bird]

Weren't Romeros pilgrims to Rome?

Originally, yes, but the word ´romero´ was later extended to mean all pilgrims. In English, the same thing happened to the word ´palmer´ so romero and perergrino could be taken as synonyms, if not exact ones. A local festival is referred to in Spain as a ´Romería´, especially if it involves a procession. ´Romero´ is also the word for ´rosemary´.

 

[Kathar1na]

Indeed, the RAE says that romero and peregrino are synonyms.

Here on the forum posters sometimes emphasise that a romería is a short pilgrimage, for example a pilgrimage that takes only a day or less, and peregrinación is a long-distance pilgrimage.

The English language lacks nouns that would make a distinction between the two. German has Wallfahrer and Pilger where it is similar: the two words are synonyms but Pilger is more associated with a longer pilgrimage than Wallfahrer.

See www.rae.es and www.Duden.de.

 

[bullingtonce]

I took a photo of the Hospital de Peregrinos Santo Espíritu in Hornillos del Camino. I googled for some information and found this:

Hospital de Peregrinos Santo Espíritu​

"Durante la época medieval fueron creados aquí tres hospitales para atender a los peregrinos. Dos de estos lugares llevaban el nombre de San Lázaro, destinado a leprosos y peregrinos, y el Hospital de Peregrinos Santo Espíritu en Hornillos del Camino, es el único que se ha mantenido, creado para romeros y peregrinos. Actualmente este recinto tiene un área separada como lugar de encuentro de la peregrinación moderna." [/viajecaminodesantiago.com/camino-frances/hornillos-camino/]

"... para romeros y peregrinos." My small Spanish-English dictionary translates 'romero' as 'pilgrim'. 'peregrino' is also translated as 'pilgrim'. So the Hospital was created for pilgrims and pilgrims. An automatic translation gave me 'created for rosemary and pilgrims', which seemed an unlikely alternative.

My question is, therefore, what's the difference between a romero and a peregrino?

It's rather obvious: 'romero' is a character in an Italian opera and a 'peregrino' is a quite fine delicate wine. One you drink, one you don't drink other than you figuratively 'drink' in the opera as it plays itself out. Chuck

 

[Kathar1na]

That's not even funny, Chuck. You could at least have made a bit of an effort and quoted Dante.

 

[Rick of Rick and Peg]

The English language lacks nouns that would make a distinction between the two. German has Wallfahrer and Pilger where it is similar: the two words are synonyms but Pilger is more associated with a longer pilgrimage than Wallfahrer.

Possibly wayfarer but I don't think anyone would be putting it into a pilgrimage context.

Note the similarities between the German and English words though.

 

[CWBuff]

That's not even funny, Chuck. You could at least have made a bit of an effort and quoted Dante.

OK... I'll try this one: "A Roman Pilgrim walks into a Hospital de Peregrinos Santo Espíritu Albergue.... but then I digress...."

 

[CWBuff]

Indeed, the RAE says that romero and peregrino are synonyms.

Here on the forum posters sometimes emphasise that a romería is a short pilgrimage, for example a pilgrimage that takes only a day or less, and peregrinación is a long-distance pilgrimage.

The English language lacks nouns that would make a distinction between the two. German has Wallfahrer and Pilger where it is similar: the two words are synonyms but Pilger is more associated with a longer pilgrimage than Wallfahrer.

See www.rae.es and www.Duden.de.

that was my thought almost immediately - the word "romero" seems to me like "rover"

 

[AidaYYC]

View attachment 179559

could it be this?

In the vernacular, a Romero was a pilgrim that came through Rome or from that direction.

 

[David Tallan]

I took a photo of the Hospital de Peregrinos Santo Espíritu in Hornillos del Camino. I googled for some information and found this:

Hospital de Peregrinos Santo Espíritu​

"Durante la época medieval fueron creados aquí tres hospitales para atender a los peregrinos. Dos de estos lugares llevaban el nombre de San Lázaro, destinado a leprosos y peregrinos, y el Hospital de Peregrinos Santo Espíritu en Hornillos del Camino, es el único que se ha mantenido, creado para romeros y peregrinos. Actualmente este recinto tiene un área separada como lugar de encuentro de la peregrinación moderna." [/viajecaminodesantiago.com/camino-frances/hornillos-camino/]

"... para romeros y peregrinos." My small Spanish-English dictionary translates 'romero' as 'pilgrim'. 'peregrino' is also translated as 'pilgrim'. So the Hospital was created for pilgrims and pilgrims. An automatic translation gave me 'created for rosemary and pilgrims', which seemed an unlikely alternative.

My question is, therefore, what's the difference between a romero and a peregrino?

I learned a long time ago that a romero was a pilgrim to Rome, a palmero was a pilgrim to Jerusalem, and a peregrino was a pilgrim to Santiago - the three primary medieval Christian pilgrimage sites.

I subsequently learned that the meanings had shifted over time and in different locations/languages, so that what I had originally learned didn't necessarily hold any water.

Personally, romero and palmero have root meanings that are specific to those pilgrimages, while peregrino strikes me as more generic. I would have called pilgrims to Santiago "concheros".

 

[AidaYYC]

I l

I learned a long time ago that a romero was a pilgrim to Rome, a palmero was a pilgrim to Jerusalem, and a peregrino was a pilgrim to Santiago - the three primary medieval Christian pilgrimage sites.

I subsequently learned that the meanings had shifted over time and in different locations/languages, so that what I had originally learned didn't necessarily hold any water.

Yes, definitions vary over time, but I thank you for that historical definition. Buen Camino

 

[Bert45]

My thanks to all of the above (with one exception, perhaps).

 

[mark connolly]

A "pilot-fish"?

roam | Etymology of roam by etymonline

"walk, go, walk about;" early 14c., "wander about, prowl," a word of obscure origin,… See origin and meaning of roam.

www.etymonline.com

Definition of ROMERO

pilot fish… See the full definition

www.merriam-webster.com

 

[Kathar1na]

@Bert45, I don't know whether you will find this information useful for your photo caption: the text from the viajecaminodesantiago webpage makes it sound as if the building in Hornillos was built in the Middle Ages and is the only one of three medieval albergue-hospitals that is still standing but this is not accurate. More trustworthy sources say that the medieval hospitales of Hornillos have disappeared.

An article in the Diario de Burgos from March 2017 about the owner of the building in question and his plans to turn it into a Camino pilgrim albergue says that the building dates from 1515.

So this building appears to be a nicely renovated 16th century building. According to local news media, the owner started renovation about many years ago with the aim of opening another pilgrim albergue in Hornillos. He even obtained a € 50.000 grant from one of the EU programs for rural development. But it seems that it is not (yet?) in use as an albergue for Camino pilgrims?

When I saw photos I thought at first that the beautiful "tavern sign" is very old but a closer look shows that it is contemporary. All very pretty though. I had not noticed it at all when we walked through Hornillos.

---

 

[Joe C]

I learned a long time ago that a romero was a pilgrim to Rome, a palmero was a pilgrim to Jerusalem, and a peregrino was a pilgrim to Santiago - the three primary medieval Christian pilgrimage sites.

The newly-released newsletter of the Confraternity of St. James has an article that talks about these distinctions.

 

[JabbaPapa]

My question is, therefore, what's the difference between a romero and a peregrino?

Romero is derived from a Greek Ῥωμαῖος, meaning Roman (Catholic) (by semantic opposition to Eastern Catholic & Eastern Orthodox), and meaning Western Crusaders and Pilgrims to the Holy Land, from that Greek/Eastern perspective.

Peregrinus > peregrino/pilgrim referred originally somewhat specifically to the pilgrims of the Way of Saint James, from the Latin peregrinus meaning foreigner/traveller/pedlar (in Imperial era legal Latin it also meant a non-Citizen inhabitant of the Empire, which became increasingly obsolete as Citizenship rights became more common).

Both words eventually just meant pilgrim in the various Romance languages, though for example peregrine in English retains the meaning of foreign/from abroad -- Spanish has retained some of the old distinction whereby romeros are pilgrims heading East, and peregrinos those heading West.

The third of these words, palmero, is from a Catalan original referring to Jerusalem pilgrims in particular, though it too has a general meaning of pilgrim.

So that despite some specific & particular uses, in Spanish generally peregrino means pilgrim to Santiago ; romero pilgrim to Rome or generally/further East ; palmero pilgrim to Jerusalem/the Holy Land.

 

[Kathar1na]

The newly-released newsletter of the Confraternity of St. James has an article that talks about these distinctions.

About the distinction (if any) between romero and peregrino in contemporry Spanish?

The quoted text in the first post is taken from the webpage of a Spanish travel agency who sells Camino travel. If I’ve not mentioned it before: context, context, context is everything when trying to understand the meaning of unfamiliar foreign words.

And they did not even write the text about the three medieval hospitales of Hornillos themselves but copy-pasted it. The line “creado para romeros y peregrinos” turns up dozen of times in Google Search, always in connection with Hornillos. These are the usual online copy-paste jobs with the occasional slight editing thrown in. Romeros is just a space filler in this text and in this context. There is no deep meaning behind it. These medieval albergue-hospitals served all travellers. They were not like today’s Camino albergues where nowadays some of these albergues serve only one-directional pilgrims on foot or on bicycle on the way to Santiago …

I see that the CSJ newsletter costs £5 and is not accessible online.

 

[Kathar1na]

Some more text analysis .

The motherlode is the website of the town administration of Hornillos where they have a paragraph under the tab “History” saying: Con los años se crearon hasta tres hospitales, el de San Lázaro, destinado a leprosos y peregrinos, el del Santo Espíritu, creado para romeros y peregrinos y otro más, hoy desaparecidos. Can you not feel the stylistic need that requires a yada y yada after the first lepers and pilgrims? You cannot reproduce this stylistic element in an English translation of the sentence but that is all there is to it. Also note that the town administration writes that all three of these medieval albergues have disappeared. Not even the name of the third hospital is known today.

And @Bert45 ought to ask for a larger Spanish-English dictionary for Christmas or better yet, make more use of the RAE that is online and free.

 

[dick bird]

hoy desaparecidos.

Not sure how word order works in Spanish, but surely desaparacidos, given its postion in the sentence, could be taken as describing the romeros y peregrinos?

 

[Kathar1na]

Not sure how word order works in Spanish, but surely desaparacidos, given its postion in the sentence, could be taken as describing the romeros y peregrinos?

That would not make much sense to me. We could do with some native Spanish speakers with a firm grip on grammar and vocabulary . For me it's clear: Los hospitales - hoy desaparecidos.

 

[Pafayac]

Not sure how word order works in Spanish, but surely desaparacidos, given its postion in the sentence, could be taken as describing the romeros y peregrinos?

Non, it describes the 3 hospitales.
In French, there is a single word "pèlerin" to denote all the pilgrims.
In old French, the term "roumieu" or "romieu" was also used, but I am not sure it was dedicated to pilgrims to Rome.
Most of the middle-age pilgrimages were local, and I think they were called "romieu" or "pèlerin", without taking account their destination...

 

[Kathar1na]

I learned a long time ago that a romero was a pilgrim to Rome, a palmero was a pilgrim to Jerusalem, and a peregrino was a pilgrim to Santiago

Where did you read that peregrino was exclusively used to denote a pilgrim to Santiago? Here on the forum? I may err but I think this wrong belief stems from a badly understood or badly reproduced quote from Dante's Vita Nuova, and he wrote in Italian. But now even more forum members will believe it.

 

[David Tallan]

Where did you read that peregrino was exclusively used to denote a pilgrim to Santiago? Here on the forum? I may err but I think this wrong belief stems from a badly understood or badly reproduced quote from Dante's Vita Nova, and he wrote in Italian. But now even more forum members will believe it.

It was so long ago that I have no recollection where. I think it was before I joined the forum. And it may not have been in the context of Spanish. That's why I acknowledged the terms may mean different things, not only in different places and times, but in terms of different languages.

 

[Kathar1na]

The point is that at no time and in no language was Spanish peregrino (or Latin peregrinus or Italian peregrino as a variant of pellegrino, etc etc) a term that referred only to pilgrims to Santiago.