The historic Venta de Aragoncillo

The Venta de Aragoncillo is an ancient venta situated in the pedanía of Aragoncillo, a municipality of Corduente in the province of Guadalajara. It is located about a kilometer south of the main area of Aragoncillo, near the current N-211 highway. Documentation suggests the building was conceived and erected as a rest stop on the road from Alcolea del Pinar to Molina de Aragón, probably in the first half of the 19th century.

Francisco Gómez Aguado and his wife Joaquina Salvador Esteban acquired the building toward 1860. In 1863, their only daughter, Bernabea, born at the venta, took charge of the establishment together with her husband, Salvador Martínez Hernández, after the death of her parents. Bernabea and Salvador had eight children, and two of them, Lucio and Salvador, inherited the building after their mother died in 1943. The brothers then divided the building into two halves, with the western part belonging to Salvador and the eastern part to Lucio.

In addition to its role as a venta, the building had an agricultural vocation and served as a distribution point for mail to the towns of Aragoncillo and Torremocha. During the guerra civil, agricultural installations on the other side of the national road were requisitioned as barracks for soldiers, located near the venta's era. A significant event occurred at the height of the venta on 1937, where an attack against General José Moscardó took place. A spark from the chimney caused a major fire in 1941 that devastated part of the residence. The venta ceased its activity as a rest stop in the 1960s and fell into disuse as a permanent residence in 1974.

Sources: Wikipedia, OpenStreetMap, Wikidata, Wikimedia Commons