Hoya del Salobral

Published on 19/11/2018

Noalejo (Sierra Mágina)

Monuments

La Hoya del Salobral, also known as the “Joya de Custodio”, is a small hamlet in the municipality of Noalejo, in the Sierra Sur of Jaén.
The rugged terrain of this land explains its beautiful landscapes, and it may also explain the flourishing of healers whose legend has spread far beyond the natural borders of these mountains.
The most famous of them all is probably Santo Custodio, born in 1885 in La Hoya, where he lived and always received whoever sought his help.
His house, on the main street of this small hamlet, is today a place of pilgrimage that opens every Sunday of the year so that the Santo’s faithful can pray to him.

More about this place…

Santo Luisico, Santo Manuel, Santo Custodio… Michael Jacobs came to the Sierra Sur to look into and write about the phenomenon of its folk healers, and ended up living here for the rest of his days. The beauty of these mountains and their character also explain why healers flourished here: a geography that encouraged isolation, and with it beliefs and a faith the Church did not control. It was the people who made their own saints, healers who to this day inspire tremendous devotion not only among the people of the Sierra Sur but in many parts of Andalusia and all of Spain.