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As Midsummer Day and the celebrations of San Juan (23rd June) approach, old legends are revived throughout Spain in association with these magical nights, and one of them concerns the cave known as the Cueva de los Encantados in Jumilla.
The story goes that in the long-distant past a great soldier named Bernardo decided to live secluded in this cave as a challenge to God, hoping to add another victory to his list of glorious battles, with the only concession being that he would venture into the outside world on the night of San Juan.
Locals came to believe that on that night troops of ghostly soldiers roam the countryside, and that the sounds of galloping hooves, gunfire and military drums and cornets can be heard above the strong winds that blow every year. Only at the first light of dawn do these phantasmagorical figures vanish, although another version of the legend says that gale fore winds return at midday on the Day of San Juan, bringing with them the sound of soldiers on the march.
Curiously, there is also another legend in Jumilla involving a man named Bernardo and a cave. This one concerns a monk in the monastery of Santa Ana, who lived a life of chaste piety until he fell in love with a young girl from the town who asked him to hear her confession. So impressed was he with her beauty that as a penitence he stated that she had to return two days later, and he soon became so obsessed that he began to climb over the monastery walls at night to be with her.
Eventually the prior found out and Bernardo was expelled from the monastery, following which he wandered distraught on the mountainside before falling into a deep cavern. He died of hunger shortly afterwards, and his body was found by a shepherd alongside a letter telling his tale – the cave is known known as the Cueva del Monje (the monk’s cave).
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