Iglesia de Santa María la Mayor

The Iglesia de Santa María la Mayor crowns the hill of Ujué, a village in Navarre, and looks more like a castle than a church. The building was designed to do both jobs. Its walls are thick and topped with battlements, it has projecting turrets and a fortified upper level, and from the plain below it appears as a block of stone against the sky. This is the same monument that is described elsewhere in this guide as the castle of Ujué, and the two listings refer to a single site. The reasons for its strength lie in the history of Navarre: the village was close to the frontier with Castile and Aragon, and a church on the highest point could serve both as a spiritual centre and a place of refuge.

The church was built in phases. The oldest part is the eastern end, the chevet, a Romanesque apse with semicircular chapels and carved capitals, dating from the twelfth century. In the fourteenth century, when the kings of Navarre favoured the sanctuary, a Gothic nave was added, along with the defensive structures, and the building took its present fortified appearance. The contrast between the Romanesque and Gothic parts is easy to see inside, where the lines of the vaults change from rounded to pointed. The walls are supported by heavy buttresses, and a covered gallery runs along part of the outside, with openings that look over the village and the plain. Spiral steps in the stonework lead to the upper levels.

For the people of Navarre, the church is above all a shrine. It houses a Romanesque image of the Virgin of Ujué, the focus of one of the most important pilgrimages in the region, which brings large groups of walkers from the towns of the south on a Sunday in spring. Many make the journey in a spirit of devotion that has continued for centuries, and the village hosts them with food and services. Some of the towers are described in local sources by names that cannot be matched to the building reliably, so the guide leaves them out.

Entry to the church is free, though visitors are invited to leave a donation, and guided tours for groups must be arranged in advance. When the upper levels are open, the climb gives broad views across the plain towards the Bardenas Reales and the Pyrenees, and the sky is large and clear. The wind at the top is strong, so a jacket is useful even in warm weather.

The village itself is small, with stone houses and narrow lanes, and a few places serve traditional food. The Camino de Santiago passes at some distance, and Ujué suits a half-day visit on a drive through Navarre. Combine it with Olite, about twenty kilometres away, for the castles of the kingdom.