Sedano

Sedano was historically the head of the Partido de Sedano and fell under the jurisdiction of the Marquis of Aguilar de Campoo, who held it as a señorío. The 1787 Floridablanca Census recorded it within the Intendencia de Burgos, one of fourteen administrative districts of the time. A later cadastral census counted 40 households and 160 residents. By the mid-19th century the municipality had absorbed the neighbouring settlement of Mozuelos de Sedano, and by the 1981 census it had been grouped into the broader administrative unit of Valle de Sedano. At that point the combined area covered just over 4,000 hectares and held around 105 households and 324 residents.

The valley has a sharp military memory from the Peninsular War. In 1812, the Burgos-based guerrilla commander Francisco de Longa caught French forces here and inflicted around six hundred casualties, killing both the general Fromant and a colonel named Bremont. Longa himself was a remarkable figure: born in Vizcaya in 1783, he had moved to Puebla de Arganzón as a young blacksmith's apprentice, married his master's daughter, and inherited the forge. When Napoleon's forces arrived in 1809 he raised a band of a hundred men and began raiding convoys across Burgos, the Basque Country and surrounding areas, often joining forces with another guerrilla unit. By 1812 he was a colonel commanding the División Iberia, seizing Castro Urdiales and winning actions at Cubo and Miranda. His decisive capture of Gamarra Menor helped turn the Battle of Vitoria, after which he fought alongside Wellington into France. He returned to Spain in 1813, rose to field marshal, and died in 1831 aged 48.

The original settlement stood on a rocky spur used as a defensive stronghold during the repopulation of the valley; once the threat receded, inhabitants moved down to the valley floor. The castle on that spur is a declared national monument. The village is also recognised as a historic ensemble, a designation confirmed in 1993.

Stone mansions bearing the carved shields of families descended from the early settlers — among them the houses of the Guevara, Huidobro, Arratia and Bustillo lineages — line the streets. Behind the parish church of Santa María, a path leads to a small medieval necropolis: a cluster of anthropomorphic graves cut into a single rock, tucked near a spring.