San Frutos del Duratón

“The site of this monastery is one of the roughest, most secluded and frightening in Spain. It is in the bishopric of Segovia. The river Duratón is surrounded by a great rock, which will be half a league in circumference; the rock, from the top of the river, is cut as if it had been cut by hand, and so deep that it is horrifying to look down. At the top of this rock there is a small plain, and on it is the monastery. It has no land even for a small vegetable garden. It has no water. All the ground is a smooth rock. To enter where the monastery is, the rock is cut off, and there is a wooden bridge there, which they say that Saint Frutos, on his way to retreat from the enemies, stabbed the rock with the staff he was carrying and it opened up, leaving him with this cleft, and the siege that the river makes, isolating the small square where the monastery is. Behind the river, this rock is surrounded by other rocks so high that they must be a hundred feet high, and so smooth and cut, that they look like a wall. A musket could not reach from the monastery to these rocks that are that surround it.” “ El sitio de este Monasterio es de los· más ásperos, retirados y espantosos que hay en España. Está en el obispado de Segovia. Ciñe el río Duratón una gran peña, que tendrá en contorno media legua; la peña, desde lo alto del río, es tajada como si la hubieran cortado a mano, y tan profunda, que pone horror mirar abajo. En lo alto de esta peña hay un pequeño llano, y en él está el Monasterio. No tiene t ierra ni aun para una pequeña huerta. No tiene agua. Todo el suelo es una peña lisa. Para entrar donde está el Monasterio está cortada la peña, y allí hay un puente de madera, que dicen que San Frutos, yendo retirándose de los enemigos, dio como una cuchillada en la peña con el báculo que llevaba y se abrió, quedándose con esta hendidura, y el cerco que hace el río aislada la pequeña plaza donde está el Monasterio.