Though we’re still quite far from Halloween, the legend of Cortijo Jurado is something that would send chills up your spine.
Cortijo Jurado is a building that conceals mystery behind its walls and is situated in Campanillas, a neighborhood outside Malaga. While researching for this article, I dug up old articles that said this location has been haunted for a long time.
Appearing in some of Spain’s most notable mystery programs, such as Iker Jimenez’s Cuarto Milenio, the Cortijo Jurado also has a cult following in popular culture.
“The legend is sometimes the only symbolic approach to express a reality that is passed in time,” Iker Jimenez once observed. What basis for this ghostly legend might there be?
History of Cortijo Jurado
The ruins of the Cortijo Jurado are majestically perched on a hill. What was previously home to two of the wealthiest families in Malaga is now a somber image. How many drivers lose sight of the road in front of the house, which is situated in front of a busy road, every day?
Being Mr. Morbid, I ponder its mysteries, possibly buried or forgotten by a period that consumes everything in its path.
The Cortijo Jurado has some history to it. Not all of it is pleasant
The landscape was different years ago, but the place’s spirit has unquestionably marked the area. In the image above, the farmhouse stands out over the surrounding terrain with an unexpected intensity.
It begs us to learn a little more about its past and to look into the details to uncover the real meaning of the mythology.
Little is known about the precise year of its construction because time’s inexorable progress has destroyed any records that would have provided proof. According to popular belief, it was constructed between 1830 and 1840 by the Heredia family, one of Malaga’s most affluent families.
The interior of the Cortijo Jurado has been vandalized
The Heredia family would not always enjoy good fortune. They moved to Malaga from La Rioja and established their future there. Still, in 1925 they were forced to sell the house owing to financial hardship and gave it to the Larios, another affluent family in Malaga.
Larios and the Heredia family had a familiar La Rioja territory and kept a close emotional and professional bond. They belonged to the province’s top bourgeoisie, who lived two kilometers away in another rural home.
In addition, the Quesada family purchased the property following the Larios. A doctor from Valladolid took over as the new owner later that year, and thanks to his good fortune, he was able to contribute to the history of the farmhouse even though he never lived there.
The Vega Jurado family, who bought the farmhouse in 1975 and are the source of the name “Cortijo Jurado,” were the home’s final residents. A corporation bought it in 2000 to construct a five-star hotel, but they never finished, giving the Cortijo Jurado new stories.
The Cortijo Jurado when brief reconstruction and preservation works were attempted
That was probably a rumor since I never found anything formal about it. Still, I stumbled across some articles about the ghostly encounters of long-dead employees and curious persons who fell into large holes in the ground.
Upon the passing of the Heredia family patriarch, the legend starts. Between 1890 and 1920, young girls in the neighborhood started vanishing; they were allegedly killed after enduring humiliations and torture in demonic rituals.
This is when the new owners of the land took over. Later, some of the young victims’ bodies were discovered close to the farmhouse along the Campanillas River’s banks.
The Heredia family was the subject of attention because, due to their friendships in France and England, they were thought to be importing satanic activities.
They believed the victims were brought to the farmhouse through covert tunnels and that the home’s basement contained torture equipment that the Inquisition may have formerly utilized.
The narrative was started by a few of the property’s employees and later by Manuel Martin, a young guy who, in 1942, bravely entered one of the tunnels in front of his pals. Seasons lived the Cortijo then, and it was already shrouded in gloomy tales that some workers had created.
The young man claimed he discovered a room filled with torture devices and strewn bones upon his stealthy entry. He fled in a frenzy that he never experienced again out of terror; it was a memory that has always made his blood freeze.
According to his neighbors and researchers who have known him for a while, this youngster has maintained the same testimony over the years.
The Many Mysteries of Cortijo Jurado
It is a fact that the structure has basements and tunnels that may connect to the Cortijo de Colmenares, which is now the Guadalhorce Golf Club but was once the Larios’ home and was constructed in the 18th century.
There were tunnels connecting a lot of bourgeois haciendas. In fact, some UK haciendas, with intricate underground labyrinths, are filled with the remnants of satanic rituals, a practice that the top bourgeoisie of the time evidently engaged in more frequently than we think.
Some myths develop in response to actual or imagined occurrences; in the case of Cortijo Jurado, we are still determining its veracity. The Cortijo Colmenares construction project is said to have caused the soil to swallow a large truck.
Following this realization, they hurriedly covered the excavation with concrete; whether this was done to avoid tarnishing the names of such vital persons from Malaga’s past or to prevent the project from taking too long is still being determined.
The inside of the Cortijo Jurado
There is clear proof that the underground passages do, in fact, exist and are reachable from the stall of the farm itself. Sadly, those who walk inside will encounter an impassable concrete wall without a pick.
It appears that the farmhouse’s owners closed it around 1950, concealing some of its mystery behind these high walls.
I will provide a link at the end of this post that looks into the matter of ghosts and other demonic activities and appears to uncover some hints of what took place. The reader is ultimately responsible for forming his or her own view.
The number of paranormal occurrences that have occurred in this haunted house in Malaga must be added to the mythology, which only serves to make things worse.
Innumerable electronic voice recordings feature mysterious voices with no apparent source. These crystal-clear sounds occasionally seem to speak with the people there.
There are accounts of a figure appearing in the courtyard, where the same voices claim bodies are buried several meters below the surface.
Several people assert that a figure materialized in one of the farmhouse’s turrets.
A Documentary Film That Was Attempted
Jorge Rivera attempted to produce a short documentary about Lovecraft at Cortijo Jurado in 2000. Ultimately, mishaps like fires, accidents, and other catastrophes prevented the movie’s release.
One of the actors was injured during the filming when he went through the elevator shaft. After being released from the hospital, he vanished and was never seen or heard from again. Most of the time, the equipment’s batteries were discharging while shooting.
Cortijo Jurado today. The place is in ruins
They eventually gave efforts due to issues with the hard drives and ruined photographs, which added to the folklore surrounding this haunted mansion in Malaga. Here is the link that I promised for some further reading. Good luck.
RIP Victims of Cortijo Jurado
Other Famous Ghosts Caught on Camera
Ghosts have appeared in photographs ever since the invention of photography. The Victorians were enamored with the notion that freezing a moment in time could also slay the ghosts they believed to be all around them.
It was only a short step from artistic representations of angels and ephemeral figures to the fabrication of images, with figures covered in sheets or strands of dubious-looking ectoplasm erupting from their mouths to deceive the gullible.
The Cooper Family Hanging Ghost
The Cooper family of Texas purchased an old home and moved into it sometime in the middle of the 1950s. The father shot a family photo to remember their first night at the house. The wife, two small sons, and mother of Mr. Cooper were all seated at the dining room table. Everyone was delighted because it was their first house and a piece of the American Dream.
Over several days (perhaps weeks), the father finally took the exposed roll of film to the neighborhood drugstore to get the images “processed.” In the days of chemical photography, he was informed that he may pick them up one week from now.
The Cooper Family Hanging ghost
One week later, Mr. Cooper went to the pharmacy to get the tiny package of pictures and brought them home. He found what appeared to be a body hanging from the ceiling in the photo of his family that he had taken on the first evening in their “new” home.
When the father snapped the picture, it wasn’t there. So, from where did it originate? Was it a tribute to a house’s deceased previous tenant? Nobody knew.
The Brown Lady of Raynham Hall
According to legend, Raynham Hall in Norfolk, England, is haunted by The Brown Lady of Raynham Hall. When photographers for Country Life magazine claimed to have seen it, it quickly rose to the top of the list of most well-known hauntings in the UK. Due to the brown brocade dress that she is said to wear, the “Brown Lady” earned her nickname.
The “Brown Lady of Raynham Hall” is reputedly the ghost of Dorothy Walpole, who was Robert Walpole’s sister and is frequently referred to be Great Britain’s first prime minister. She was the second spouse of the infamously aggressive Charles Townshend, 2nd Viscount Townshend.
The apparition of the Brown Lady
According to the legend, Townshend punished his wife by shutting her in her quarters at Raynham Hall after learning that she had cheated on him with Lord Wharton. Mary Wortley Montagu said that the Countess of Wharton actually caught Dorothy.
Knowing that her husband would never permit her to leave, not even to see her children, she invited Dorothy to stay for a few days. She stayed at Raynham Hall until her smallpox death in 1726.
The Saudi Police Witch Video from 2014
In 2014, the Saudi Arabian police, while patrolling through the remote wilderness (possibly a backroad), discovered something truly terrifying. Though it isn’t confirmed what the being is, it remains one of the most horrifying videos to date.
Though many have been saying that the video is fake and reconstructed, no credible information is backing it up. Bizarrely, the witch that is spotted in the video does not seem to have a shadow either.
An excerpt from the Saudi witch video
The video (accessible here) shows a witch in the wilderness in the middle of a dirt road. There is tall grass on either side of the road, and the terrified driver pleads with the being to move out of his way. The woman, who is entirely white, has long brown hair, uses a walking stick to help her move along the road, and the car slowly approaches her.
She is illuminated in full view of the camera by the car’s flashing headlights.
She goes back towards the car with her head cocked, and her eyes hauntingly fixed on the camera. From behind the camera, a terrified voice is heard pleading, “Lock it [the door], lock it!”
‘Who’s that?’
The eerie woman keeps staring at the camera as she approaches the car.
“Turn around! The man continues, sounding increasingly terrified, “In reverse!”
The woman stops walking as the automobile moves back to a safe distance.
Next, read about the Aliens That Are Living Beneath Lake Baikal. Then, if you’re interested in true crime, read the Unsolved Mystery Behind the Lava Lake Murders!
