The Fish-man of Liérganes (El Hombre Pez de Liérganes)

Liérganes is a small village in Cantabria, on the Miera River. Francisco de la Vega Casar was born there, by one account on 22 October 1658. His mother was María del Casar.

Eve of St John's Day, 1674. Francisco went to bathe with other young men in the estuary of Bilbao. His companions watched him swim away down the ría. He left his clothes with theirs. He did not come back. Some modern retellings place the scene in the Miera River instead.

1679. The sea of Cádiz. Fishermen saw the figure of a rational person swimming on the waters and diving beneath them at will. When they tried to get close, it vanished. The next day it showed itself again with the same form and the same flight; after returning to land and telling others, the fishermen threw pieces of bread into the water, watched the figure take and eat them, and caught it in their nets.

He was about six feet tall, well built and in proportion. His skin was white. His red hair was short, as if just beginning to grow. His nails were worn down, as if eaten away by saltpetre. Later informants spoke of a few scales on his spine that soon fell off, and skin rough like sandpaper.

At the Convent of San Francisco in Cádiz, friars questioned him in several languages. No answer. Some days later he pronounced one word. Liérganes. Don Domingo de la Cantolla, secretary of the Suprema Inquisición and a native of Liérganes, passed the word on to the village.

1680. Fray Juan Rosende brought the young man north. At the hill called la Dehesa, a quarter league from the village, the friar told him to lead the way. He walked straight to the house of María del Casar. She knew him at once, and embraced him.

He did simple tasks when told, promptly but without enthusiasm. He went without food for up to a week, then ate avidly. He preferred to go naked. He said only tabaco, pan, vino, and without purpose. Once he threw himself into the water and came out at the Santander quay. Archbishop Tomás de Agüero remembered him from childhood as a peaceful man, eating and playing at his uncle's house in Rucuendo. Then, after nine years, more or less, he disappeared. Nothing more was ever known of him.

Benito Jerónimo Feijoo, a Benedictine monk and a debunker of popular superstitions, defended the story in 1734. He leaned on several witnesses, among them the Marqués de Valbuena, and on common knowledge across the region. His explanation was natural: breath holding learned by habit, like pearl divers, and a mind worn down by salt water, raw fish and isolation.

In 1934 Gregorio Marañón called the fish-man story undoubtedly false, yet would not dismiss so many testimonies. Marañón matched the traits to cretinism, then endemic in the mountains around Santander: almost mute, white skin, red hair, scaly skin, wandering. Ichthyosis has also been suggested. Meanwhile the retellings grew. A strip of scales from throat to stomach. Gills around the neck. Membranes between the fingers.

Today a bronze sculpture by Javier Anievas Cortines looks at the water from the bank of the Miera, beneath the Puente Mayor. An interpretation centre opened beside it in 2015. In 2010, Iker Jiménez travelled to Liérganes for Cuarto Milenio.