The Three Designations
First to designate the Camino de Santiago was the Council of Europe, which in 1987 initiated the Cultural Routes programme by declaring the Santiago de Compostela pilgrim route to be the first European Cultural Route. In 1998 the technical side of cultural routes was hived off into a separate organisation called the European Institute of Cultural Routes, based in Luxembourg. Unesco had already declared the city centre of Santiago a World Heritage site in 1985. In 1993, it followed this by giving the same status to the Camino Francés and finally, in 1998, declared elements of the routes in France to be the same.
European Cultural Route
The Council of Europe, in a declaration made in Santiago in 1987, initiated the idea of European Cultural Routes. The CoE was founded in the aftermath of World War II in a conscious attempt to replace nationalist ideologies with a pan-European vision of shared values: "human rights, cultural democracy, European cultural diversity and identity, dialogue, mutual exchange and enrichment across boundaries and centuries". The Santiago declaration draws on this by highlighting the role played by roads in spreading values over national borders. The pilgrimage to Santiago was the first of these 'cultural routes', as it was "highly symbolic in the process of the creation of Europe". One of the tasks was to mark the "principal points of the route" with a common emblem, the now well-known stylised shell. The declaration ends with the hope that "the faith of the pilgrims of the past, and their common aspiration transcending national interests, would inspire people of today, particularly the young, to follow these routes and build a society founded on tolerance, respect for others, liberty and solidarity".
Of course, no-one can seriously question such noble sentiments. It's also perfectly true that the pilgrimage to Santiago did cement Spain's relationship with countries beyond the Pyrenees, and did indeed represent a spreading of values over national borders. However, the hope that those following the routes today would be inspired by a spirit of tolerance and respect for others sits awkwardly with the spirit of intolerance and lack of respect for others displayed by the medieval Church, the values of which the pilgrimage spread. St James was, after all, Matamoros, slayer of Moors; 'thou shalt not kill' does not apply to Moslems, it seems. The same 'Catholic Monarchs' who founded the Hostal in Santiago also initiated the Inquisition, hardly a model of tolerance and respect for others. The medieval Church may have been pan-European, but it did not share the values of the CoE, in fact was closer to the totalitarian model ('we're right; everyone who opposes us is wrong and must be eliminated') that the CoE was founded to oppose. No doubt mindful of this, further cultural routes were later initiated to highlight the 'mutual exchange and enrichment' caused by other religions and ethnic groups in Spain: Arabs/Moors, Sephardic Jews, Gypsies.
There is also something of a contradiction in seeking to show the cultural influence and the spread of values of the pilgrimage to Santiago by marking specific places, particularly as these markers (the stylised shells) have now been used (perhaps misused) for waymarking specific routes. Cultural influence is by its nature diffuse, disorganised and unplanned. Whilst it's perfectly true that culture and values are spread by travellers, a group which in medieval times included pilgrims, and that these will have used the roads of the time, it's a distortion to make it appear that culture spreads along waymarked trails.
World Heritage
As stated above, Unesco's later designation of the Caminos as a World Heritage Site was made in two parts: Spain first, then France. It was influenced by the CoE's initiative, which may be why the two are often confused, but has a very different aim. Whereas the CoE is concerned with the spread of common European values, an abstract concept, Unesco's World Heritage list is concerned with physical remnants of the past, specifically those of "universal application". "World Heritage sites belong to all the peoples of the world, irrespective of the territory on which they are located." Whilst some sites - Pyramids, Taj Mahal, Stonehenge - are obvious candidates for "universal application", inevitably, others will be more dubious. There are additional problems with a route, which is not really a 'site' at all. There are other linear structures, such as the Great Wall of China, on the World Heritage list, but a route or road is not a monolithic, unified structure like this. So whilst there is a sense in which a route is part of heritage, it is "essentially a communications route", so does not conform to the usual criteria for sites.
a) Spain
The justification starts with "the different pilgrimage routes converged on Santiago ... the cultural heritage scattered along the length of these routes is immensely rich." However, it then goes on to talk about "public works created expresssly for the Route" and "the Route, which is to a large extent preserved intact". So "different routes" become one "Route". This Route is, surprise, surprise, the Camino Francés plus its Navarran (Roncesvalles) and Aragonese (Somport) extensions. "It is not claimed that all the buildings and settlements along the Route are equal in cultural value, but rather that the remarkable historical ensemble that they represent is of outstanding universal significance." Some 1800 monuments along the route are listed in an appendix, and it highlights "certain settlements ... of outstanding quality" such as Puente la Reina and Estella. It claims that some 80% of "the Route" survives intact. The conclusion is that "The remarkable degree of completeness and high level of survival of the Route of St James itself and of the buildings and settlements along its length make it a unique example of a medieval pilgrimage route. ... The Route has preserved the most complete material record in the form of ecclesiastical and secular buildings, settlements both large and small, and civil engineering structures."
There are obvious problems with this:
- the route is largely based on Roman roads; many of the settlements, such as Astorga and León, and much of the infrastructure, such as bridges and actual roadway, predate the pilgrimage, and would have been there whether the pilgrimage had existed or not
- similarly, because there was an existing major road, many of the later settlements and infrastructure such as travellers' accommodation would have grown up along it too, again whether the pilgrim road to Santiago had existed or not; this is, after all, what happened to Roman roads in other countries, such as Britain
- likewise, many villages and towns not on "the Route" have monuments that are just as impressive if not more so as some of those on the route; in fact, if you were presented with a church or other building in N Spain, would you be able to say whether it was on the Camino or not? Is there anything intrinsic to those on the route that distinguishes them from others? Surely not
- this is also the case for buildings on others of "the different pilgrimage routes"; how do they differ from those on "the Route"?
- the argument is made that the pilgrimage route provided the channel for Romanesque architecture to spread to Spain, yet the earliest Romanesque churches are in Catalonia and have nothing to do with Santiago; conversely, several of the major monuments of the Camino Francés, such as León and Burgos cathedrals, are post-Romanesque, and others are of a distinctly Spanish baroque style. Santiago itself is a good example: its built heritage is predominantly baroque, so postdates the medieval pilgrimage
- in addition, any route/road changes over time; this means it is not a fixed 'heritage site', and also makes the claim that 80% of "the Route" survives rather questionable
Perhaps the fundamental question is whether the pilgrimage (a) added an extra dimension to the existing Roman and later infrastructure, and (b) provided a coherence to the whole that would otherwise not have been there. It's hard to disagree with the conclusion that it did; after all, there will have been little call for travellers to cross N Spain to Galicia other than to visit the shrine of St James. The part of Spain passed through by the Camino changed much less than other W European countries due to industrialisation and urbanisation; there was also much less major road-building. This in turn has meant that much more from the medieval and immediate post-medieval world has survived. So it's also hard to disagree with the statement that what survives along the Camino Francés is heritage of worldwide importance.
b) France
The problems listed above are, however, writ large with the later designation for France. Here, as the justification admits, there is "a string of individual monuments of high quality and historical significance that ... do not constitute continuous routes." The justification highlights several Romanesque buildings, and lists 7 sections of route and 71 structures (6 of which appear on the World Heritage list in their own right). Sites are included because they "figure on the guide produced by Aymeric Picaud [i.e. the 'Pilgrim's Guide'] ... or because they contain important relics and other material that connect them directly with the pilgrimage to Santiago". To save you the trouble of sorting them by the routes mentioned elsewhere on this site, they are listed at the end of this page.
As you can see, the sites are mainly churches and, besides those mentioned in the 'Pilgrim's Guide', include major cathedrals, such as Amiens, and major pilgrimage shrines, such as Mont-St-Michel and Rocamadour, as well as small village churches, such as Jezeau (in the Pyrenees, in case you don't know). The other sites in the list are mainly bridges and hospitals/hostels. The justification document includes two maps, one of the sites, and another which appears to show that all roads led to Santiago, though no historical evidence is provided to justify this map.
This is a decidedly eclectic collection of sites - there is even a dolmen! The justification states "to reach Spain pilgrims had to pass through France, and the group of important historical monuments that constitute this inscription ... mark out the four routes [i.e. the routes given in the 'Pilgrim's Guide'] by which they did so." However, nearly half the sites aren't on these "four routes"! Many of them seem to have little or no connection with Santiago (perhaps those who erected the dolmen realised that some putative 'Road to Santiago' would later go that way, so they put it alongside?). Even the route sections designated are questionable. The evaluation claims that they are all on "the Le Puy route". But what Le Puy route? The 'Pilgrim's Guide' (see separate page for discussion of this) on which the justification relies only mentions two places (Conques and Moissac) for the 700+km to the Pyrenees - hardly a detailed route description! The simple fact is that the 'Pilgrim's Guide' gives a detailed list of places on the Camino Francés but does not give any details for any route in France. The currently used Le Puy route, the GR65, is an invention of the 1970s that the creators admitted was not based on historical evidence - largely because there is no historical evidence. To take the Bach-Cahors section as an example, that is basically a section of Roman road; maybe it is 'world heritage', but what evidence is there that it was more used by pilgrims to Santiago or that it is more worthy of world heritage status than any other section of old road, Roman or otherwise?
At stake here is not whether these sites are of architectural or religious importance - clearly, most of them are - but whether they represent, as the Spanish designation puts it, a "remarkable historical ensemble ... of outstanding universal significance". The answer is surely 'no, they don't'. There is no such 'remarkable historical ensemble', in fact, there's no ensemble at all, just a motley collection of unrelated sites. If I ask the same question I asked above for Spain - whether the pilgrimage (a) added an extra dimension to the existing Roman and later infrastructure, and (b) provided a coherence to the whole that would otherwise not have been there - the answer again must surely be 'no'.
The justification seems to be saying that the sites on the list were primarily there as part of the pilgrimage to Santiago, and that the main roads of France were there primarily as part of the Camino. But this is the tail of Santiago wagging the dog of French roads and shrines. Of course, pilgrims did go from or through France to Santiago. Of course, they may well have used roads that took them over the bridges and past the churches in this list. But that is far from meaning that these roads, bridges and churches were there because of the pilgrimage to Santiago. The bridges and hospitals/hostels were for all travellers, not just pilgrims, let alone pilgrims to Santiago. The Pont Valentré in Cahors, for example, is a fine structure, and might be worthy of world heritage status, but what's it got to do with Santiago? Among its users may very well have been pilgrims to Santiago, but they must have been well under 1% of the total.
Likewise, pilgrims will have visited other shrines en route to Santiago, but they will surely have been a small proportion of the total at the shrine. Of course, there are obvious similarities of style and layout between the cathedral in Santiago and other shrines in France, such as Ste-Foy in Conques or St-Sernin in Toulouse, but that's to be expected of buildings from the same period built for the same purpose. No doubt a contributing factor was that masons and sculptors travelled widely and worked on buildings that were widely spread geographically. But that is far from meaning that these shrines formed part of the pilgrimage to Santiago. Links with the pilgrimage to Santiago are much less clear-cut in France than in Spain; whereas parts of the Camino Francés can realistically be seen as having been purpose-built for the pilgrimage to Santiago, that is not the case in France.
All in all, the list looks like nothing more than a job lot of structures that the local authorities wanted to promote and thought would benefit from world heritage status. No harm in trying, of course, but why was it ever approved? This sort of incoherent muddle devalues the whole concept of World Heritage Sites; it should be deleted from the list.