According to

Portuguese Portuguese may refer to: * anything of, from, or related to the country and nation of Portugal ** Portuguese cuisine, traditional foods ** Portuguese language, a Romance language *** Portuguese dialects, variants of the Portuguese language ** Port ...

Galicia Galicia may refer to: Geographic regions * Galicia (Spain), a region and autonomous community of northwestern Spain ** Gallaecia, a Roman province ** The post-Roman Kingdom of the Suebi, also called the Kingdom of Gallaecia ** The medieval King ...

n, and

Asturia Asturias (, ; ast, Asturies ), officially the Principality of Asturias ( es, Principado de Asturias; ast, Principáu d'Asturies; Galician-Asturian: ''Principao d'Asturias''), is an autonomous community in northwest Spain. It is coextensive ...

mythology Myth is a folklore genre consisting of Narrative, narratives that play a fundamental role in a society, such as foundational tales or Origin myth, origin myths. Since "myth" is widely used to imply that a story is not Objectivity (philosophy), ...

, the Mouros are a race of supernatural beings which inhabited the lands of

Asturias Asturias (, ; ast, Asturies ), officially the Principality of Asturias ( es, Principado de Asturias; ast, Principáu d'Asturies; Galician-Asturian: ''Principao d'Asturias''), is an autonomous community in northwest Spain. It is coextensi ...

and

Portugal Portugal, officially the Portuguese Republic, In recognized minority languages of Portugal: :* mwl, República Pertuesa is a country located on the Iberian Peninsula, in Southwestern Europe, and whose territory also includes the Macaronesian ...

since the beginning of time. For unknown reasons they were forced to take refuge under the earth, and now they are usually seen by people in the surroundings of '' castros'' and

long barrow Long barrows are a style of monument constructed across Western Europe in the fifth and fourth millennia BCE, during the Early Neolithic period. Typically constructed from earth and either timber or stone, those using the latter material repre ...

s. The Mouros work with gold, silver and gemstones with which they make up enormous treasures that are protected by

cuélebre Cuélebre ( Asturian) or Culebre ( Cantabrian), is a giant winged serpent- dragon of the Asturian and Cantabrian mythology, that lives in a cave, guards treasures and keeps '' anjanas'' (also known as ''xanas'') as prisoners. Although they are im ...

s. The Mouros do not usually go out of their dwellings, except for taking food, and also in special dates like

Midsummer Midsummer is a celebration of the season of summer usually held at a date around the summer solstice. It has pagan pre-Christian roots in Europe. The undivided Christian Church designated June 24 as the feast day of the early Christian marty ...

. Galician anthropologists had formed the theory that the Mouros are the opposite character of traditional galician peasant. The philologist Isodoro Millán argues that the term Moor comes from the Celtic mrvos akin to the Indo-European term mr-tuos, whence the Latin mortuus. This would relate the Moors to races already extinct, dead. The Mouros encantados some times appear as giants or warriors, and they include the legend of the moura encantada and the legend of the ''mourinhos'' or ''maruxinhos'', a very small

elf An elf () is a type of humanoid supernatural being in Germanic mythology and folklore. Elves appear especially in North Germanic mythology. They are subsequently mentioned in Snorri Sturluson's Icelandic Prose Edda. He distinguishes "ligh ...

like people who live under the ground.Autores da Região “O Tesouro dos Maruxinhos”
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References

Galician mythology Asturian mythology Spanish legendary creatures Mythological peoples Portuguese legendary creatures Portuguese culture Portuguese mythology Fairy tale stock characters Portuguese folklore Medieval legends Portuguese legends Fictional species and races Fictional Portuguese people {{europe-myth-stub

See also

References