Devil’s Door

Everything started in 1822 in the church of Panchimalco, which was already built and was headed by a priest named Francisco, a native of Valladolid, Spain. He was a member of the order of Saint Francis of Assisi.

Two years later, Mr. Rosendo Renderos came from Valencia with his daughter Maria de la Paz. He had many servants and a lot of money to buy lands in El Salvador. The Valencian was a widower. However, he had Maria de la Paz, his daughter, a young graceful whose unusual beauty impressed the natives, who said that he had “the same eyes and the same face as the virgin of the church of Panchimalco.”

The Renderos family lived for a while in the same convent, until Mr. Rosendo found what he was looking forward to not so far from San Salvador more or less 10 km. He bought some land surrounded by hills near the convent of Panchimalco. His intention was to plant orange trees with the Valencian seeds he had brought.

The servants and patron set to work preparing the land to sow the coveted seed. The Spanish servants were insufficient, and they hired Indians from Panchimalco. They constantly exchanged songs and traditions among themselves during their work. After a while, they got great fame, and the plain became known as “The Plains of Renderos.”

Years passed, and one afternoon, the priest went out to enjoy Mr. Rosendo’s fragrant chocolate and his daughter’s factory. When he arrived, the orange trees were then covered with perfumed flowers and very soon the coveted mature fruit, making a fantastic contrast the emerald of the foliage with the gold of the fruits.

Everywhere preparations were made for the harvesting of the orange as they do with grapes in Spain. They prepared festoons and colored pennants; the priest made from the pulpit a beautiful panegyric referring to the festivity.

On that date, they began to march from Panchimalco with its Indians neighbors. The women in their multi-colored suits and the white handkerchief on their heads, and Mr. Rosendo and his daughter wore their best clothes; the one with trousers cinched at the waist with a red silk girdle and covering her head with a wide-brimmed black hat. His daughter with her net dress, her comb, and her silk scarf towards the figure of an authentic Spaniard.

They had already climbed with difficulty those of the guitarron, the tun, the tepunaguaxtle, and the dancers of the Cujtaucujomet with their traditional jaws of deer because the dance is the reminiscence of their older generations. The Spanish songs, and the sweetness of Valencia, the sounds of Madrid also made the audience happy.

Midnight arrived between drinks of chicha and chocolate. When at the sound of the first bell of midnight in the legendary church of Panchimalco. They observed the road up the hill, making their unexpected entry to a mysterious character whose horse was black at night, like his suit and hat. From the hooves of his steed came red, blue, and greenish flares; you could feel a unique atmosphere impregnated with the smell of burning burnt and sulfur. The same demon had come down from the hill!!!

The Black Knight dismounted his steed, and at the time, the first bell of twelve o’clock sounded, he saluted Maria de la Paz and disappeared with her as if by magic. They said that a strong wind shook the orange groves and felt a penetrating smell of burning burnt and sulfur! The word spread like wildfire that the devil himself had come down from that hill to attend the orange harvest party.

Then it began from mouth to mouth that at nightfall or when the day was darkening, the demon began to haunt The Plains of Renderos! The one who came down from El Cholul Hill to talk with the beautiful Valencian Mr. Rosendo’s daughter, the rumors reached the Panchimalco’s priest, who neither slow nor lazy called Mr. Rosendo and without saying anything to Maria de la Paz. They went out in procession on Thursday.

On a Friday morning, the natives of Panchimalco talked with the Spanish servants and devised a plan; they would sow a large trunk of conacaste at the foot of the window and prepare thick chains to tie the same demon with them. Effectively at the first bell of the twelve o’clock at night, the Spaniards and Indians crouched by the window of Maria de la Paz to catch the mysterious knight. The priest raised his hand to sprinkle holy water, but the water did not do anything to him!

The servants and natives held the trunk to the same devil that in the fight threw at whatever servant tried to hold him. In his fight, this achievement escaped, and he rode his steed, throwing flames from helmets fleeing at full speed towards El Cholul Hill with such bad luck that he crashed with it, splitting the rock in two! With the impact, he left a gap and fell into the abyss steed, and rider. They said that in those moments, there was a strong earthquake and a tremendous storm. The boulders collided, the orange trees were shaken, and the fruits were thrown on the ground. It rolled down the sloped rocks that buried the entire town of Panchimalco.

When the sun finally sunrise and the calm returned. They observed a hole in the hill that followed as a faithful witness of what happened that night! Nothing remained standing only the bell tower of the church of Panchimalco that today continues in the same place as in those stormy times.

They also say that every afternoon along the path that leads from Panchimalco to The Plains of Renderos, the Valencian Maria de la Paz walks praying.

She arrives at the temple, seats briefly in the belfry before vanishing, spilling abundant tears that roll down the slopes. Little by little, the Earth consumes and joins them at the bottom of a bedrock. In the end, they form a headwater that cascades out from behind, the cemetery of Panchimalco.

Some people believe that this waterfall is still there from those convulsive times that the same surviving bell tower real of that earthquake and storm of the time and the fantasy of the legend. However, nowadays, you can just appreciate a fantastic view of that place called Devil’s door (figure 1) as a memory of that fight with the devil.

Figure 1. Devil’s door. ¹

Inspired by El Salvador Región Mágical’s version.

Credits:

¹ De Efegé - Trabajo propio, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=10107086