At the time that Madoz was putting together his encyclopaedia, almonds were acquiring a status in agricultural production that they hadn't previously enjoyed. They had, so it is generally understood, been introduced to Mallorca by the Arabs, but their cultivation had never been vast, until the reorganisation of farm land in the first half of the nineteenth century paved the way for greater exploitation of crops rather than the staples such as cereals and grapes. They were to get a further boost when the vines were devastated by phylloxera in the early 1890s and alternatives were therefore sought.
As far as Son Servera is concerned, almond production is hardly unique to it. Indeed, it is probably fair to say that towns such as Bunyola and Santa Maria are more associated with almonds. But almonds there most certainly are on the eastern part of the island, and at this time of the year the trees are in or coming into blossom and are thus contributing to one of Mallorca's most familiar and prettiest sights.
Son Servera has the almond in common with much of the island, but this hasn't stopped the town staging an almond fair. This in itself is also not unique; Santa Margalida has one as well, but in September at almond harvesting time. Tomorrow, therefore, the town is staging its sixth fair dedicated specifically to the flower of the almond, "flor d'ametler", i.e. the blossom. This is the name of the fair but almonds and almond products of different sorts also feature at the fair. The fair's name is the same as one of Mallorca's better-known products, the Flor d'Ametler perfume, made from almond blossom, that has a history going back to the 1930s and which is still produced along with other products by the family business, Rover S.L. in Marratxi.
The fair, as with several others on the island, was created as a means, it was hoped, of tackling the effects of tourism seasonality. Whether it has succeeded in doing so is doubtful, but Cala Millor, part of which is in Son Servera, lends its name to the fair along with the town hall. As a celebration of the Mallorcan landscape at this time of the year, its success would be deserved, but we are all too well aware of the issues that conspire to limit its potential success.
The story of the fair and of the almond is in fact a story within another story, and one that is of some significance to Son Servera, as it involves how the town came to acquire this name. The fair is held at the estate of Ca s'Hereu, which is now a finca for agrotourism that offers seven bedrooms, but which has a history that stretches back to the thirteenth century and to the aftermath of the conquest by King Jaume I.
One of those who came on the conquest was a Jaume Cervera, and his family became one of two landowners of what, at the time of the conquest, was known as Binicanella but which, through marriages, evolved into two estates divided up between two brothers who, by the mid-fifteenth century, had the surname Servera. One of the estates was Son Frai Gari, the other was Ca s' Hereu, where the original tower had been built at the instruction of Jaume Cervera.
The estate of Ca s'Hereu was, until the 1970s, a working farm that employed around a hundred people and where livestock were raised and various crops were grown. One of them was of course the almond, and given the historical importance of both the estate and the almond to the town, where better to hold the fair than on what had been a farm that had gone a long way to making the almond a crop significant enough for Pascual Madoz to have highlighted it.
So, in 2010 the Son Servera tourism councillor in collaboration with the regional government's ministries for tourism and agriculture organised the first fair, and among the various dignitaries who were on hand to celebrate the occasion was the then mayor, Antoni Servera, and he was following a further tradition. Servera is, for obvious reasons, a very common surname in the town, and its first mayor, in 1837, was also a Servera.
Index for January 2015
Balearics' politicians and New Year messages - 3 January 2015
Cala d'Or improvements and positioning - 19 January 2015
Canaries' own airline - 23 January 2015
Dog poisoning Puerto Pollensa - 24 January 2015
Education struggle in Balearics - 26 January 2015
Election year in Spain - 6 January 2015
Exceltur on tourism spend - 22 January 2015
Holiday lets regulation in Balearics - 11 January 2015
Intellectual property - 21 January 2015
Javier Pierotti - 4 January 2015
Luis Bárcenas released - 25 January 2015
Mallorca's airport - 9 January 2015
Most popular stories of 2014 - 1 January 2015
Noise and tourism - 7 January 2015
Opening hours and zones of large tourist influx - 20 January 2015
Palma airport fees and AENA privatisation - 16 January 2015
Palma police corruption allegations - 17 January 2015
Podemos and Syriza - 27 January 2015
Political parties' illegal funding - 13 January 2015
Sant Antoni clamater - 10 January 2015
Sant Canut - 18 January 2015
Sineu King Jaume II statue - 29 January 2015
Son Servera almond blossom fair - 31 January 2015
Spanish Cabinet and perceptions in the Balearics - 14 January 2015
Syriza: all-inclusives - 28 January 2015
Technological developments and Mallorca's tourism - 8 January 2015
Tourism growth and electioneering - 30 January 2015
Tourism promotion and strategy - 15 January 2015
Uber in Spain - 5 January 2015
Week of the bearded ones - 12 January 2015
Year of the Archduke Louis Salvador - 2 January 2015
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