The Canary Islands, in addition to having an enviable climate and a geography full of unique landscapes, has a wide range of legends and unusual events, which throughout history have merged with popular folklore. Many of them are those of the aborigines of the Canary Islands who, as they did not know writing, many of their traditions and their history ended up in oblivion and the little that is preserved was rescued by different chroniclers, who with the passage of history has become legends: one of them is known as that of the Loco Mencey.
In pre-Hispanic times, Anaga formed one of the nine menceyatos that from the island of Tenerife and included the current municipalities of Santa Cruz de Tenerife and San Cristóbal de La Laguna, in addition to the Anaga massif.
According to the Canarian historian and poet of the s. XVII, Antonio de Viana, in his work ‘The conquest of Tenerife’, the menceyato of Anaga, led by Beneharo was the first to oppose conquestled by Alonso Fernández de Lugo.
This leader joined other menceys on the Island such as Bencomo or Acaymo to confront the Castilians in the Battle of Acentejo, known later as the massacre of Acentejo due to the defeat suffered by Alonso’s troops at the hands of the Guanches and which was fought in the municipality that currently bears the name La Matanza de Acentejo. He also fought in the Battle of Aguere and the Second Battle of Acentejo, a place known today as La Victoria de Acentejo, since it was there that the Castilians managed to reduce the inhabitants of Tenerife.
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Survived the conquest, accept the Peace of Los Realejos and takes the name of Fernando de Anaga.
The legend, which has its origin through different writers of chroniclers such as Viera y Clavijo or Juan Nuñez de la Peña and fused with popular folklore, tells that the Mencey, faced with the harassment of the Castilians but also the impotence when seeing his people enslaved by the invaders led him to throw himself from the mountains of Anaga, thus giving way to the myth of Beneharothe crazy mencey, who has starred in so many poems and songs.
In the 70s, this legend became popular with the record work of The Sabandeños titled The Cantata of the Mad Menceybased in turn on the 1927 poem La Tierra y La Raza by the Tenerife poet Ramón Gil-Roldán.
