MONUMENTS

Castillo - Fortaleza del Sol

Establecimiento adaptado a discapacitados

INFORMATION

Nowadays, the citadel, called La Fortaleza del Sol, has become a cultural thematic space, which after a process of restoration and adaptation and designed for all audiences, allows its visit, while offering an intense cultural experience and entertainment to Through its exhibitions, live history scenes, workshops, children's spaces, etc.

The Castle of Lorca, declared a monument-artistic by decree of the Ministry of Public Instruction and Fine Arts of June 3, 1931, is crowned the city on a hill with optimal conditions of security and control over the Guadalentín valley, circumstances that favored the establishment of population since prehistory.

The current physiognomy of the Castle is the result of successive renovations to adapt it to its military function. The remains of this powerful Islamic citadel (713-1244) are visible in some of the canvases of the wall known as El Espaldón and next to the reservoirs that covered the vital needs of water.

After the capitulation of Lorca in 1244, the castle continues to perform the same military functions, accentuated by being a border line with the Nazari kingdom of Granada.

During the second half of the thirteenth century, Alfonso X began the construction of the three towers (today one of them disappeared) that currently characterize the physiognomy of this fortress.

The Torre Alfonsina, built in the central and highest part of Cerro del Castillo, as a tower of homage and symbol of Castilian power, replaced a Muslim tower of smaller proportions. Fortified masonry walls delimit the interior formed by three floors covered with brick vaults that rest on a large central pillar. The last floor receives light through four windows that have lost the mullion. On the east facing face there is the small access door and the hollow of the possible foundation stone.

The Torre del Espolón tower rises strengthening the western end of Cerro del Castillo. Its square floor presents to the exterior high ashlar masonry walls pierced by stars and essential loopholes and through the open door to the east. It has a cistern (where a dungeon is currently recreated) and two floors covered with a ribbed vault.

At the beginning of the 19th century, with the War of Independence, cannon batteries were added to the fortress, popularly known as Stables, and other military dependencies such as barracks, bakeries, etc.