City Walls of Andújar

Calle Luis Vives. 23740, Andújar

The flat, sunny streets of Andújar are an invitation to travellers to take a stroll and discover the town’s rich heritage. The old quarter, declared an Asset of Cultural Interest in 2007, is very captivating. Its stately houses, churches, picturesque narrow streets, and a few towers and curtain walls evoke the town’s important medieval past and the splendour of the old castle or fortress, which was torn down in the early 20th century.

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A good way to start a tour of the town is to climb up to the viewpoint in the tower known as the Torre Mudéjar or Torre del Reloj, which boasts a lovely panoramic view of the town. The tower also houses the tourist office.

Andújar’s first fortifications were built in the Roman period, to guard the bridge across the river Guadalquivir when the town began to be highly important for its terra sigillata pottery, which was exported throughout the Empire. The settlement’s definitive fortification was built by the Amohads in 1116, although it had to be repaired years later due to the damage caused by an earthquake that devastated the town.

Andújar’s castle or fortress was erected where the square known as Plaza Vieja is today. Standing in the square, on the left pavement, you can follow the line of the old town walls and find part of their remains in some streets. The best-preserved parts, consisting of three curtain walls and two towers, are in Calle Silera, next to the gate known as Puerta del Sol, which is one of the seven main gates to the town. The walled town was defended by 48 towers and four Albarrana towers (detached towers placed along curtain walls and connected by a footbridge), as well as a complex system of fortified gates, curtain walls, embankments and moats.

After being relinquished to Fernando III by the Moorish leader, Andújar became a strategic spot for the Christians, who organised the assault and conquest of the Upper Guadalquivir from there.  The town grew enormously during the Middle Ages. As the population expanded beyond the walled town and it gradually lost its military role, the walls began to decay. Little by little the fortification was dismantled or torn down, until the castle passed into private hands in the 19th century, during the Ecclesiastical Confiscations of Mendizábal. First it was turned into tenement house and later on into a social club. In the early 20th century, a decision was made to demolish it completely to build a cinema, which, paradoxically, also no longer exists.