Village
Municipality of the comarca of Valle de Alcudia, in the province of Ciudad Real, to which much of the Valle de Alcudia belongs, for centuries the chief winter pasture of the Mesta, where hundreds of thousands of merino sheep arrived along the royal drove roads. In its district is the site of Sisapo, at La Bienvenida, a city occupied from the seventh century BC to the fourth AD and tied to the working of cinnabar and silver, raised on one of the three domes of the Castillejos Volcánicos, declared a Natural Monument; its bull-runs, documented since 1490, are considered the oldest in Spain.
Monument
The church of Nuestra Señora de la Asunción, in Almodóvar del Campo (Ciudad Real), is a building raised over a former mosque whose construction is generally placed in the 15th century, although other sources date its origin to the 14th or the early 16th century. It has three naves with pointed arches and a Baroque altarpiece, as well as a 14th-century Mudéjar ceiling: a coffered ceiling, or alfarje, considered the largest in Spain built from a single piece. Although it is now under the patronage of Nuestra Señora de la Asunción, the Diccionario histórico-geográfico de la provincia de Ciudad Real by Hervás y Buendía records that it was dedicated to Nuestra Señora de la Estrella. It was declared a Bien de Interés Cultural (Spain's highest level of heritage protection), with the category of monument, on 24 November 1992.
Monument
Former Carmelite conventual church of Almodóvar del Campo (Ciudad Real), built in 1599 of stone with courses of brick. It has three naves, the central one covered by a barrel vault and the side ones topped with domes in the manner of chapels. On the exterior, the doorway stands out, with an image housed in a niche, and a lateral belfry that crowns the whole.
Monument
Chapel of Gothic design begun in the 15th century and completed in the 16th, declared a Bien de Interés Cultural (Spain's highest level of heritage protection) in 1992 and today the seat of the municipal archive of Almodóvar del Campo (Ciudad Real). It has a whitewashed façade with a brick doorway and a Baroque-decorated interior from the 18th century, with a central dome painted around 1950 by Manuel Santos.
Monument
The house where Maestro Juan de Ávila was born, patron of the Spanish secular clergy and Doctor of the Church. It preserves the so-called Cueva de la Penitencia, where he withdrew to pray, and today houses the parish archives.
Monument
The Casa-Capilla de San Juan Bautista de la Concepción was built in Almodóvar del Campo in 1884 in honour of the Trinitarian reformer born in the town on 10 July 1561, founder of the Discalced Trinitarians, who as a young man had contact with the Discalced Carmelites and with Saint Teresa of Jesus herself. He was beatified on 21 September 1819 by Pope Pius VII and canonised on 25 May 1975 by Paul VI.
Monument
The Municipal Theatre of Almodóvar del Campo (Ciudad Real), in the Valle de Alcudia, was inaugurated in 1845 and has a capacity of around 400 spectators, making it one of the town's most distinctive civil buildings. It follows the Italian theatre model, with a horseshoe-shaped floor plan around the stalls, bordered by three superimposed tiers housing the stalls circle and the galleries.
Nature
A town identified with the Sisapo mentioned by classical sources, occupied from the 7th century BC to the 4th century AD and tied to the working of cinnabar and silver. It has been excavated continuously since 1980 and sits on a basaltic volcanic dome.
Nature
A Monumento Natural (Spain's designation for a protected natural landmark) situated in the municipality of Almodóvar del Campo (Ciudad Real), one of the best examples of volcanic pitons associated with lavas of the Campo de Calatrava. The area is defined by a one-kilometre eruptive fissure from which three eruptive centres arose, the castillejos that give the site its name, rising several dozen metres above the surrounding slates. Its composition is melilititic, with black olivine rocks in a matrix of augite and nepheline. It is a hunting ground for protected birds of prey such as the black vulture, the griffon vulture, the golden eagle and the red kite. It obtained the status of Monumento Natural on 5 October 1999; on one of the castillejos the city of Sisapo was built, whose archaeological site is declared a Bien de Interés Cultural (Spain's highest level of heritage protection).
Nature
The Almodóvar lagoon occupies part of the crater of a former volcano of the Campo de Calatrava, on which the village itself sits; the cone has suffered heavy erosion from quarrying activity. According to 16th-century documents, the lagoon is very old, predating the founding of the town. In the same Almodóvar-Argamasilla depression lies the laguna de las Cucharas, shared with Villamayor de Calatrava.
Curiosity
Former argentiferous lead mining district, discovered in 1858 in a small Y-shaped valley of the sierra Madrona, near the boundary with the province of Córdoba, which came to house its own settlement of some 4,500 inhabitants and was one of the most productive in Spain in the late 19th century, with output reaching 13,423 tonnes a year after mechanical drilling began in 1882. The operation, which at its peak employed hundreds of men and pack animals to transport the ore, went into decline as the vein became depleted, until the Sociedad Minero-Metalúrgica Peñarroya halted it in 1911; a narrow-gauge mining railway continued in service until 1970. Today only industrial ruins and spoil heaps remain, in the heart of the Valle de Alcudia.
Curiosity
Miguel de Cervantes mentions Almodóvar as many as four times in Don Quixote de la Mancha, and the Venta de la Inés, one of the spots linked to the Cervantine tale, lies within the municipal district.
Curiosity
A good part of the Valle de Alcudia belongs to the municipal district of Almodóvar del Campo and was for centuries the main winter pasture of the Mesta, where hundreds of thousands of merino sheep grazed after arriving along the royal drove roads from the north of the peninsula.
Activity
Documented since 1490, they are considered the oldest bull runs in Spain and have been declared a Festival of Regional Tourist Interest. They used to run along Calle Corredera to the Plaza Mayor and today they end in the Plaza de San Benito.
Activity
Main festivities held in September in honour of the Virgen del Carmen, San Juan Bautista de la Concepción and San Juan de Ávila. The first three days are dedicated to the Virgin and the saints, with processions and popular events; the following days are dedicated to the bull, with encierros declared a Fiesta de Interés Turístico Regional (an official Spanish designation for festivals of regional tourist interest).
Activity
A fair that recalls, at the end of March, the town's historic livestock-raising and trading tradition, when the droves of livestock made Almodóvar del Campo one of the most important fair towns in the region for centuries.
Historical milestone
In 1264 the commandery of Almodóvar was detached from that of Caracuel and went on to administer on its own account an extensive district of the Order of Calatrava. The town became the head of a district that reached as far as the Valle de Alcudia.
Historical milestone
The decree of the Catholic Monarchs of 1492 forced out the Jewish community of Almodóvar del Campo, reckoned at some two hundred people. The aljama disappeared and its trace remained in the place names of some streets of the old town.
Historical milestone
Alfonso XII granted Almodóvar del Campo the title of city by royal decree in 1879. The former head of a Calatravan commandery then lived on wool, agriculture and the mining boom of the nearby basin of Puertollano.
Historical milestone
Miguel Cano was a Baroque architect and sculptor born in Almodóvar del Campo in the mid-16th century and a reputed maker of altarpieces. The accumulation of commissions in Andalusia led him to settle with his family in Granada barely two months before the birth of his son Alonso Cano, one of the major figures of Golden Age sculpture and painting, whose father and first master he was, alongside his wife María Almansa; he worked with him and came to delegate to him some of his last works. Among his documented works are the altarpiece of the parish of San Ildefonso, in Granada, from 1601, and that of the parish of Nuestra Señora de la Oliva, in Lebrija, begun in 1628 and completed by his son.
Food and drink
Stew of lamb raised in the dehesas of the Valle de Alcudia, cooked with its crushed liver, garlic, bay leaf, pepper and wine. It is the recipe of the shepherds who wintered in the valley and remains the dish of the local festivities and pig slaughters.