Village
Municipality of the comarca of Valle de Alcudia, in the province of Ciudad Real, set at the meeting point between the Valle de Alcudia, Los Pedroches and La Serena, whose chapel of the Virgen del Castillo stands over the ruins of the Arab castle that dominates the town and guards a fourteenth-century Gothic seated carving. Its church of San Juan Bautista y Santo Domingo de Silos, of the sixteenth century, with three naves and Mudéjar coffering, has been a Bien de Interés Cultural (Spain's highest level of heritage protection) since 1991, and its most distinctive festival is la Vaquilla, in which twenty-four brothers represent the survivors of the plague of 1582-1583.
Monument
A 16th-century church raised over an earlier church of the castle, with three naves and a Mudéjar coffered ceiling. It was listed as a Bien de Interés Cultural (Spain's highest level of heritage protection) in 1991 and its rebuilding was paid for by the Marquis of Comares.
Monument
A sanctuary raised over the ruins of the Moorish castle that overlooks the town. It keeps a 14th-century seated Gothic carving of the Virgin and was visited by illustrious pilgrims such as Santa Teresa de Jesús and San Juan de Ávila.
Monument
An ashlar bridge built in 1795 to improve links with Almadén and the transport of mercury, one of the examples of Enlightenment public works in the comarca.
Monument
The Roman road preserved in Chillón forms part of route 29 of the Itinerario de Antonino, which linked Mérida (Emérita Augusta) with Zaragoza (Caesar Augusta) via Sisapo. The surviving stretch is about 300 metres long by 3.20 metres wide, and runs through the municipality as testimony to this imperial road network that crossed the mountains of the region.
Monument
A house of Renaissance character with a wrought-iron balcony, one of the best-preserved examples of the ancestral mansions with whitewashed façades and ironwork that characterise the old town.
Monument
Museum displaying the so-called Tesoro de Chillón, a collection of silver pieces donated from Mexico by emigrants from the town. Housed in one of the turrets of the parish church, it brings together donations made to Nuestra Señora del Castillo: most are pieces of Mexican silver brought to Chillón in the 17th century, along with ornaments and vestments of the Virgin, reliquaries, old books and remains of the original parish altarpiece.
Monument
The Museo Etnográfico de Chillón brings together farming implements, household utensils and other objects from the town's traditional way of life. It also includes an audiovisual section on the history of Chillón, covering its cultural, hunting and agricultural aspects. The museum has helped recover part of local history and prevent the disappearance of a heritage handed down from generation to generation.
Monument
The rock-art shelters of the sierra de la Virgen del Castillo, also called sierra de Cordoneros, which overlooks Chillón, were discovered in 1916 by the French abbot Henri Breuil. They belong to Schematic Art, with red as the predominant colour and some figures in black, and could date to the Chalcolithic or early Bronze Age. Their motifs include anthropomorphic figures, four-legged animals, ramiform signs and stylised depictions of hunters and deer.
Nature
Reliefs that frame the municipal district, with the Pilón del Lobo at 830 metres and the sanctuary range at 738 metres, at the meeting point of the Valle de Alcudia, Los Pedroches and La Serena.
Nature
Three watercourses cross the municipal district between holm oak dehesas such as those of La Pared and El Campo, fed by traditional springs such as the Fuente del Puerto, the Fuente del Bombo and La Herrumbrosa.
Curiosity
A stele decorated with the figure of a warrior, a sword and a shield, dated between 1100 and 901 BC. It is kept in the Provincial Museum of Ciudad Real and is evidence of Tartessian settlement in the area.
Curiosity
The town was a notable cloth-making centre: a royal pragmatic of 1406 valued Chillón cloth at 60 maravedís, the same price as fabrics imported from Ghent.
Activity
A ritual in which twenty-four brothers represent the survivors of the plague of 1582-1583 and act out the symbolic death of a heifer, standing for the end of the epidemic through the intercession of San Roque. It was declared a Festival of Regional Tourist Interest in 2017.
Activity
Las Luminarias de Chillón, in the comarca of the Valle de Alcudia, in Ciudad Real, is celebrated on the first Saturday of October with bonfires lit by neighbourhoods, in which old furniture and other materials are burned, accompanied by the tradition of cork torches. Children light these torches and use them to blacken both the townspeople and themselves. The festival has its origin in ancient rites of purification and renewal, linked to the closeness of the autumn equinox or solstice and to the feast of San Miguel.
Activity
Los Pericos Palos is a popular festival in Chillón (Ciudad Real) held on 29 June, the feast of San Pedro and San Pablo. It consists of building a figure from the last sheaf of wheat of the harvest, which at the end of the day is tossed in a blanket by the townspeople.
Activity
The image of the patron saint descends in procession from her sanctuary at the castle down to the village, marking the start of the August festivities. The pilgrimage is held on 12 August, when the Virgen del Castillo descends from her sanctuary in the castle of the sierra de Cordoneros. According to legend, a shepherd searching for a lost animal found the image hidden in a cave beneath the castle, believing he had found an animal; the carving, Gothic and seated, dates from the 14th century and is preserved in perfect condition except for a mark on the cheekbone that tradition attributes to a stone thrown by the shepherd.
Food and drink
Boiled and shredded beef dressed cold with onion, oil, vinegar and parsley. A leftovers dish deeply rooted in the province of Ciudad Real, it is served as a tapa in the bars of the sierra towns.