Interpretation Centre Pablo de Olavide y las Nuevas Poblaciones
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Arquillos
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Description
A population located at the foot of Sierra Morena, next to the Embalse de Guadalén, in a landscape of olive-populated lomas.
It is a small municipality founded by Carlos III in the 18th century and located to the south-west of the region of El Condado, where the areas of cultivation, in which the olive grove dominates, are alternated with those of pastures and dehesas dedicated to livestock and small hunting. The saw area has natural areas of interest, especially those located next to the Guadalén reservoir, where you can also practice the fishing of cyprinids.
Among its historical-artistic heritage is the Church of the Immaculate Conception, which was built in 1769 following the model implanted in the rest of the temples of colonization. It has a simple neoclassical façade on which an angry swordsman is placed in two bodies. The Clock Tower, on the other hand, was built in the 18th century and arouses great interest among visitors.
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History
Although the birth of this municipality is linked to the Sierra Morena colonization project, launched by Charles III in the 18th century, this foundation was made on another settlement of remote origins. The oldest documents in which the town of Arquillos is mentioned date from 1254, in which Alfonso X the Sage gives the village to Baeza for protection and defence. On another document, in which the king grants Ubeda the villages of Cabra and Santiesteban, and indicates that he had taken Arquillos to this city to deliver it to Baeza, it follows that the village would have at least one Islamic origin. In the 13th century it was occupied by Fernando III and handed over to the Council of Ubeda.
The belonging to the Arcipregamiento de Baeza still attests to the Ximena Jurado in its 1852 Anals. Arquillos, located on the county gate, forced passage on the roads from Granada to Cuenca and Valencia to Sevilla, met from ancient times the conditions for the settlement of a population based on agricultural and livestock development. For the same reason it is not surprising that he was chosen by the superintendent Pablo de Olavide for the location of one of the colonisation cores, whom he had the desire to call Campomia, although he did not finally succeed.
This project of colonization of Sierra Morena in the 18th century was a great urbanizing company that saw the creation of forty-four towns and eleven cities in Yermos places of the Parrilla and Sierra Morena. It was intended to both populate and plant semi-desertic areas, and to make the journey Cadiz- Madrid for travellers and goods safer.
The territory was ordered according to a preconceived plan and the new villages and villages were designed a priori following the classicist patterns that prevailed at the time. One of the places that have best maintained this urbanism is Arquillos, a route in damer, governed by principles of symmetry, uniformity and order, with a varied set of squares and with the civic and religious center on the western edge, next to the crossing of roads. Arquillos was a long time dependent on Santiesteban from the Port until, in 1833, Queen Elizabeth II granted her independence for having given, ten years earlier, to General Riego, a symbol of revolutionary liberalism, refugee there in the last insurrection.
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Clock Tower
The tower is square and starts from a zocalo. The whole factory is a bartender. Of its two bodies, the first has twice its height and in it is opened a half-point arch with pillows. On this door a flask window opens that gives light to its interior and is repeated on the other three sides. A triple molding separates the first from the second body, in which the clock appears, a small square window and docile pilasters at the ends. On the ledge there is an artisan iron structure, added in 1884 to house the bell and the veleta. In the 18th century the hours were marked by the bells of the churches. To raise a municipal tower with the sole function of indicating the hours was unusual at the time and symbolizes the confrontation between the civil and ecclesiastical powers that stars the reign of Charles III.
Church of the Immaculate Conception
Built in 1769, it has a typical facade of the 18th century colonized villages. It has a simple neoclassical front-crowned cover that maximizes its straight lines. On it is raised an angry swordsman that has the particularity of articulating in two bodies: on the bottom two twin holes are opened to blow up bells, while the upper body, with a single bell hole, is losing thickness to culminate in a triangular front that, in turn, hosts a tiny bell.
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