Castillo de Castro Ferral
The only remains of this castle are a rammed earth tower built by the Muslims prior to the Battle of Las Navas de Tolosa. In 1169, this castle was conquered by Calatravo Knights commanded by Fernando de Icaza, second Master of the Order. However, prior to the Battle of Las Navas de Tolosa, the fortress had returned to Moorish control. The castle would star in several acts of arms during the military campaign that concluded with the Christian triumph of Las Navas de Tolosa in 1212. The strategic importance of this castle, controlling one of the traditional passes of Sierra Morena, made it an essential objective for any army that wanted to cross the area. The Christians, in the days before the battle, sent a detachment that occupied Castro Ferral, abandoned by its defenders. The Christians in turn abandoned it the following day, perhaps as part of a deception to persuade their enemies. The Christian withdrawal was preceded by an ephemeral Islamic occupation, since, after the great defeat of Las Navas, this castle passed back into Christian hands. From then on, it was one of the strategic points from which the conquest of the Upper Guadalquivir would be undertaken. In 1217, the Archbishop of Toledo appropriated this castle and others in the region, an alienation that was confirmed by Pope Honorius III, converting them into the territorial limits of the Archdiocese of Toledo, to which it belonged until 1243, when it was integrated into the jurisdiction of the Bishopric of Baeza, who claimed it. The transfer of the border to the Betic Cordilleras marked the decline of Castro Ferral, who lost his role as watchman of the accesses to the Guadalquivir Valley. The castle was made up of three defensive enclosures. The first, currently the worst preserved, was made up of a wide palisade on an earth slope that closed the top of the fence, forming an almost perfect circle. Inside, there is a second enclosure, possibly built in rammed earth on a masonry base, of which various remains and two bastions that could have protected the entrance to the castle are preserved. The central core of the castle is made up of a rectangular enclosure of mortar rammed earth, inside which the remains of underground cells, possibly cisterns, are visible.
Location
Located north of Santa Elena, on Camino del Puerto del Muradal.