History - Villarrodrigo
The first vestiges of settlements in the town date back to the Bronze Age and are found in the place known as Piedras de la Ermita. Later in the Iron Age, human presence was located in the Atalayon area. Continuing with this chronology, remains of Celtiberian culture appeared in the nearby area of Bayonas. There the sculptural group known as “The Lion of Bienservida” was found and taken to a museum in Albacete, a sample of Greek funerary influence and dated to the end of the fourth century BC. The Romanization of these lands also bequeathed their culture in the form of a necropolis in Las Higuericas, where funerary inscriptions can be seen chiseled on the rocks.
During the Middle Ages, in the thirteenth century, coinciding with the advance of the Christian Kingdoms towards the south, the Sierra de Segura became territorially united to the Crown of Castile under the Lordship of the Order of Santiago and the Commandery of Segura. The master of the Order of Santiago, Don Rodrigo Manrique, granted the town the title of town in 1478, imposing as a condition the construction of a wall. On that date, the village, now converted into a town, was renamed Villarrodrigo, in honour of Don Rodrigo, father of the famous medieval poet Jorge Manrique.
In 1553, Prince Felipe granted Don Rodrigo, in the name of his father, Emperor Carlos I, the Charter of Privilege, and the exercise of civil jurisdiction. and criminal, thus becoming independent from Segura de la Sierra. The town was also the seat of the Vicariate with jurisdiction over the neighbouring towns of Génave, Torres de Albánchez and Bayonas. It was governed like the entire region by the Ordinances of 1580.
During the eighteenth century, it was part of the maritime province of Segura. Within the framework of the administrative reforms carried out in the nineteenth century, the new provincial division, the work of Javier de Burgos integrated the municipality into the province of Jaén in 1833.