Near Old Marines, on top of the peak of the Royal (574 meters) is the most prominent monument of historical and artistic heritage of the municipality, the Royal Castle. This beautiful castle, reputed to be impregnable, was probably built by some of the kings of the Taifa of Valencia during the eleventh century. The reason for this construction was to control the wealth of the valley, and basically ensure the safety of the route that went from Lliria to Segorbe Gátova the wicket. Thus, the castle became part of the defensive structure of the city of Valencia.
The name of the castle comes from the Arabic ar-RHal, meaning "the farm", which is the name with which the Moors designated to this garden and rainfed land around it. Although the original name of the castle was Hisn al-'Uqab, which means "Castle of the Eagle".
The name of this castle appears in the eleventh century, in a document referring to the city of Valencia and wrote Ibn Alqama. In these notes relates the taking of Valencia by El Cid, who had come to help the King of Valencia, al-Qadir's attack the Almoravids. Before the arrival of the latter, Qadir decided to hide their precious jewels and treasures in the castles of Segorbe and the al-Uqäb Hisn. This was the year 1092, finally the monarch of Valencia was killed, and the Cid after clarifying the matter from which he had deposited their jewelry, attacked the castle and take it, dealing with their own assets that al-Qadir had deposited.
After the conquest of Valencia by the Christian King James I, the castle appears as the center of an area comprising the farmsteads of Gátova, Marines, Olla, towers and gardens. In 1277 the castle was partly destroyed by the King. The reason for this destruction was to prevent the enemy seized the castle and hiciese strong there. Fundamentally demolition occurred outside the perimeter of the castle.
In 1368, the second Baron Olocau, Antoni Vilaragut I reformed the castle renovated and converted, in addition to any residence in the starting point of his hunting wild boar, roe ... From this time until the century century, the fortress became a family ilaragut hand, First barons and earls of Olocau later.
The ascent to the castle which sits on the rock is difficult and dangerous to the north and west, where there is an impressive cross section. Only accessible by the southern and western slopes. The fort has a perimeter of irregular outline, and has two different venues: the first, outside, is known as the executors. This campus is surrounded by a wall of mud, which had towers at each end. It also has a large cistern, rectangular. This cistern is covered with barrel vault made of stone slabs bonded with lime mortar and sand. The entire interior is covered with a thick layer of stucco painted red. As usual in tanks Muslims. At the start of the vault are observed holes through which water entered. This reservoir, following a practice deeply rooted in the medieval fortresses, responds to the need to provide water to the valley's inhabitants and their cattle, which, in case of danger, came to take refuge in this large-scale outdoor enclosure.
The second enclosure is home to the castle itself. For construction use only material available on site, ie cracked rock stones joined with mortar, just as the previous reservoir. This castle has three broad areas of different levels, and lower the first two relate to the manor area, rebuilt during the years 1287-1289 for the new occupants Christians. The first space is in a state of total decay, while in the second we find a large rectangular room with barrel vault made of slab of rock, and also a small rectangular alcove. This dependence can be related to the intimate parts of the palaces and the main dwelling and Mudejar as Muslims are the main alcobillas Living.
This space linked by a corridor to the I to the castle. This third part is where would be carried out strictly military functions. Emphasizes the tower installed there, two floors and terrace, which is an impressive vantage view from the road to Old Marines. This tower is preceded by a quadrangular courtyard, which is reached by a corridor-shaped bent elbow. The patio floor, as the hall is in stucco. Just across the courtyard is the second reservoir of strength. Smaller than the preceding and that remains part of a skylight.
Inside the towers, one notices the ladder to the second floor and the terrace. At the bottom there are two units attached to the northern wall, it would be dungeons. In this part of the tower, the light came through two narrow windows with triple sheet rock by lintel. Above these windows are seen the holes in the beams or needles that were used to construct the walls. This is common in Muslim defensive constructions.
In conclusion we can say that we have a Muslim construction: battlements without loopholes, cisterns with red-painted interior walls, rubble produced by the procedure of the wall, zig-zag Linez split on the walls ... But Christians, in the course of time introduced several reforms in its construction. The new conquerors of Muslim defenses
Vídeo
