Murallas de Segura de la Sierra

In the year 781, Segura de la Sierra was taken by Abul Asward, which fortified it and surrounded it by three rings of walls, which made the village an impregnable fortress. This walled enclosure comprised a complex and very well-preserved site. Currently, still many sections of its walls are visible, like the ones surrounding the lower part of the town, others that climb upward from Puerta Nueva to the Castle, the paintings which run down from the Castle to the bullring and the area outside the Alcazaba. The wall in some stretches is quite narrow, making one question whether that was its original layout, as according to some authors it is likely that it was mainly a “fiscal fence”, a wall built in the 16th century or later, to control the entry of products to the town. Some of the sections of the medieval one would be built upon it.

An important defensive complex must have existed outside the walls, though many of the buildings are today disappeared. One example is the Eras Tower, on a small promontory from which the path that leads up to the castle begins. It is a large rectangular tower with two areas, a lower base almost completely covered by vegetation, and an upper part some four storeys in height.

The most important nucleus remaining of the Arab walls is a crenelated wall surrounding the lower part of the town and running upward along the side towards the Castle. The wall, accessible through several doors, is reinforced with towers (like the one that houses the Catena door, next to the Moorish Baths) of truncated cone profile and square base with merlons. There is another tower similar to this one called the “Eras Tower” which only preserves two of its faces, located on the other side of town beside a cistern (Pozo de las Nieves). This defensive construction is made of stone and mortar.

Research carried out by Salvatierra, Castillo, Gómez and Visedo hypothesise that several successive enclosing walls existed, differentiating them according to the building materials and technique used.