Cerrito del Moro

Four periods on one hill

Beside Huerta del Marquesado, a hill preserves the dry-stone terraces and walls of a later Iron Age Celtiberian settlement spreading from summit to slopes. Since 2021 a team studying the Serranía’s «castrificación» (formation of hillfort settlements) has excavated it with Town Council funding. Its phases: some Copper Age objects; the Celtiberian hillfort; an Andalusi reoccupation, perhaps a shepherds’ and farmers’ village, perhaps a frontier post between coras, administrative districts; and occasional use by shepherds in Christian times.

The plaque idol

In 2023, near the gate, a slate sheet emerged, engraved with triangles, circles and lines: a plaque idol, a highly schematic human figure of the kind placed in Copper Age graves. The first known locally; the peninsula’s others are chiefly in the Alentejo, Galicia and Mediterranean region. It was handed to the Cuenca Museum. It may have come from elsewhere, such as nearby Cueva de la Mora, or an early level remains unexcavated.

Plan your visit

Before you travel

Do not visit independently: it is an archaeological site under excavation.

Combine with

Piedra de San Roque and Molino del Batán.