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A map of the sites visited in Spain
In January 2006 a field visit to Spain was undertaken to identify historic rammed earth structures. Below is a diary of the events.
Today was the first day of proper research. My first objective was Castillo Santa Barbara in Callosa de Segura. I got out of Murcia eventually but decided to take the N roads rather than the motorway as I wanted to get to know the car a little better. I passed Castillo Cox, which is on a hill outside of Cox but could find no good access and pressed on to Santa Barbara. Castillo Santa Barbara was built in 1266 and is on a promontory just outside of the town. It has recently been repaired by placing concrete on top of the rammed earth. Unfortunately there is a locked gate on the door meaning no internal access, but the site is large so that much information can be gleaned from the outside.
I first looked at the buildings I discovered last night in the centre of Elx, which are the town hall and the archaeological museum, together with some consolidated ruins close by. Unfortunately it was raining slightly, but that didn't seem to affect the photographs.
Back to Novelda and Castell del Mola. I spend quite a lot of time investigating a hole I found in the wall, which was about 50cm square and 1m deep through the wall, however it was supporting 2.5m of rammed earth above it. I have a video and a sample of fallen material to analyse when I get back. Much of the castle has recently been restored with concrete made to look like rammed earth. I found excellent evidence of the concrete walls cracking where the rammed earth did not - a perfect example of shear cracks in a deep beam. However the castle was locked again, but I could see a way in over one of the fences. A man then appeared and parked his car and opened the church next door up. I was torn between making a break for it or asking him if he had a key to the castle. He did, and he showed me round, explaining things to me in slow Spanish, so that I understood. I got lots of photos of the interior and of the towers, going up to the 3rd floor of a 12th century rammed earth tower.
I at Villena castle arrived as the church bells tolled 10:30 and was let in by the guardian. There is a 12th century tower which is three stories high, and on top of that there are two stories of later masonry. There are some repairs to the rammed earth, but these appear to be mainly superficial. I measured the sizes of the blocks, and was able to go inside the tower, there are some very impressive ceilings, with lots of interlaced arches. I also measured the width of the walls at different heights of the building, the walls get noticeably thinner with increasing height. I spent a lot of time at Villena and hopefully got some good data.
I obtained a map from the lady at Lorca tourist information and she showed me where all the towns attractions were, explaining they were either closed for lunch until 4pm, or closed until April. Undeterred I headed for the castle, which didn't look too far away on the map. I climbed 130m vertical metres to the bottom of the castle, where there were signs all over the place explaining that the tourist train would not be running as the castle was closed until April. I even asked at the desk, which appeared to be open, but had no luck. I consoled myself with a tour of the (quite extensive) castle walls. Unfortunately there was very little rammed earth. I did find some, which made up the bases of three of the square towers around the curtain wall (there were probably 20 towers in all).
The rammed earth I did see was very interesting, there were two abutting walls each constructed in completely different rammed earth, with a clear gap between them. One mixture was lime rich and mixed with river pebbles, the other clay rich mixed with slates. Both seemed to be equally hard wearing and looked essentially similar, but up close the mixture was completely different. Added to this the block sizes and the sizes of the timber cross members used was different too. Hopefully these differences will enable us to age the rammed earth very accurately.
Down in Lorca town I saw repairs of another rammed earth type building. The holes made by the formwork were visible but from the outside the walls looked like rubble masonry. Only in places where the outer skin of rubble had been removed was I able to see the inner rammed earth. This is a type of rammed earth I have not come across before.
Tabernas castle was initially a disappointment because it looked like they had let most of the castle fall to ruin, then thought - 'We need a castle, its the symbol of our town', so built one out of concrete on top of the original one. I was not a happy bunny as recorded a video saying so. On closer inspection it appeared that there were some parts of the castle in rammed earth, and that probably most of the destruction had taken place at the same time, like following a siege or something, I 'll check that out. Made a very interesting discovery of a ring beam in the centre of one of the walls, in a kind of Eureka moment. I was puzzling why there was a row of flat masonry stones half way up the inside faces of one of the towers , then I noticed that in the end face one of the walls there was a hole with some timber in. I inspected the hole and found it was perfectly circular with a plaster lining. Inside this was a large piece of once circular timber, I tried to remove it but it obviously ran the full length of the wall. The hole was just below the level of the masonry I had been puzzling about earlier, and there was a hole in the face which seemed to have no particular cause. I dug around at the base of the hole and found the rest of the ring beam, and its lined plaster hole. I pulled out some of the timber, which was bone dry and probably had not seen the light of day for 500 years. Even more interestingly within the hole I found short lengths of straw, which was not visible in any of the other walls I had seen. This straw was bright yellow, and had not decomposed or or been broken down since it was added to the original mixture. I was quite exciting anyway. From this discovery it was possible to figure out the whole history of the tower and explain all the problems which I could now see. I could also prove that the people who built this tower really knew what they were doing.
I explored the rest of the castle, it was obvious that it had initially been a completely rammed earth structure, but at some point in the past it had been decided to add some masonry to the walls. Thus the exterior walls were buttressed by two layers of rubble masonry, leaning against the rammed earth walls. It was interesting to see that in places the rammed earth had survived where the rubble work had been washed away.
The part of the castle visible from miles around was concrete built onto rammed earth as I had seen previously. I don't know if this is still Spanish policy, it seems to be the prevailing preservation technique, but I will try to find out. From a distance the building certainly looks the part, with the Tapiales holes visible, and up close it is easy to distinguish the differences in the two, so from a conservation point of view, it is quite a good idea. It also seems to be working in protecting the rammed earth against the elements, it seems like the main causes of deterioration are rain directly onto the top face, and splash onto the bottom faces. With the top face protected, erosion of greatly reduced. I also like the idea that some of the walls are protected while others are left in a natural state. That way deterioration can be measured and some of the initial character preserved.
Around the castle I found remnants of a curtain wall, all in rammed earth, but it seems these have been left to decay back. However they seem to be surviving fairly well, I will check on the history of this castle for more information.
I also looked at the church in the centre of Tabernas. There were plenty of mechinales type holes visible, but the church seemed to be constructed in brick. I had a look around the outside, and there seemed to be no hint of rammed earth, only brick fronting. I'm not sure about this one, perhaps it is a rammed earth structure which was later clad in brick, or maybe it is a brick structure with holes for scaffolding, to aid the construction.
The Alhambra of Granada is a large site, and a fairly major tourist attraction. Most of the curtain wall, which was built by the Muslims seems to be constructed in rammed earth and the Alcazaba at the west of the Alhambra complex is constructed almost entirely in rammed earth. We paid the €10 each entry fee and headed straight for the Nasrid Palaces because our ticket only allowed us to enter at a certain time. These palaces are extremely ornate, built in marble with fantastic detailing of Koranic writings and intricate patterning. The whole palace complex is very reminiscent of the Red Fort and Taj Mahal in India, which were constructed around the same time. However due to the marble, there was no rammed earth visible.
I found some rammed earth between the Nasrid palace and the Partal gardens, which were parts of Muslim houses outside the Palace of Yusuf III. We then continued round through the gardens, which are butted up against the curtain wall. The curtain wall is interesting, as I think it is constructed from rammed earth, fronted with brick, as the Tapiales holes are visible in parts, but it is quite difficult to tell. Having explored the gardens and taken lots of photos of the walls, we headed back towards the Alcazaba. It seems like many of the towers were originally rammed earth, but have been repaired, extended and knocked down, it will be difficult but interesting to piece together the history of the construction of the Alhambra.
The Alcazabar was built before the Nasrid palaces and is much more plain than the dazzling facades of the palace, the Alcazabar is definitely a working fortress. It is mentioned in documents from the 9th century. I took lots of pictures of the rammed earth and other parts of the fortress, and have also bought a guide book to the Alhambra, so will be able to fully investigate the rammed earth here.
Next we visited the Palace of Carlos V, a huge building similar to the British museum in London, a square building with a central open circular courtyard. Then a swift trip through the museum, which was interesting, but there were far more interesting exhibits outside of the museum really.
We then went around the outside of the Alhambra walls, where I was able to see the rammed earth outside of some of the towers, I noticed that there were two rammed earth towers which were circular in construction, something which I have not seen before, as is obviously more difficult to construct than a straight rammed earth wall. I also noticed terracing on the other side of the valley, where it looks like rammed earth has been used as a retaining wall, this will have to be investigated, but at first sight this would seem to be the case.
We left the Alhambra and headed for the Arabic quarter where I expected to find some more rammed earth. Was not disappointed, where we found some parts of the city wall, and a church, which looked to have mechinales holes, but again this will require further investigation. It was now past lunchtime so we settled down for some paella and coffee, then explored the rest of Granada, including the cathedral in the centre of the city, which is also very ornate, and painted white inside so it it light and airy.
The rammed earth walls of Jaen were pretty fantastic, and looked like they had been through many phases of deconstruction and reconstruction. Some parts were masonry with rammed earth above, others rammed earth with masonry above, and then there were parts of the walls with a rammed earth core and masonry cladding. I think I will be able to piece together the history of the wall from the photographs I've taken. The style of rammed earth was similar to that I had seen earlier at Tabernas, with large mechinales holes supported by large flat stones above the hole, and the quality of rammed earth ensured that it was impossible to sample because the walls were too hard. There were towers constructed every ten metres, some in rammed earth, others in masonry and some of which were falling down and some which were in a reasonable state of repair, but none of which had been repaired in concrete which was good to see. Because of the range of rammed earth at Jaen, and its state of repair, I think it will be a good site from which to glean much information on the deterioration of rammed earth.
The Castillo de la Yedra at Cazorla used to have rammed earth walls, but it seems that most of them have been covered in stone or replaced. I found some sections of rammed earth, but not really worth a two hour detour.
We ended the day at Banos de la Encina, which is a huge rammed earth castle, but isn't open to the public.
The castle at Banos de la Encina was built in 967 by the Muslim rulers, and is completely constructed in rammed earth. It is also very castle shaped, there are 15 square towers and one round keep at the end. There are very few defects in the walls, considering the building is over 1000 years old. There appear to have been a few cosmetic repairs recently at the base of some of the walls, but generally speaking the castle is in good shape. The walls are 1m thick, and the rammed earth has rock like hardness, very similar to a conglomerate. It is made using a very lime rich mortar, with sand and pebbles as aggregate. It was impossible to make out intermediate steps in the block making, so I assume that each rammed earth block was constructed in one go. I think the survival of this castle however is down to its castleations, all of which appear to be intact and are made of something slightly different to the rest of the rammed earth wall. These seem to not be eroded at all, and despite being probably 80cm tall, every single one on the perimeter is exactly as it was when constructed. There are some parts of the wall where water has appeared to seep through, but this has caused only superficial cracking. There did not appear to be any straw in the rammed earth, but in places the original rendering was intact, and it was possible to see that the castle had originally been white, with patterns and motifs on all of the walls. In quite a lot of places we were able to see horizontal lines drawn on, with diagonal marks between them, and in one place it was obvious that flowers had been drawn on the outside of the castle. The towers were approximately perpendicular to the walls but not exactly, but they were always square in plan. It was also possible to see inside the walls in some places where cracks had become more visible. Here we could see that the large stones present in some previous walls were also used here above the mechinales holes, but not right up to the face of the wall, once again this suggests a quite complex level of sophistication in the construction. There had been erosion at the bases of some of the walls, and one of the towers appeared to have a structural crack, but I must say that generally speaking the castle looked much younger than 1000 years.
The only further thing to do now was to get inside. Number 10 looked more open now, but we double checked in the local shop and discovered that we had got the wrong street and that we were to ask for Antonio. We went and asked his wife who seemed quite used to people popping by and asking for the keys to the castle. We were told to wait by the castle and Antonio would come and open it up for us. I think Antonio was in the bar, because I think we waited for Antonio for two hours. In the meantime we got chatting to the man who lived closest to the castle and was planning to open up his living room into a souvenir shop. The back wall of his house was built onto the curtain wall of the castle, and was 800 years old, and the rest was a mere 300 years old. He also told us of a book of the history of the castle, which we bought from the town hall.
Eventually Antonio turned up, muttering to himself as though his wife had told him to go and let those people into the castle. The key was a proper castle key, but worked in the lock absolutely fine. Inside the castle was fantastic too, and we were able to go to the top of the towers and onto the battlements to properly inspect the rammed earth, and also play at being in a proper castle. I was able to get a better sense of the scale of the castle from the battlements and see the layout of the towers more clearly. The castle was interestingly used as a cemetery in recent years, for 76 years until 1928, so the level of the interior was much higher than the exterior. There had been some excavation and it was possible to see the original building layouts at the internal base of the wall. The towers and parts of the walls were infested with pigeons, but these did not seem to have too much of an effect of the stability of the wall, I don't know if pigeons expand on the size of the hole they use for nesting in. There was a cistern in the centre of the castle to supply water to the castle, but I don't think the castle was ever taken by force. This summer will see excavations of the centre of the castle down to original ground level, while also interesting from an archaeological point of view, it will be interesting to see the response of the buried rammed earth walls. They may have previously bulged when the internal ground level was raised, and now relaxed, it will be interesting to find out.
Our first objective was the Mezquita, the original mosque in the city, and apparently an alternative pilgrimage site for those who could not get to Mecca for the Hajj. The Christians took over the site in the 13th century and built a church in the middle, but I was most impressed by the Muslim arches. I will post a picture, but the entire building is filled with black columns topped with red a white striped arches, and the effect is dramatic, every where you look there are arches, really as far as the eye can see, because in places it is quite dark inside (because the Christians blocked up the outside doorways). The church part was quite good with lots of statues of saints and gold, but I really did prefer the Muslim part. Outside the building but within the walls there were orange trees planted in rows, all just very chilled and relaxed.
Having found no rammed earth in the Mezquita we checked out the walls of the city of Cordoba which were all constructed in rammed earth. We found five sites, all in different parts of the city.
The first site was opposite where we had parked the car, just round from the hostel. This site had a walkway around the base and had been restored with concrete in sections. The parts which were not concrete however were fairly well eroded. The site seemed to be more clayey and pebbley.
The second site was two bits of wall either side of an archway, one side of which had been restored and one which was left as original. The original part had a few cracks in, but nothing more than superficial water runs running between mechinales holes. Here each intermediate lift was visible on the face and some of the original timber had been left in.
The third site was next to the river, where there were a number of curved towers which were slightly eroded at their base, but I think this is due to the action of people rubbing rather than water action. These are only the second set of curved towers I have seen, the others being as the Alcabaza in Granada. I think here that the survival of these walls is down to their being protected from the elements at the top, allowing only superficial weathering on the faces. Further round from these towers the wall heads perpendicular to the river, and there was rammed earth walls with castellations on, the castellations however I think are more recent, and we saw a gang of community service types clearing the watercourse at the bottom of the walls.
We then headed out to where we had passed some rammed earth on the drive into the city. On the way to this section of wall we found another bit, opposite the police station and a church which had a stork nesting on top. The wall was weathered but certainly capable of standing for another few hundred years.
The final site, which took a bit of walking to find was alongside one of the main roads into the city, with a dirt section in front of it where you were able to park your car. This long section of wall had a number of towers which had variously been left to decay, or restored at different times in the past. I also managed to sample from here. The most noticeable feature was that there was erosion at both the top and bottom of the wall, due to the actions of rain and people, but in the mid height section the original surface was usually present. The mechinales holes were visible, and some had become large enough to fit soft drinks bottles in, but generally the wall was in a reasonable state of repair. I got photos of both the front and the back of the wall so will be able to construct a fairly accurate representation of the city walls of Cordoba.
Many thanks to Tony Reed of InfoCordoba for his excellent information on the history of Cordoba and particularly the city walls.
Set off for La Rambla, a tower in the middle of the town which housed the pottery museum. The museum was closed but we were able to see each of the faces of the tower. There was concrete on top but generally the building was in a good state of repair. There was also parts of the old city wall in a park close to the tower, which had pigeons and rats living in it, and a graffited map of the original layout of the walls.
From La Rambla we went back up to the motorway and on to Palma del Rio. After much searching around the town we eventually stumbled on a section of the city wall. This was in the middle of being restored with concrete, so I now have evidence of the Spanish repair techniques. The castle appeared to be the municipal tip with a small number of remaining walls around the perimeter. I took a number of photos but then returned to the car for lunch. We had lunch in a park but then returned to the castle to take some more photographs. I parked up and found the the walls we had found were a small section of the quite substantial rammed earth castle. Unfortunately there was no internal access but I managed to go around the whole building and take pictures of the exteriors of all of the walls.
Next stop was Fuentes de Andalucia, where we perfected the technique of driving round the town and looking up every street to see if we could see the castle. We eventually spotted a tower but were thwarted in getting to it, because it was surrounded on all sides by houses, so I have some photographs of the top but no real pictures of the faces because we were unable to get into peoples houses.
Last stop today was Carmona which had a large castle on top of the hill. We parked the car and wandered up. There was barbed wire fences around most of the walls, but I managed to take pictures of the exterior. On one side of the castle there was a hotel full of businessmen, but we managed to find a way in, through a waving cloth which acted as a door. This castle was ruined by earthquakes in 1504 and 1755 (the Lisbon one) so it will be good to see if I can find any earthquake survival. The tower and the battlements were all rammed earth, there were bits of pottery in the walls, and grass growing on top of the battlements. As we had a free run of the inside we were able to fairly well cover the inside of the structure, managing to sample some parts of the walls. On leaving the castle we came across some workmen who I think were surprised to see us, but didn't seem to mind that we were inside.
Seville Alcazar contained a little bit of rammed earth in the centre, but not too much. I think it was too much of a palace and not enough of a fort, very ornate but no good for me.
Then headed to a section of the city walls which were built in rammed earth. The section was probably half a mile long, and had been repaired by a number of different techniques, all with varying degrees of success, so this will provide good examples of which techniques work and which don't.
We left Seville early in the morning to get to Alaca de Guadaira, a massive rammed earth site. The site was excellent, and I would have spent more time there if I wasn't soaked to the skin. I definitely saw erosion in action though, although even with rain running down the faces, the rammed earth didn't seem to really be eroding at all really. I have some good videos of the rain, which will prove the durability of rammed earth. I also saw evidence of rammed earth acting as a beam which I have not seen before.
Next to Antequera where we parked next to a car with its windows broken. Unfortunately the castle seemed to be being restored, and there was no access, and it was difficult to get good photographs of the rammed earth section.
We began the day visiting the castle at Fuengirola, which appeared to be a huge rammed earth castle, but on closer inspection was a concrete repair of a masonry wall. This was slightly annoying, but given that the castle is right on the coast, I think that stone masonry is probably a better choice than rammed earth.
Malaga however does have an Arabic castle, which is in two sections, an older part at the bottom of the hill, and a newer section right at the top of the hill outside of Malaga. We eventually found our way to the top of the hill, and looked around the castle. There was not very much rammed earth at the top part, which was not surprising given that this was the newer Christian built section.
Reading the guidebook whilst traveling, we decided upon a visit to Les Alpujarras, with the link that the region was within the Sierra Nevada national park, and was also operated as the fiefdom of the last Granada emir, so retained much of its Arabic spirit while the rest of Spain was under Christian rule. Therefore there might be some rammed earth there. We stopped for lunch in Salobrena, a lovely little town with a castle perched on top of a rocky outcrop, where we eventually managed to break the bread we had bought yesterday (and have the video to prove how difficult it was) and enjoyed the view over the Mediterranean. The castle looked to have rammed earth sections within brick corners and windows, another variation on the rammed earth construction methods.
After lunch headed north towards the Sierra Nevada, the roads getting thinner and windier the further and higher we went. Snow began to appear on the roads (at 500m, we checked) but we drove on, in search of Les Alpujarras, on the off chance that there would be some rammed earth there. The church was very similar to one in Tabernas, full brick on the outside but with mechinales type holes which could have been constructed for rammed earth but equally could just be holes for scaffolding.