Archidona

Human settlement around Archidona stretches back to the Lower Palaeolithic, evidenced by stone tools found in the area. The Cueva de Las Grajas holds richer finds from the Middle Palaeolithic — Mousterian culture artefacts pointing to Neanderthal hunter-gatherer groups. Polished stone axes, adzes, and sharpening stones from the Neolithic have also been found, along with Bronze Age pottery, tombs, and artificial caves.

In later centuries the town's municipal territory shrank considerably as surrounding settlements broke away to form independent villages — the so-called Villas Nuevas. Several communities left in this way, eventually becoming Villa Nueva del Rosario, Villa Nueva del Trabuco, and Villa Nueva de Algaidas, among others.

Archidona carries a painful recent history too. It is one of the province's towns with the highest number of people shot and buried in mass graves during the twentieth century — 125 had been counted by 2007.

On a civic note, the town was granted city status in 1901, and in 1980 it was declared a Historic-Artistic Complex.

The castle is the town's oldest surviving structure, built over the remains of Roman walls and later rebuilt during the Nasrid Kingdom period. Two of its original three defensive rings still stand on the hillside.

The Plaza Ochavada is the town's centrepiece and one of the finest examples of Andalusian Baroque urban design in existence. Built in 1786 to designs by Antonio González Sevillano and Francisco Astorga Frías, it has an octagonal plan with facades of red brick and lime rendered in Mudéjar style.

The Casa del Pósito — also called La Cilla — dates from the end of the early modern period. Its standout feature is a Baroque stone doorway flanked by ducal shields. Originally built to store the harvests of the Dukes of Osuna, it later served as the town hall and now houses the municipal museum.

The churches add further variety. Santa Ana, built in 1505, was the first church in the lower town after the Christian conquest and still retains its triangular tower and late Gothic elements. The church of the Mínimas convent has a Baroque doorway and a striking polygonal tower of red brick with a polychrome ceramic capital in white and green. The convent of Santo Domingo, founded in 1531 by the Count of Ureña, is the oldest convent in the town, built around a central courtyard with a plain Dominican-style entrance.

Archaeological sites across the municipality span the full run of Archidona's history, from Palaeolithic cave art and Phoenician-era fortifications to Roman villa remains and medieval fortified enclosures.