Priego

Iberian traces and the remains of a Roman road suggest people were living around Priego long before the medieval period. The town's recorded señorial history begins in 1298, when Fernando IV granted Alonso Ruiz Carrillo lordship over the town. The Carrillo family held that title for generations, and in 1465 Enrique IV of Castile made Diego Hurtado de Mendoza the first Count of Priego, after he married Teresa Carrillo, the sixth lady of the town. The two families merged their names to Carrillo de Mendoza and extended their landholdings across Guadalajara and Molina de Aragón. In 1440, King Juan II of Castile — father of Isabella the Catholic — raised Priego to the rank of city; one of the Carrillos served Juan II as his chief falconer and royal chronicler.

The seventh Count of Priego, Fernando Carrillo de Mendoza y Villarreal, served Philip II as ambassador to Portugal and as majordomo to John of Austria. He was present at the Battle of Lepanto and carried word of the victory to Pope Pius V. In return, the Pope gave the count a painting of the Virgin of the Angustias and granted Priego a singular privilege: an Easter Sunday procession known as the Reverencias, in which the Risen Christ is represented by the Custodia as it goes out to meet the Virgin of the Tower, the town's patron saint.