Casas del Turuñuelo — Guareña
El Turuñuelo · Casas del Turuñuelo tartessian palace
Iron Age Tartessian (c.500–400 BCE)·Tartessian Orientalizing (Guadiana valley)·🇪🇸 Extremadura, Badajoz, Guareña, Guadiana Middle Valley, Casas del Turuñuelo hill, Spain
About
About Casas del Turuñuelo — Guareña
Casas del Turuñuelo (Tartessian 5th century BCE, c.500–400 BCE) near Guareña in the Guadiana valley is a monumental 2,500-sq-m mudbrick palace-sanctuary under a 8-m artificial mound, revealed 2015–22 by Celestino and Rodríguez with a central 60-sq-m Proto-Aeolic capital hall, bath, altar and courtyard where 16 horses, 6 cattle and 4 pigs were sacrificed in articulated rows at deliberate closure. The burnt mudbrick preserving wall paintings and marble alabaster battlements demonstrates Tartessian elite's Phoenician–Greek hybrid architecture inland, successor to Cancho Roano 10 km away.
Why it mattersLargest Tartessian building known; intact horse hecatomb and architecture rewrite Iron Age Iberia.
Open questions
Mysteries & theories
Mysteries
- 01Proto-Aeolic capital origin — Phoenician itinerant masons?
Theories
- 01Last Tartessian palace before Celtic Vettones irruption; equine hecatomb closing ritual
Theories are interpretations, not findings. The seal above tells you how much scholarly weight the place carries.
History
How it came to be
- Built
- c.500 BCE; burnt c.400 BCE
- Period
- Iron Age Tartessian (c.500–400 BCE)
- Culture
- Tartessian Orientalizing (Guadiana valley)
- Builders
- Tartessian Orientalizing
- Purpose
- Tartessian palace-sanctuary and redistribution centre
- Excavation
- Excavation ongoing
c.500 BCE
Monumental mudbrick palace erected on hill with quarry levee
c.400 BCE
Equine hecatomb and deliberate burning, covered with mound
2015
Esther Rodríguez discovers on aerial; Celestino excavates
2022–present
Proto-Aeolic capitals and bathtub found; ongoing conservation
On the ground
Structures & features
38.8640° N · 6.0990° W · 220 m · 2 mapped features
Turuñuelo Hall of Capitals — Proto-Aeolic
hall60-sq-m columned hall with two proto-Aeolic limestone capitals and painted dado, central hearth
38.8645° N · 6.0985° WTuruñuelo Horse Sacrifice Courtyard
sacrificeEastern courtyard with 16 horses, 6 cattle, 4 pigs sacrificed articulated in rows at closure fire 400 BCE
38.8635° N · 6.0995° W