Fort Santa Barbara
Castillo de Santa Barbara, Castle of Santa Barbara
Spain, Costa Blanca
Fortress Santa Barbara is a triumph of military architecture and engineering, a strategic point from which the entrance routes to the city were controlled. Remains of the Bronze Age and the Roman era have been found in its underground layers, although the real history of the fortifications begins from the time of Muslim rule, the end of the 9th century and during the 10th century.
The strategic position of the rock was once used by the Carthaginian commanders, already in the 3rd century BC, mountain fortifications were built on this site, which no one dared to attack. The place was chosen extremely well. An impregnable formidable fortress helped to maintain power over a vast territory. Later, the Romans, Moors, and Christians were engaged in its reconstruction.
On December 4, 1248, on the day of Saint Barbara, Infante Alfonso of Castile, the future King Alfonso X the Wise, after a siege, captured the bastions from the Arabs by assault. Older versions of the names have not survived to this day. Most of the current buildings of the fortress belong to the VI - VIII century. It is especially worth noting the Tower of Honors, the English Bastion, the Chapel of St. Barbara, Philip II Hall, the Queen's Bastion, the Governor's House. The fortress includes cannon platforms, drawbridges, an underground prison, a powder store, bastions and residences. Now the premises of the fortress are used for the exposition of works of modern and ultra-modern art, avant-garde painting, graphics, sculpture, photography, bizarre and intricate installations.
