El Palomar and Cerrada de los Santos (Aragoncillo): Celtiberian settlement and cemetery

The settlement

Half a kilometre south of Aragoncillo, on a gently sloping thirty-metre hill adjacent to La Pedriza, stood the Celtiberian settlement of El Palomar. It preserves an extensive perimeter defensive wall and remains of several rectangular dwellings constructed on stone plinths and superstructures of mudbrick adobe. Its ceramic vessels have been studied as evidence of specialized local workshop production.

The necropolis

Roughly 500 metres to the south, on a valley floor now cultivated with cereals, lay its cemetery: Cerrada de los Santos. Discovered in 1987 and excavated between 1990 and 1994, it is an Iron Age cremation necropolis exhibiting two distinct phases of use. Studied together, the settlement and burial ground provide valuable insight into the domestic and funerary customs of a small Celtiberian community.

Nearby

Aragoncillo also preserves the fossil forest and the archaeological remains of El Turmielo. Read more in Celtiberia.

Visiting

A clear distinction must be made: among all the Celtiberian hillforts in the Señorío, only two are genuinely prepared for visitors, El Ceremeño in Herrería and Peña Moñuz in Olmeda de Cobeta. El Palomar has received little conditioning for the public: it is unadapted, virtually unsignposted, and what remains visible on the surface is very difficult to interpret without specialist guidance. If you visit, stay on the paths, do not climb on the walls, and do not remove anything from the ground.