Sunday 23rd March 2025 – Priego de Cordoba, Spain

The fairly short drive to Priego de Cordoba took us up into the Sierras Subbeticas and it was a beautiful journey through mountain scenery. The Roman Villa el Ruedo was just beyond in the village of Almedenilla. A cemetery with Roman and Muslim burials was discovered when a by-pass was being built here and this led the archaeologists to the associated villa. Fortunately, occupation of the site in the Muslim period did not destroy the Roman era remains and there was a lot to see. Often Roman ruins are cut off at ground level but here some of the walls are extant and there is a lot of painted wall plaster – a real rarity. There were also some very good, although rather dusty, mosaics.
One of the most impressive parts of the villa was the dining area where there is an intact stibadium – a semi-circular sloped stone bench that replaced the triclinium couches that were used in the dining rooms in earlier part of the Roman period. Diners would lay on their sides, eating dishes from plates on a table in the centre whilst being entertained by musicians, poets or dancers. This stibadium had a fountain in the centre fed from a spring that had been channelled to form a waterfall that flowed down behind the diners. It must have been a beautiful place to be entertained at a feast, although I am more likely to have been a slave rather than one of the guests.
The reception area had a small museum and an exhibition of Roman instruments together with recordings of them being played. It was fun to see them and be able to listen to the sounds that they made. There was also a small shop and I treated myself to a replica Roman lamp and a Roman intaglio (signet) ring.
We had beautiful views on the way but as we left Almedenilla it started to rain and the clouds descended over the mountains, obscuring those views. We drove back a few kilometres to an aire at Priego de Cordoba, situated on the outskirts of the modern part of the town. By this time, we couldn’t even see the mountains.
Photos: This room had a lot of the wall plaster remaining; Another room with a mosaic and more wall plaster; The Stibadium in the formal dining room with the hole for the fountain in the centre and the waterfall directly behind; This shows where the water ran that fed the waterfall and the stibadium fountain – the diners would look through to the pillared courtyard with its fountain, which you can just see in the background.