MONUMENTS
Fortress and Chanca-House, Pilas Palace Zahara Chanca Palace, also called Las Pilas Palace, was built in the first half of the 15th century by the Duke of Medina Sidonia, descendant of Guzmán el Bueno, who received the king’s grace to run the almadrabas in the South Atlantic and Mediterranean. Its aims were threefold: • Defensive Castle against Turkish-Barbary pirates. • R esidential Palace for the Dukes of Medina Sidonia during the almadraba season. • C hanca, a processing plant where the tuna fish was cut up, salted and prepared. It is the only Palace in the world with these features. With a surface area of over 15,000 m2, inside were a huge salting plant (currently a church since 1906), a wood store, a butcher’s, a supplies store, a well, the Duke’s lodging quarters, kneading ovens, pools, etc. It has a slightly quadrangular floor plan and originally consisted of three towers: two corner ones, Torre de Levante [Eastern Tower] and Torre de Poniente [Western Tower] (the only one preserved today), and a central one, Torre de la Vela, where the Bell Tower was. There were two large courtyards, their current layouts coinciding significantly with their respective original ones. One attached to the North façade, used as a boathouse, containing the Postes de la Ramada, where the tunas were hung for cleaning and quartering, and where the auction was held. The other courtyard, larger than the previous one, is currently the rear part of the enclosure and delimited by the outer wall on the South, East and West. At the beginning of the 17th century, and due to the good campaigns, Zahara began to be populated. The first houses were built, nearly always against the town wall. Then houses with vaulted ceilings started to be built. People came from all over the Peninsula to work in the fisheries. Great writers
8
have visited Zahara and spoken of its wonders, such as the author of Don Quixote, Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, who put Carriazo, the protagonist of La Ilustre Fregona, in the Zahara fishery. The work depicts the life of a pícaro (roguish hero) at the fisheries: «In short, everyone saw Carriazo as a virtuous, clean, well-bred pícaro who was more than fairly discreet. He went through all the levels of picaresqueness until he graduated as Master at the Zahara tuna fisheries, where he is the epitome of picaresqueness». In 1929 the Consorcio Nacional Almadrabero (Almadraba National Consortium) was founded, an association of a mixed nature with public and private capital, which included State and large tuna fishery companies. Making use of the extraordinary powers granted by the Royal Decree of its constitution, and experiencing a sharp decline in catches during the Second Republic, the Consortium implemented a policy for rationalizing the fisheries, which would lead to a drastic suppression of many of them, although the one at Zahara survived. The Consortium ran the fishery and occupied the Palace from 1929 to 1936, when it was used as barracks, first by the army and then by the Civil Guard until 1974. The building was declared a National Monument by Decree on 22nd April 1949, and in 1985 the new Spanish Historical Heritage Law declared it a Site of Cultural Interest (BIC). In 2004 (BOJA of 19/11/04) the Andalusian Regional Government Ministry of Culture declared it a Site of Cultural Interest in the category of Monument, thanks to the neighbourhood mobilizations to ensure its protection against the constant threats of demolition.
