Campofrío

Campofrío

Campofrío is situated between the mountains and La Mina, about 84 km from the capital and has 866 inhabitants. The municipality limits with Linares de la Sierra, Higuera de la Sierra, Minas de Riotinto y Nerva.

During the Middle Ages, the village belonged to the town of Aracena until it was disbanded in 1753, by the Royal Privilege granted by Ferdinand IV. In this area archaeological remains of the Second Bronze Age have been found.

The first historical reference dating back to the village is in 1401-1411, in which reference is made to this village and then of Aracena, which was named as a town by royal privilege of the monarch Ferdinand IV, in April, 1753. It had a church, and a well populated surrounding area.  Archaeological remains found in the municipality include flint axes, many second Bronze Age and other artefacts, as well as Iberian graves, and a hemispherical granite stone, with a diameter of 1.21 metres. This stone had a carved geometrical border with letters recognizable as the Iberian alphabet.

Perhaps the most interesting findings relate to Cobullos Hill, where there are remains of rough dwellings, a reasonably preserved well, and fortifications on the summit showing the existence of a second Iberian Bronze Age fort.

In Roman times there are traces of a causeway, tombs and inscriptions (one appears in his collection by Hubner Corpus and others are at the Archaeological Museum of Huelva), ceramic vessels, mining lamps, coins of various emperors, remains of a necropolis at a site called Risco del Tesoro, which also has carved granite stones, one with an inscription, and finally a small sculpture of a woman made of bronze, preserved in a collection of Seville. The materials for the tabernacle of the church of El Escorial had to be worked on over eight years, because of the excessive hardness.

Perhaps the most interesting findings relate to Cobullos Hill, where there are remains of rough dwellings, well preserved fortifications on the summit evidencing the existence of a second fort Iberian Bronze Age. Archaeologists and an old local tradition continue to give the name of Cobullos to the old castle. This is echoed by Father Juan Pineda, sixteenth-century Seville who in his History of King Solomon ,printed in Venice in 1609,  argues that the monarch ordered the sending of their ships to Tartessos, attracted by mining wealth of this area. This argument is based on various books of the Old Testament,

Campofrío Monuments

Church of St. Michael the Archangel, the fifteenth century. Enlarged in the XVIII.
Santiago Bullring, 1716. Considered the oldest in Spain.
Archaeological sites
Roman roads.
Roman Necropolis of  Risco del Tesoro.
Puente Romano. (Roman  bridge) on the river Odiel.

The remains are from the Bronze Age to the Roman era.

Campofrío Gastronomy

The rich cuisine of this population is based on meat from Iberian pigs as “adobao” made from spiced offal cooked at the time of slaughter.
Also cooked ham, garlic stew, and desserts, pancakes, toast … etc

Getting There

From Huelva: take  N-435 (Huelva-Badajoz), which crosses the Sierra de Aracena transversely through Gibraleón, Beas, Valverde del Camino, Zalamea la Real, Rio Tinto and Campofrio.

Distances from Campofrío

Nerva 15 km
Zufre 25 km
Jabugo 45 km
Huelva 85 km
Sevilla 87 km
Aracena 23 km
Galaroza 40 km
Higuera de la Sierra 18 km