Guide to Andalucia > Destinations > La Herradura > Historical background

La Herradura. Historical background

Almuñecar’s historical name was Sexi, from its time under Phoenician rule, a name kept by the Romans. The present name comes from the Muslim rule, "Hins-al-Monacar" («surrounded by mountains»).

The city’s coat of arms, the heads of three Barbary pirates floating in the sea, was a gift from Emperor Carlos I.

La Herradura flag

As for the history of La Herradura, it’s really a story from Almuñecar, but one event marks the town’s history: the sinking of an expedition by Philip II’s Armada on the 19th October1562. While sailing between Malaga and Naples,they sought to shelter from a storm in the Punta de la Mona. A sharp change in the wind took them by surprise and caused the boats to collide and sink, with the loss of more than 5,000 lives

Invencible Armada

The first historical accounts come from 1500 BC, with remains from the Bronze Age Argaric culture. Before the Roman occupation at the end of the 3rd century BC, it was colonised by thePhoenicians, who left the city well organised.

The Romans remodelled the city, building temples, a theatre and an aqueduct.

Later, during the Muslim occupation, it was not a city as it is now until the eleventh century and afterwards, when the lands of al-Ándalus were divided intotaifas, and Almuñecar depended on Granada. It was the foremost coastal city.

The Granada coast surrendered to Castilian troops the after the fall of Baza in 1489.