Ruínas Itálicas and Monuments of Santipoce. Seville Spain

Monuments of Santiponce

Roman Theater

By the end of century I and beginnings of century II, porticus post scaenam is transformed into closed patio and some years later a dedicated temple is constructed in him to the Isis goddess. With time this porch becomes public Forum. Destroyed during the Barbarian invasions, the Theater during the Average Age was used later like cemetery and for cattle and industrial aims.

As of century XVII, with the transfer of the villa of Santiponce to hills where was the old Itálica, the Theater is hidden under the small village, until it removes to light in very recent dates.

Francisco Collantes de Terán and Delorme, in 1.937, document the existence of rest of the Theater under a series of constructions. In 1.970 he comes himself to one first excavation, but he is not but up to 1,979 when a work of systematic recovery begins.

The Roman Theater of Itálica follows the form of a typical Roman theater urban, near an area of buildings public and oriented the east.

The cavea is of semicircular form (of 71 meters of diameter), closed by the facade in which five doors were located; the power station opened to a porch. In orchestra the launching slips of moenia were located (of 22.5 meters of diameter). Frons pulpiti has exedras to lodge sources. The scaena frons (of 48.5 meters in length) had two bodies with hornacinas of rectangular form and doors; as much the structures of the scene as those of proscenio they were constructed later. Porticus post scaenam was at the outset an open space that later was closed to create a garden in which a temple dedicated to Isis was elevated.

The construction technique throughout the s. I d.c is of concrete, and from Trajano the brick is used. The building decorated with coatings and marble pavements polícromo, escultóricas inscriptions dedications with bronze letters, altars with reliefs, sources, marble columns, statues, etc.

Roman set Italicas Ruins

The first establishment dates, according to Apiano of aims of century III a.C when when finishing the Second Punic War, Escipión distributes between its men some earth in the valley of the Betis. With this occasion it founds a small establishment for his veterans (vicus civium romanorum) to whom llamaria Itálica on memory of the origin of those first colonos.

It included/understood the primitive Itálica a pair of small hills next to the Gualquivir, that denominate Hill of San Antonio and Cerro of the Palaces at the moment. Both heights were occupied later by the neighbors of the modern population of Santiponce, who are based there from aims of century XVIII.

In its origins the city has the character of a located military facility in the proximities of Beturia, a region that extended until the Guadiana river and that offered during some time a serious danger to the Roman occupation. This military character maintained the city to it throughout almost all its existence, as it attests epigraphic documents of the Legio VII Gémina and a Cohorte III Gallorum, among others.

Also the fact that is significant in Itálica some outstanding personages pass some time of suys respective military specialties, like Marco Ulpio Trajano, father of the emperor, and Key Vallio Maximiano, general who calms the Bética, in a while of dangerous insurrections and North African invasions, by the end of century II d.C.

During the principality of Augusto, Itálica is transformed into a municipality, which confers the prerogative to him to coin. It later opens therefore a mint that is going to produce bronze currencies from the 15 a.C with the pictures of Augusto first and of Tiberio. Between the symbols used in this local mint, the military subjects abound, possibly related to the same origin of the city.

Most significant yet, than it emphasizes of this city of the rest of the Bética, is the one that two of their children acceded consecutively to throne: Trajano (97 - 117 d.C.) and Adriano (117 - 137 d.C.).
It gave like result immediate an unquestionable one to be able to the most remarkable families of Itálica in the policy and the public life of Rome.

Several italicences enter the Senate and get to constitute a true center to be able and deciciones in the Rome

of century II d.C. At this moment the city returns to change its legal status and happens of the condition from municipality to the one of colony. It tolerates that if before, like municipality, it had a certain autonomy and own laws, when happening to be colony its organization is going to copy the one of Rome exactly. The change is so little common that Adriano is surprised, according to account Aulo Gelio in Aticas Nights, from which their countrymen, like those of Utica, have made that decision.

By the others, the moment at which this takes place it seems to be that there is to locate it in the reign of this emperor, every time the name of the new colony is going to incorporate the gentilicio of Adriano to be called Aelia Colony Augusta Italica.

The obtained salary to locate in the two throne to italicences, deberia to repel somehow in the city. On it it is explicit Dión Casio that informs us into which as much the one as the other made donativos to their native city. In special Adriano it seems to be that he was particularly generous with his countrymen. The literary sources are not very explicit in this aspect, but the archaeological excavations have provided abundant documentation on the adrianeos donativos.

Most remarkable that we can date contemporary of this emperor it is an extension of the city by the North side. This new district of ample streets and great mansions is what today it is visited in the excavated part of the ruins.

Monastery of San Isidoro del Campo
Avda. of San Isidoro del Campo, 18. Santiponce. Seville.

The Monastery of San Isidoro of the Field was founded. in a place near the Roman ruins of Itálica, by Alonso Perez de Guzmán and Maria Alonso Colonel in 1301 where, according to the tradition, he had been buried San Isidoro of Seville. Their rest were discovered and transferred to Leon in 1063. The Monastery from its foundation has been under the spiritual and temporary administration of different cistercienses, ermitaños, successively Hieronymite orders religious and Order of San Jerónimo.

In this singular monastery strength, with double church, the gothic style with clear influences of the Languedoc, and mudéjar are juxtaposed, in which the tradition is visible almohade. In 1432 the ermitaños Hieronymites of Fray Lope de Olmedo replaced the cistercienses, taking I finish a deep reform in the Monastery that affected of substantial form the decoration. As opposed to the cisterciense austerity, the Monastery decorates with paintings murals that possibly conform one of the most remarkable sets of all Spain. In the middle of century XVI a center arises reformer in Seville, the prior and several monks of San Isidoro will be jailed, others fled outside Spain, among them Casiodoro de Reina author of the Bible of the Bear, first translation of the Bible to the Castilian. After these episodes Felipe II .de will order the fusion. the congregation with the Hieronymite Order.

The Monastery was being extended and becoming rich with the centuries, arriving to count on a tower, One espadaña, five claustros and, next to the monacales dependencies, is the office of the judge advocate general. hospedería and the own farming facilities of these institutions that they tried to be self-sufficient.

Around the Claustro of Deads the dependencies of the medieval nucleus articulate: churches, refectory, sacristía, room to capitulate, etc. Their properties were very numerous and included the population of Santiponce, located originally to borders of the Guadalquivir until it was destroyed by riada in 1603, that caused the transfer of the population to the ruins of Itálica which gave rise to acts establishment.

One is a monumental set whose physical space surpasses the 30,000 square meters. Twelve years have been used in the recovery from this exceptional cultural legacy, with an economic investment, in charge of the Council of Culture, that surpasses the six million euros.

Twelve years that culminate with the recovery of the most monumental zone of the building, which will allow to present a patrimony little well-known and, even, unpublished for the own Andalusians given the passed years of closing of San Isidoro of the Field. These interventions have been centered in the consolidation and putting in value of the buildings, as well as in the integral restoration of their exceptional paintings murals and personal property. After the opening of the Monastery, the Council of Culture makes available of the east public cultural space.

OFFICE OF TOURISM OF SANTIPONCE Tel: 955 998 028