As soon as you enter the town Alcaucín you will notice that it is a clear example of a Moorish town, with low houses, whitewashed façades and above all, a disorderly and sinuous distribution of narrow streets.
The referential point of the urban nucleus is the square of San Sebastián, today named The Constitution where the Church and the City council are situated. The most notable buildings and houses of the town correspond to the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.
The name of Alcaucín is of Arab origin, derives from القوسين al-qawsayn (probably pronounced al-qawsīn in a colloquial way), which means “Los Arcos”. Some authors say that the name was due to the existence of an aqueduct and others to the abundance of the Tejos, trees whose wood was made hunting and war arches.
The municipality is one of the first areas in Malaga to be inhabited by man, as documented in the excavations carried out in the “Boquete de Zafarraya” in 1983 in which human remains appeared, including a jaw, which It belonged to a Neanderthal man, during the Phoenician colonization period, the foundations of the Zalía Fortress were laid, but it was the Arabs who built the present castle until in 1485 it was conquered by the Catholic Monarchs.
This environment has one of the richest areas in terms of flora and fauna of the Axarquía, within the vegetation the most characteristic element is the pine forest, which in this case is of the Aleppo type and repopulation.
Points of Interest
Área Recreativa El Alcázar: Paraje located in the Sierra Sierra Tejeda. You need to pass it in some of the walking routes that go to the peak of Maroma, the highest peak in Malaga with 2,068 meters. It offers excellent facilities to spend a day in the countryside. It is a recreational area, located on the banks of the Alcaucín River. The small waterfalls that form in the first meters of the channel of this stream and the thick vegetation that surrounds it are some of the natural attractions of this coquettish corner. Click here for more pictures.- Natural Monument Los Tajos de El Alcázar: The Los Tajos Natural Monument of El Alcázar is a group of unique geological formations, among which the Tajo de El Fuerte stands out, with more than 170 meters of altitude and 500 meters in length. It is an inaccessible place, only frequented by birds of prey (eagles) and mountain goats. Located at the head of the stream of El Alcázar, it has a vascular flora of great ecological interest. It has been declared to Natural Monument in January 14th, 2012 and has an extension of 10.71 ha.
- Hiking trail to the highest mountain of the province of Malaga. There is a route that begins on the forest track at the entrance to Alcaucín, in the direction of “El Alcázar”. Approximately 4 km away we find a recreational area, called “Cortijo del Alcázar”. From here we will take the path that leads us to the Maroma; We will arrive at “La Cerca” (semi-winter dwellings), ending in the stream of the same name, climbing a small hill we will find a firebreak that we will continue until its end, thus reaching “Loma de las Víboras”. At the end we will take a path and we will approach the “Senos de la Tejeda”. Once cross country and past these will spot the Maroma. This route will allow us to know Sierra Tejeda in its different landscape and botanical stages, providing us with a quite complete panorama of the Sierra Tejeda in its Mediterranean Slope.
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