Castro de Vigo

Overview

The Castro de Vigo is an excavated and partly rebuilt hillfort village of the Galician castro culture, on the slope of Monte do Castro in the middle of Vigo. People lived here between the 2nd century BC and the 3rd century AD, and the fenced enclosure you can walk into is only a small excavated corner of a settlement that once spread across the flanks of the hill.

What makes the visit worth the twenty minutes of climbing is the contrast built into the site. Around 1,800 m² of low original walls sit alongside three castro buildings rebuilt from the ground to the roof, so you get the archaeology and the volume of the thing in the same glance.

Vigo’s tourist board calls this the place the city started, which is less marketing than it sounds: the excavated houses are the oldest settlement evidence in what is now the largest city in Galicia. Don’t come expecting an interpretation centre or a big museum. It’s a small, well-kept, free open-air site that takes half an hour.

History

The village probably began at the top of the hill, where the fortress now stands, and spread down the slopes as the population grew. The earliest houses are round, the standard plan across the castro culture of northwest Iberia, and the excavated ground between them is cut with channels, stone basins and post holes.

From the end of the 1st century AD the settlement is in heavy contact with Rome. Rectangular and square buildings with tiled roofs start appearing, and the finds turn commercial: terra sigillata tableware, pottery imitating marble, painted ceramics, amphorae.

Nobody sacked the place. The abandonment was peaceful, and the likely explanation is a move downhill to the Areal, the shoreline strip where Vigo’s later life happened.

The medieval hill is a different story and a different set of stones. The castle of O Castro went up alongside the castle of San Sebastián below, with a fortress linking the two; of its three walled enclosures only the first and part of the second survive, the third having been the town wall, which is gone entirely.

Digging here ran through the 20th century, on one flank of the hill, and recovered roughly twenty constructions. The site you visit is the result of a council project launched in 2008 and funded through the Spanish economic stimulus plan of the period. Work began in May 2009, finished by the end of that year, and the site opened to visitors in February 2010.

Visiting

Opening hours are short and they are the thing to plan around. From October to June the site opens Tuesday and Friday 11:00 to 13:00, and Friday and Saturday 16:00 to 18:00. From July to September it opens Tuesday to Friday 11:00 to 13:00, and Saturday 17:00 to 19:00. Turismo de Vigo lists the site under the address Monte de O Castro and states that prior booking is required, on 986 810 260.

There is no admission charge, and the guided visits are free too; the council routes enquiries about them through its 010 citizen information line.

Inside the fence, the route runs on walkways past the consolidated original walls and then up to the three full-height replicas. Read the ground as much as the walls: the rock-cut channels, basins and post holes are the parts that tell you how the houses were roofed and drained.

The walk up is the other half of the visit. The archaeological enclosure sits on the hillside inside Monte do Castro park, whose paths climb to the fortress at the summit and a viewpoint over the ría, and whose planting runs to pines, cedars and camellias. The park has no gate and no hours; only the castro does.

Tips

• Check the day before you go. The enclosure opens in two-hour blocks on a handful of days, and the pattern changes between the October to June timetable and the July to September one.

• Phone ahead on 986 810 260. Turismo de Vigo lists prior booking as a requirement, not a suggestion, so a walk-up during an open window is a gamble.

• Take the guided visit if one is running. It costs nothing, and with no indoor museum and no audio guide it’s the only in-depth commentary on offer; the 010 line handles the enquiries.

• Come outside the opening windows and you can still see plenty. The fence around the remains was deliberately built to be transparent from outside, so the enclosure is legible through it even when locked.

• Budget half an hour inside the fence and another hour for the hill. Pair the castro with the climb to the summit fortress, which is a viewpoint over the estuary and free at any hour.

• Don’t expect the whole village. What’s fenced is one excavated sector of a settlement that covered the flanks of the hill, and roughly 45 stone constructions survive across the slope as a whole.