In the center and at the core of the current seeder Santa Pola stands the castle-fortress, one of the few preserved examples of pre-bastioned constructions existing in Alicante and Valencia in the entire country.
Its layout is a square of side 46 m, with two bastions at the ends of the NW-SE diagonal, called "bastion of the Duke" and "Bastion of the King" in this order and retains only integrated mind the latter. The curtain walls are inclined up to two thirds of its height, line is defined by an exterior molding around the entire fortress. Finishes off the set with gunboats. It originally had only one income, and today, there are two in the NS axis.
All masonry work is done securely locked and the walls, unlike bastioned works of the era, are not compact or terraced, but hollow and arranged on two floors, vaulted naves barrel designed to accommodate the different rooms of the fortress. As defenses, aside from the arrowhead plant of the defenses and found only a very special gun, arranged at half height and positioned in the blind spots of the defense, that is, on the boards of the defenses with the walls.
According read a plaque that exists in the gate, the work was built in 1557 on behalf of D. Bernardino de Cardenas, Duke of Maqueda, Lord of Elche, in the defense and protection of seafarers. In denoting the stone age above must be added the presence of clearly under-medieval elements such as half-height gunboats, also present in the Palace or the Palace Cocentaina Fortress Onil, XV century works. Similarly, these features of constructive vagueness, characteristic of a transition period, we must add the existence of hollow vessels in its walls.
Obviously, we are dealing with a work falls within the group of pre-bastioned buildings, like their sisters of the Santa Barbara Castle Alicante, or the walls of Villajoyosa, etc. All evidence of penetration into our land of Renaissance criteria, such as M. believes Beviá, also traced in the military and civilian buildings not only in religious, erected in the sixteenth century Ecuador. In 1784, the castle-fortress passed to the Crown and in commemoration of this event was placed above the main door shield that carries the royal arms of the Bourbon House. A few years later, in 1806, the exhibition is in a sorry state, until the year 1855 was given the order to abandon and demolish the building to have been futile and useless to the military's defense of the coast. Taking advantage of this situation, Santa Pola Corporation requested the transfer, citing the interest in assigning Parish Church and to welcome the Customs. On September 13, 1859 the castle was ceded to the population and now, once transferred the municipal offices, is a leading cultural center whose units are the Maritime Museum, with its rooms for archeology, ethnography and aquarium.
(as Rafael Azaur and Francisco J. Navarro CASTLES OF ALICANTE)
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