ORDINARY, everyday roadworks in an ordinary, everyday town in central Spain have uncovered the largest-ever Roman settlement in the country.
Workmen digging up land alongside the main La Solana highway through Valdepeñas (Ciudad Real province, Castilla-La Mancha) literally stumbled upon a 1,500-square-metre Roman villa and giant wine-cellar which could be between 1,600 and 2,000 years old.
Close to the Baños del Peral area, where Roman remains have been found, the 'exceptionally well-preserved' wine-cellar is the part that has most fascinated local historians: 31.6 metres long and 11.08 metres high when it was fully built, taking up 350 square metres in total – about the size of three modern-day apartments of three or four bedrooms.
Around one-seventh of the space would have been used for pressing the grapes, and another 18 square metres for treading them.
The biggest settlement yet uncovered in what was then Ancient Hispania, it is thought to have been built initially in the first or second century AD, and completed or still in use until the fourth or fifth century AD.
Mayor of Valdepeñas, Jesús Martín, and deputy regional heritage minister Ana Muñoz, visited the site yesterday (Wednesday) after the roundabout works were immediately halted as a result of the discovery.
They say research will be carried out to see whether it is 'worthwhile' continuing to excavate in the area, in case more of the Roman settlement remains underground and could be of historical value.
The above photographs were taken by Castilla-La Mancha regional government and Valdepeñas town council, and displayed on @CMM_noticias on Twitter.
