Castillo de Gigonza

San José del Valle, Spain, Spain

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Castillo de Gigonza is a well-preserved medieval fortress of Andalusian origin from the 12th-13th centuries, located in San José del Valle, Cádiz province, Andalusia, Spain, on the site of ancient Roman Saguntia and earlier fortifications near medicinal sulfur springs.

Featuring a nearly square layout with two bodies, a horseshoe-arched entrance leading to vaulted upper floors with windows, a tower of homage accessing dungeons, an enclosed armory courtyard with a large dovecote, and Gothic-Mudéjar style elements like a pointed arch door bearing the Arcos family coat of arms, it served as a frontier refuge during border skirmishes with Granada until 1492.

Owned by figures like Alonso de Guzmán in 1312 and later the Dukes of Arcos, it became a prestigious 19th-century spa balneario under the Ponce de León marquises before private ownership in 1945, now standing as a protected Bien de Interés Cultural with an adjacent 1848 chapel.