Near the foot of Mojácar Pueblo, this pretty public fountain is a village landmark. Locals and visitors still fill containers with the water that tumbles out of 13 spouts into marble troughs and tinkles along a courtyard below colourful plants. A plaque tells us that in 1488 this was where the Catholic Monarchs' envoy met Mojácar's last Moorish mayor, Alavez, to negotiate the village's surrender.
As the plaque records, Alavez pleaded for his people to be allowed to stay in Mojácar with these poignant words: 'When the people of my race have lived more than 700 years in Spain, you say to us "You are foreigners, go back to the sea". In Africa…they will doubtless say to us, like you – and certainly with more reason than you – "You are foreigners: return across the sea by which you came and go back to your own land" '. History tells that the Catholic Monarchs agreed to Alavez' request for the Muslims to stay, then expelled them from Mojácar as soon as they had possession of its keys. The village was repopulated with Christian families from Murcia.
