The Palacio de Villardompardo complex houses one of the most intriguing collections of artefacts and archaeological remains found under one roof in Andalucía. The 11th-century Baños Árabes, beneath the current ground level, are in a remarkably good state of preservation: of their three rooms (cold, warm and hot), the warm room, with its multiple horseshoe arches, is the finest. In an adjoining room glass flooring reveals part of a Roman street complete with water channels.
A 10-minute explanatory film in Spanish with English subtitles outlines the baths' history. After the Reconquista, the Christians, suspicious of what they considered to be a decadent and vice-inducing habit (that also nurtured the Muslim faith), converted the baths into a tannery. The baths then disappeared altogether in the 16th century when the Conde (Count) de Villardompardo built a palace over the site, and were only rediscovered in 1913.
