The Ojen Web
THE HISTORY OF A MOUNTAIN TOWN
In the mid Palaeolithic this area was inhabited by the Neanderthal
man, who lived in nomadic groups, and in the Neolithic there was already
a town standing, as proven by the Pecho Redondo cave. During the Low Roman
Empire it was very populated and it is speculated that the are of Ojén
had a nucleus which exploited the agriculture and cattle.
The first time that Ojén is quoted is in the "Chronicle
of events of the Cordoba emirs". According to the chronicle, Abderramán
III initiated a battle to conquer the rebellion of the Mozarabs (Christians
who lived in the Muslims lands) and Málaga Muladies. It is known
that one of the battles between the rebels and the army took place in front
of the walls of the Ojén castle. The revolt of the Mozarabs provoked
the existence of
the ephemeral kingdom with the capital in Bobastro; in the year 921 Abderramán
freed Ojén and its church was converted into a mosque. In 1485 the
Muslims surrendered before the king, Fernando el Católico and the
town enters the Modern Age. At that time, Ojén sent Marbella to
export raisins, dry figs, almonds, silks, wax and honey from its hives,
to Africa. The Mudejar Muslims became vassals of Castilla and in 1492 the
Catholic Kings took over the kingdom of Granada, ending the reconquest.
Ojén
is formed into a counsel and the districts boundaries are fixed. Ojén
depends on Marbella, which nominates a governor with civil and criminal
jurisdiction. The Kings would not allow the presence of Muslims at less
than a league from the coast and many inhabitants of Marbella establish
themselves in Ojén; this measure was taken to avoid the Muslims
collaborating with the Turkish and Berber pirates. There were then 114
neighbours in Ojén, four of them were old Christians. In spite of
the promise to respect Islamism, the Christians erected a church in 1505,
by order of the archbishop of Seville, Diego de Deza. The taxes and the
Christianising caused bad feelings between the Moors, until in 1568, during
the monarchy of Felipe II, the Moors of Istán produced a rebellion,
and in 1569 were joined by the Moors of Ojén, who fled with their
families and goods to the nearby sierras abandoning the lands after killing
their old Christian neighbours and burning the church, houses and crops.
Felipe II nominates the Duke of Medina
Sidonia
and the Duke of Arcos to pacify the Ronda highland and end the rebellion.
In 1570 the war ends and Ojén is repopulated by old Christians.
The Moorish problem continues in Spain until in 1609 when the King Felipe
III expels the Moors.
In 1772, the British chronicler, Francis Carter, describes Ojén as "a town of affable simple people who dont know tea and coffee, but enjoy goats milk in their clay mugs". In 1807, Carlos IV gives Ojén its independence from Marbellas jurisdiction. In 1905, Pedro Fernández sent for the Fuente de los Chorros fountain to be built and in 1906 the Marquis of Larios erected the Juanar Palace as a hunting refuge, where the king Alfonso XIII was once invited. The Juanar Palace was made into a national inn in 1965 and since 1984 is exploited by a workers co-operative from Ojén.