In the bowels of the center of Albacete

In February 2018, during the process of excavating a ditch for the installation of a new sanitation collector in the urban center of the city of Albacete by the company Aguas de Albacete, a cavity was discovered in which several jars could be seen. Therefore, the works were stopped, bringing the discovery to the attention of Cultural Service of the Provincial Directorate of Education, Culture and Sports of Albacete

Archaeological surveys

The work began with the opening of an archaeological survey by the archaeologist D. José Ángel González Ballesteros, focusing on the discovery discovered up to that time.

In this first survey, three more or less twin jars were discovered, equal to the rest of those that we can see inside the tunnel and those discovered later in probe 03, which have a bitroncoconical shape with a thick lip, turned to the outside and a flat base.

In April, work began on the excavation of the above-mentioned survey, which will be interrupted two days later due to the “appearance of new elements of consideration, which contextualize the first jars discovered and the counting of a larger number of them.”

Already in October of that same year, we took charge of the site to carry out new surveys to help delimit and document the discovery. The result of these surveys was mixed; the first of them (the farthest from the initial point discovered) was completely archaeologically sterile, but the second, much closer, allowed the discovery of the entrance to an old underground cellar that houses, as far as we know, a total of eleven good-sized jars distributed over a gallery of about 12 meters of development.

The actual entrance to the cave-cellar presents the vault excavated in the ground, as does the rest of the structure, reinforced by stone and mortar masonry plinths, like jambs or sockets that protect this area from the traffic of the passage.

Fell in the middle of the passage of this entrance, we found a completely overturned jar and it seems obvious that it must have fallen here from the nearest hole located to the left of the entrance once the place was abandoned.

The date of the findings

In a hole located next to this entrance, we rescued a good set of ceramic remains that would provide us with the date”Before whom”, since this structure (and by extension surely the warehouse itself) is amortized and abandoned.

From this entrance, which is just at the northern limit of the proposed survey, we can only glimpse the rest of the cave-cellar in which we can distinguish different holes in the location of the jars and some of these falls and semi-covered by landslides from walls and vaults. A sketch of the development of this structure would be the one presented here, in which we distinguish up to 14 holes drilled in the walls of the cave and up to 11 jars that we came to differentiate.

So, for now, and with the aim of being able to continue the work, we have been able to draw up a fairly approximate sketch of the development of the site, as well as locate its original access (even if it is partially lost due to later works in the area) and delimit the discovery chronologically, at least in the term”Before whom”, since the rescued ceramic remains would indicate that this structure was amortized around the middle of the 20th century.

The jars

On the other hand, the very typology of the jars present at the site provides us with a probable date before which the winery should have been built, since, according to Mª Dolores García (1993) in her study on tinajera pottery in Villarrobledo (the area where we believe these would come from), the manufacture of the type of conical jar present here usually dates back to 1914, the date on which the tinajero Pedro Antonio Girón made the first large cylindrical jar, and from that moment on this last type of Jar that favored an older liquid storage in cellars.

This data would abound in the chronological description of the use of this winery during the late 19th century and the first half of the 20th century, possibly until the area was completely remodeled in 1973.

As for the very presence of this warehouse in this particular place, a neighbor in the area has assured us that a grocery store existed here around the middle of the last century, an establishment founded in 1917 that was originally called “The Feed Room” and was later renamed “Casa Marqueño”, to which this facility could very well belong.

Consulted bibliography

• Cabasa Calpe, S. (2011). “The tinajería and its relationship with the wine industry”. Oleana, 26, 319-338.
• Carrilero Martinez, R. (1997b). Historical approach to Albacete in the 16th century according to its municipal system, IEA. Albacete.
• García-Saúco Beléndez, G. and Sanz Gamo, R. (1991). Albacete in its History, Albacete City Council. Albacete.
• Garcia Gomez, M. Dolores (1993): Four centuries of tinajera pottery in Villarrobledo. Institute of Albacete Studies, Albacete.
• Gonzalez Ballesteros, J.A. (2018): Archaeological Action Project in Calle Albarderos S/N on the occasion of the sanitation and water supply works in the urban center. Unpublished document requesting authorization for archaeological works.
• Martinez-Porral, R. and Molina Garel, M. (2011). “The underground cellars in the castle-fortress of Torralba (Cuenca). Archaeological documentation prior to the consolidation process”. Oleana, 26, 89-106.
• Baker Moya, M. (1976-1977). “Albacete toponymy. Origins and evolution”. Papers of the Department of Geography, 7, 133-175.
• Pretel Marín, A. (2010). The town of Albacete in the Late Middle Ages, IEA. Albacete.