Floor tile patterns in Casa Campana

Casa Campana: About the house

On October 6th in the year 1900 Don Juan de Dios Ruiz Herrera bought a section of the Mayorazgo Palace and turned it into his house.

That house is now called Casa Campana.

As you go inside, you see a large inner patio with original floor tiles and a long vaulted ceiling (shown left).

The high arches on the ground floor number six and are exact matches of those in the palace coutryard next door. This suggests the patio dates back to the fifteenth century.

All over Arcos de la Frontera there are remnants of its long and interesting past. Here in Casa Campana, at the back of the inner patio you'll find a Roman memorial stone measuring 1.05m x 0.60m (shown below). We know it precedes the reign of Augustus (31 B.C. - 14 A.D.) because of the style of lettering on its inscription. This marble stone was discovered long ago in an old house nearby, and later it was transferred here.

The passage of time has made the Latin inscription almost illegible now, but this is what it says:

CALPURNIAE. Q.F.
GALLAE. D.D.
ET. POPVLI.
CLODIA. C.F. OPTATA.
MATER. HONORE. VSA.
IMPENSAM. REMISIT.

In essence the stone honours Calpurnia Gala, whose generous mother Clodia used to contribute to the costs which the town incurred. It is unlikely that the town would have been Arcos de la Frontera, as the stone was probably originally discovered in the countryside around here - where Roman ruins were once abundant.

At the top of the stairs there is a carved stone with a spiral shape inside a lozenge, also set into the wall (see below).

We know very little about the meaning of the symbol, nor to what period the stone belongs. We think it could be Roman, Celtic or Moorish!

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