Top 6 Castles around Manresa

A town with a great history that is worth visiting 🤩

Pleasant walk through Talamanca and its surroundings with a moderate slope. The route runs along well-marked tracks and is marked with milestones with white and green labels. With this itinerary we will discover the medieval origins of Talamanca based on its cultural and natural heritage. The route follows a section of the stream between small gorges and waterfalls that have emerged between the rocks. The itinerary discovers constructions such as the dry stone huts, the water lilies or the unique area of the balma salt of the Gobians and a part following the stream bed, scene of one of the most important battles of the war of succession. Part of the excursion goes through Sant Llorenç del Munt i l'Obac Natural Park.

The original building, built in the 11th century, was the embryo of the town and the political center of the district. It was part of the network of castles aimed at the defense of the colonists who repopulated the lands conquered by the Saracens. In the twelfth century, the Saracen threat faded but the process of feudalization caused disputes between Castilians for control of the castle, with several sagas taking place: the Cardona, the Talamanca, the Castellbell. In 1717, Bourbon troops demolished the castle, a fate shared by many of the castles of Old Catalonia. In the 18th century, the Castellbells built the manor house with a tower.

On January 22, 1939, Franco's troops occupied the summit of Cal Xamal, where General García Valiño installed the major plain, and deployed to the upper part of Pla de Fals. Some rudimentary coats that the soldiers made to spend the night can still be found. On the morning of the 23rd, the soldiers began to advance through the Plan, surrounding the group of houses in the Raval d'Oliveres. A republican machine gun, installed at the top of La Torra (see photo above), fired, while another fired from the corner of the boulder. Artillery responded and destroyed part of the construction. The machine gunners withdrew in the direction of Manresa. On the other side of Pla de Fals, on an elevated point in Les Costetes, another machine gun was placed there, which killed a non-commissioned officer of the nationals. In retaliation, the machine gun soldiers were shot. The next day, the owner of Grauet found the bodies of seven soldiers, and a patrol hung them all together. Because the grave was shallow, animals and rains soon uncovered some of the remains, and even today scattered bones of the soldiers are found. Since then, the place has been known as the "Plan of the Dead".

The Sagimona Tower, also known as "La Torra", is a square-plan farmhouse, covered on four sides and with ridges parallel to the facades. Although it is probably a work of the 17th century, much reformed in the 18th century, it was built next to an old medieval tower of the 11th century. This tower was probably a keep of the neighboring castle of Fals, built to control access through the corner of Pla de Fals and to protect the path from Fals to Rajadell. The tower is cylindrical, with an external diameter of 5.85m and a height of 14.25 metres. Surely, the people of Torreda should acquire rights over the land that surrounded it until it became a prosperous farm, which made the construction of the farmhouse possible. A set of 10 tubs are located on the west side of the building.

This section, which runs between Molins and Rajadell, parallel to the train track, is well known and frequented by local cyclists.

very beautiful village in a magnificent area

Town, head of the municipality of the same name, formed in 1840 from the grouping of Castelltallat, Coaner, Salo, Sant Mateu de Bages and Valls de Torroella, with a little over 600 inhabitants. With more than 100km2, it is the largest municipality in the province of Barcelona. The site of Sancto Matheo is documented since the 10th century. The castle is mentioned for the first time in 1018. During the Second Spanish Republic it adopted the name of Bages d'en Selves.