The City Council of Cortes de Arenoso (Castellón, Spain) has commissioned a multidisciplinary team led by AUG-ARQUITECTOS, SLP, to draft the Cultural Section of the Catalog of Protections. Together with the AUG-ARQUITECTOS, SLP team, Amparo Barrachina and Maite Suñer, PhDs in archeology and paleontology, respectively, will collaborate.
Cortes de Arenoso is a sparsely populated municipality with difficult access, located in the Alto Mijares region, north of the Valencian Community, bordering Teruel. It treasures a rich and varied heritage, both in landscapes, nature and fauna, as well as in the remains left behind by human activity. In an area of just over 80 square kilometers, the territory is dotted with remains of human settlements, ethnological elements and samples of popular architecture. The dispersion of the settlements in the area determines the existence of a large number of archaeological sites and about seventy farmhouses, some of which are still inhabited. In addition, the region has different areas considered of paleontological interest, which have provided a rich and varied fossil flora and fauna, the latter consisting of mammals, amphibians, crustaceans, arachnids and insects, among others. In the municipal term of Cortes de Arenoso is the “La Hoya del Cretacico amber deposit in Cortes de Arenoso” (LIG Code: IB076), considered a fossiliferous locality of great scientific and heritage interest that was included at the end of 2013 in the Inventory of Places of Geological Interest (IELIG) prepared by the Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Environment, with the collaboration of the Autonomous Communities and scientific institutions, such as the Geological and Mining Institute of Spain (IGME).
The relationship of the company that wrote the new Catalog with the Cortes de Arenoso City Council dates back to the end of the 20th century, when AUG-ARQUITECTOS, SLP drew up the general plan that still constitutes the local urban framework today. Since then, AUG-ARQUITECTOS, SLP has continued to develop different jobs for the city council, which will be complemented with this new commission, in which the corporation has placed a special interest, aware of the opportunity offered to start inventorying, knowing , protect and recover, its rich heritage.
For the elaboration of the Cultural Section of the Catalog of Protections, a subsidy has been granted by the General Directorate of Culture and Heritage, of the Department of Education, Culture and Sports.