Castle of Zafra

The castle occupies the whole of a sandstone outcrop in the Sierra de Caldereros, in the municipality of Campillo de Dueñas in Guadalajara, at 1,400 metres. Bronze and Iron Age pottery has been found in cavities in the rock and around the site, and classical-era remains in the grounds suggest the Romans may have held the crag as well. The earliest fortress known here is thought to have been Visigothic, established before about 720; the Moors had a fortification on the rock that was used by the Taifa of Toledo.

That Moorish fortress changed hands in 1129, when the Christian kingdoms of the north took Zafra. The Kingdom of Aragon held it as a key defensive position in the south of its territory, guarding the newly created community of town and land of Daroca, and in the Charter of Molina de Aragón of 1154 the area's semi-independent ruler, Don Manrique Pérez de Lara, named it among the most important of his dominions.

The present castle was built between the second half of the 12th century and the first years of the 13th, as the de Lara family sought to consolidate its hold on the Real Señorío de Molina, on the border between Christian and Muslim-ruled territory. Its defences were tested in 1222, when Don Gonzalo Pérez de Lara, third lord of Molina, drew the hostility of King Fernando III of Castile. Gonzalo had committed a series of excesses in territories adjoining his fief, including attacks on villages held by neighbouring lords, while other Castilian magnates raided royal lands in what appeared to be an attempt to overthrow Fernando in favour of Alfonso IX of León.

When the royal army marched on Molina, Gonzalo took his family, his court and his retainers into the castle. The army was unable to storm it, and after several weeks of siege the two sides negotiated. Under the Agreement of Zafra the Señorío de Molina was to pass on Gonzalo's death to his daughter Doña Mafalda, who would marry Fernando's son Prince Alfonso, bringing the lordship under the Crown and ending its independence. The castle itself was never conquered.

The walls enclose so little ground that there is barely room for arsenals or stores of food, a puzzle historians have met with the suggestion of large caves cut into the rock beneath. The castle is thought to have held as many as 500 people.

During the Castilian civil war of the 14th century, Henry II of Castile bestowed the castle and lordship of Molina on his French mercenary ally Bertrand du Guesclin. The people of Molina rebelled and invited Peter IV of Aragon to rule them; the castle was fought over and was eventually granted to Peter's vassal Ximeno Pérez de Vera. It passed back to Castile by marriage.

In the 15th century Henry IV of Castile provoked a second rebellion by bestowing castle and town on his favourite Beltrán de la Cueva. Its castellan, Don Juan de Hombrados Malo, saw off all opponents and held the place for the crown until it passed into the hands of the Catholic Monarchs of the unified kingdoms of Castile and Aragon in 1479. Don Juan was rewarded with the hereditary wardenship of the castle, which his family kept for many years afterwards.

The reconquest of the peninsula and the merger of the two kingdoms deprived Zafra of its former strategic importance, and from the 16th century onwards it began to fall into ruin. It remained the property of the Spanish state until 1971, when it was sold at auction for 30,000 pesetas. The buyer, Don Antonio Sanz Polo (1913–2008), a distinguished educator, was a descendant of Juan de Hombrados Malo, and his family had kept Don Juan's documents of wardenship for more than four hundred years. By then it was completely ruined. Sanz Polo spent the next thirty years and most of his fortune rebuilding it, hiring cranes, architects and historians, and was awarded the Medal of Merit of the National Association of Friends of Castles for the work.

The castle is protected under the state order of 22 April 1949 and the Spanish Historical Heritage Law of 1985, and listed as a bien de interés cultural. It remains in private hands, held by the Sanz family of Molina de Aragón; the exterior is freely visible, while going inside requires the owners' permission. The old approach disappeared long ago, and visitors now climb a ladder installed by the owner, at the end of a day-long hike or a dirt track up from the village of Hombrados. HBO filmed outdoor scenes for the sixth season of Game of Thrones here, the castle standing in for the Tower of Joy in three episodes.