The contributions of hydrogeoarchaeology to the study of the urban water supplies to the old Roman Arunda from the Llanos de la Arena springs (Serranía de Ronda, province of Málaga)

Abstract

The settlement of Arunda, now known as Ronda (Malaga) was located in the neighbourhood of La Ciudad, upon an Iberian oppidum. In the 1990s, some Roman levels were discovered with part of the potable water distribution system using pressure. This finding corroborated the Roman origins of the Fuente de la Arena aqueduct that brought water from the Llanos de la Arena springs, 6 km away, at the foot of the Sierra de Jarastepar. Jarastepar carbonate outcrops make up an aquifer with an area of 25 km2 whose recharge is produced exclusively by infiltration of precipitation (8.9 hm3/year). The Llanos de la Arena springs drain a sector of this aquifer with average resources of 1.6 hm3/year. The aqueduct was built not before the end of the 1st century AD and, was more probably constructed in the following century, coinciding with an extremely arid period in the south of the Iberian Peninsula (ca. 150 BC-150 AD). The elements identified are: the caput aquae, the brick specus with a ceramic pipe, an aerial section of more than 200 m and the well-known Predicatorio Tower (the beginning of a siphon to the other elevated end of the city). The aqueduct of the Fuente de la Arena is a relevant infrastructure that captured enough water resources to guarantee thesupply to Arunda, even when unfavourable weather conditions occurred. This suggests that the activities that were taking place in the city were much more than a mere settlement.