In which Roman cardo-decuman planning of its time, serves to identify a lost site.

>The discovery served to shed light on one of the great historical debates of the area, whereby several different hypotheses had been put forward as to the location of the lost Roman site. “El Carrascal is a completely different location than everyone thought,” says Morón.

>Although Flavia Sabora’s exact location was an enigma, the settlement’s story was not. The Roman author Pliny the Elder, who wrote the Naturalis Historia, described it in the 1st century as an oppidum, or a settlement on a hill. “That is to say, a population of pre-Roman origin, subject to the control of and payment of taxes to Rome,” the UCA researchers wrote in their report of the finding for the Spanish Ministry of Culture. The first population center was established on the hill of Sabora, a defensive position located next to the current town of 1,600 inhabitants. But as Morón notes: “It is very cold there and there is a shortage of water.” With the security provided by the Roman conquest in terms of protection and prosperity, the second variable prevailed, as demonstrated by the request of the two municipal representatives to Emperor Vespasian.