
Last modified: 2016-04-25 by ivan sache
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Flag of Moratalla - Image by Ivan Sache, 8 May 2015
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The municipality of Moratalla (8,219 inhabitants in 2014; 95,482 ha; municipal website) is located in the north-west of he Region of Murcia, on the border with Castilla-La Mancha (Province of Albacete), 80 km of Murcia.
Moratalla was settled in the Neolithic, as evidenced by the rocky  
paintings of Cañaica del Calar and La Risca.
After the Christian reconquest, Moratalla was granted to the Order of  
St. James, which revamped and increased the fortifications of the  
town. The castle. originally erected in the 9th century by the Moors  
on Iberian remains, was rebuilt in Gothic style, with a donjon (15th  
century)  of 22 m in height and 9 m in side. The most famous commander  
of the castle was Alfonso de Vozmediano (d. 1465), who attempted to  
despoil the inhabitants of the town from their land; he was lynched by  
the infuriated mob and his body remained exhibited for three days at  
the gate of the fortress.
The Rogativa (Supplicant) chapel was erected on the site of a miracle  
that occurred in May 1535. The young Ginés Martínez hit a white dove  
with a stone; when reaching the ground, the bird morphed into the  
Blessed Virgin with a bloody injure in the forehead.
Ivan Sache, 8 May 2015
The flag of Moratalla is white with the municipal coat of arms in the  
middle (photo).
The coat of arms of Moratalla is "Azure a castle or masoned and port  
and windows sable a ladder sable sinister a chief azure a sun or a  
moon argent a bordure gules 12 six-pointed stars or. The shield  
surmounted with a Marquis' coronet."
Ivan Sache, 8 May 2015