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Manilva (Municipality, Andalusia, Spain)

Flag of Manilva - Image from the Símbolos de Málaga website, 21 September 2016

Presentation of Manilva
Symbols of Manilva

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Presentation of Manilva

The municipality of Manilva (4,587 inhabitants in 2015; 3,530 ha; municipal website), the south-westernmost municipality of the Province of Málaga, is located on the Costa del Sol, on the border with the Province of Cádiz, 100 km of Málaga and 35 km of Gibraltar. The municipality is made of three main settlements: Manilva (2,634 inh.), San Luis de Sabinillas (8,276 inh.) and El Castillo de la Duquesa (838 inh.).

Manilva was already settled in the late Age of Bronze; the site of Los Castillejos de Alcorrín (9th century BC) provides archeological evidence of contact established between the local and Phoenician seamen. In the early Roman times, the area was covered with small rural estates; they progressively disappeared, most probably because the inhabitants moved to the coast following the boom of salt fish industry in the 2nd century. The site of El Castillo de la Duquesa has yielded remains of a villa, of thermae, of a necropolis and of a great garum factory adjacent to a market. The coastal settlements were abandoned in the beginning of the 5th century.

After the Muslim conquest, the population was scattered in small estates, most probably depending on the big citadel and fortified town located in Casares. River Guadiaro, today the border between the Provinces of Cádiz and Málaga, was for years the border between the Christian states and the Nasrid Kingdom of Granada. Casares was reconquerred in 1485 and transferred to the Duke of Cádiz.
The Manilva estate was not established until 1530, as a means of resettling the areas neighbouring the coast, abandoned for long to the pirates. Most colonists came from Casares. The population slowly increased, favoured by the development of sugarcane and wine-growing.
Manilva was granted the status of villa in 1796, separating from Casares.

Ivan Sache, 21 September 2016

Symbols of Manilva

The flag of Manilva (photo, photo, photo, photo, photo) is horizontally divided celestial blue-white-celestial blue with the municipal coat of arms in the center. Neither the flag nor the arms appear to have been officially registered.

The coat of arms of Manilva is "Per pale, 1. Argent a stone castle on waves azure and argent, 2. Azure pallet argent charged with two bunches of grapes. THe shield surrounded by a wheat spike and a branch of olive. The shield surmounted by a Royal crown closed."

Ivan Sache, 21 September 2016