The castro of San Cibrao de Las , also known as A Ciudá , Lambrica , Lansbrica or Lanobrica , is one of the largest Galician castros in the process of excavation among those located in the territory of present-day Galicia , and one of the four pillars of the Galician Network of Archaeological Heritage . From the result of archaeological studies can be defined a period of continuous occupation from the second century BC to the second century AD, and with possible later sporadic occupations
The City is the traditional name among the surrounding people. The names Lambrica, Lanobriga and Lansbrica come from various readings that were made on a Roman altar dedicated to the Galician god Bandua , existing in a private house in the neighboring parish of Eiras .
Due to its size, it can be compared to that of Santa Trega and the citanias of northern Portugal , Galician or Galician- Roman settlements of the castrexa culture that are characterized by their advanced state of Romanization and their large dimensions. Among the most significant exponents are the cititania of Briteiros , the castro of Mozinho and that of Sanfíns
Given its typology, it can be said that it is an archaeological site corresponding to the final stage of the castrexa culture , in which the Romanization process set up a society with a defined culture, also known as Galician-Roman culture, in which the preexisting social system is in a process of change and adaptation to the Roman system, so that both cultures mix.
On the contrary, the neighboring castro of San Trocado , located on the Monte de San Trocado , brought a series of finds [ 3 ] that give it a chronology around the sixth and fifth centuries BC, corresponding to the initial period or formation of the castrexa culture, which makes discard the possibility of a contemporary occupation with the one of Las.
Its possible original name appeared in one of the three inscriptions found so far: One on the twilight door of the central enclosure, fragmented; another, brief and on a rock, in the croa, with a dedication to Jupiter ; and the third, an altar dedicated to Bandua Lambricae , which together with medieval documents makes known the name of the town.
The city is located at a difficult point of natural defense so it needed strong and extensive defense devices. From the place you have a wide view of the valleys that surround it and maintain eye contact with the castros of Santa Ádega and Trelle , as well as the Sierra de San Mamede , Mount Faro , Pena Corneira or the heights of O Vieiro . For this reason dominion over the territory was guaranteed, along with the proximity to easy-to-cultivate lands and the mining of Laias, where obtaining gold was of great importance.
It is a large castro, in the image of the castros of southern Galicia and northern Portugal , such as the castro of Santa Trega or the citanias of Sanfins , Mozinho , Ancora or Briteiros . The parallelism with these towns also extends to the almost orthogonal outline of their urban planning, a system considered an evolutionary product produced by the influence of the Romanization process.
It is structured in two almost concentric elliptical walled enclosures, with a slight elongation in the northeast-southwest axis, with dimensions of 294 meters of the east-west axis and 420 meters of the major axis. Thus the intramural surface is 95,900 m² distributed in 8,750 m² of the croa and 87,150 m² of the antecroa
There are two walled enclosures: the exterior reinforced with a third wall with its moat, and a parapet (on the west side) except on the more pronounced east side:
Inner wall : the croa is delimited by a wall , made up of masonry and granite bowls from the place, which has an average thickness of 3 meters. At the top it could have a slate walkway [ 5 ] which would be accessed by means of steps located laterally inside the wall [ 6 ] and by stairs of various types, one or two spills, embedded in the wall. The diversity of access stairs to the walls is evident throughout the defensive system.
This wall opens into cubic-defended gates on the west-east axis. In the cubes of the east door, which was excavated in 1982, there are two open and rectangular guards and with a running ledge inside two towers. This door has a tiled step as a step .
Flying staircase leading to the croa wall. On the wall you can see the polygonal placement system of the boulders (and even in the shape of a herringbone ) characteristic of the castrejos and the witnesses of the reconstruction.
In the west door there is only a less developed guardhouse, in which was found a fragment of inscription difficult to interpret ( ... MI / ... VLE / ). It is flanked by two cubes, the one on the right semicircular and facing the wall, and the one on the left elongated. When it was excavated in 1948 it reached a height of 3 and a half meters. The cliffs with recesses are the entrance pavement.
Exterior walls : the second enclosure, or antecroa, is delimited almost entirely (except in the southeast and east) by two walls with their respective ditches dug in the sábrego and granite penedía, and reinforced in some areas with an outer parapet. These walls open into 3 gates, to the west, east and south, all of them with flanking towers, some of them with guards.
In the area of ??the outer west gate the slight slope of the ground did not facilitate the defense, which forced an accumulation of defensive lines. The wall reaches at this point six meters thick, and has an average thickness of 3 meters. The wall is not based directly on the sandstone or the bedrock, but on a layer that does not exceed 15 cm of paleosol, a layer that favored the evacuation of water preventing them from weakening the foundations of the wall. It is built by two polygonal granite facings that complete an internal structure of masonry and earth.
Exterior walls south and moat leading to the south gate.
The south outer door sits on the rock and bears witness to the rolling of the carts and the hinges of the door assembly. It is flanked by two advanced towers in which there are no guards. This door opens onto a wide moat located between it and the second outer wall. At present a cart path enters through this section, so that the two walls are completely destroyed, the mother rock being visible, and no remains of the construction of the gate witnessed by archaeologists are visually perceptible.
The third line of the wall starts from almost the outer west door and reaches 60 meters beyond the south door, closing on the second wall.
Due to the features and characteristics of the southern walls, it is believed that its gate must have been the oldest in the village, setting up an easily defensible access, as it forced the village to enter through the moat between the two walls, which ends not at the gate but later, as a possible system of deception.
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