Calatrava la Vieja is a fortress site in Carrión de Calatrava, in Castile-La Mancha, Spain. It guarded the roads to Córdoba and Toledo. Its name comes from the Arabic Qalʿat Rabāḥ, the Fortress of Rabah, after an Arab nobleman who held the area in the eighth century. The fortress may date to Iberian times, and it is first mentioned in 785.
It was partly destroyed in 853 and rebuilt, becoming a regional capital. After Alfonso VII conquered it in 1147, King Sancho III of Castile granted the town and fortress to whoever would defend it. Raymond of Fitero organized the defense and founded the Order of Calatrava, which was organized along Cistercian lines. The Almohads took the site in 1195, and it was recovered in 1212.
In 1217 the order moved to Calatrava la Nueva, about 37 miles (60 kilometers) to the south. The site was fully abandoned in the early fifteenth century and is now an archaeological park.
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