Territorial survey of the town

Segovia is one of the southern provinces in the Autonomous Region of Castilla y León. It occupies the northern slopes of Spain's central mountain range and the intermediate space as far as the Duero river.
The morphology of the province is determined by the mountain range and its valleys. The capital lies at the foot of the mountains on their northern side, near the lands formed by the rivers that rise in the mountain range.
Segovia is located at the foot of the mountains, in the northern valleys of the central mountain system, which turns toward the Duero river. Its lands are high and cool, with a continental climate, and highlands at 1,001 m above sea level. In 1990 it had 54,754 inhabitants.
The city sits on an elongated spur of rock that runs east-west between the Eresma and Clamores rivers which meet on the western side at the foot of the Alcazar.
There are important suburbs around the city, documented since medieval times and it is divided into the city lying inside and the one lying outside the walls.
The exact time when Segovia began to be populated is unknown. In the caves around the city there are signs of Neolithic and Bronze Age occupations, while the area now lying within the walls began to be populated around the Iron Age. The hill also began to have an important nucleus of population around the Iron Age and a primitive fence dates from that time.
With the advance of the Roman conquest, Segovia became an important Roman site, associated with commerce and roads. One of its most important monuments worldwide is the Aqueduct, which tells us how important this municipality was in Flavian times.
The crisis of the 3rd century must have made it necessary to build a wall, as also happened in the rest of the Iberian peninsula. The foundations date from the Low Empire in some parts of the wall.
Visigothic presence tells that the walled hill continued to be populated. At the beginning of the 6th century it was a bishopric.
In 711, the Arabs invaded the Iberian peninsula and settled in its towns, sharing the space with the Christians. The Arab presence in Segovia can be detected by its toponymy and the archaeological remains found in the city.
Christians advanced towards Segovia before the 9th century. In 1085, Toledo was taken by Alphonso VI, and Sepulveda and Segovia were the bases for the military attack.
In 1088 Segovia was repopulated. It became a royal residence for Christian kings, and Christians, Jews and Muslims lived together in peace.
In the 15th century it became the residence of King Henry IV and his sister Queen Isabella was proclaimed in Segovia.
The 15th-16th centuries became the time when the city underwent its biggest boom. It was the third city in importance in Castile after Salamanca and Valladolid. However, this was also the period of the decline of its walls.
The wool crisis of the 17th century is responsible for the gradual depopulation of the city and the ruin of the walls. As a consequence of this, the city only had 10,000 inhabitants and was in a latent state of ruin at the end of the 18th century.
This process continued throughout the 19th and first part of the 20th centuries, with continuing destruction of the walls and monuments. After the first half of the 20th century, a protection policy was begun, along with a process of restoration of the city’s historical heritage.