Transcendence of the site:
First and most important fortress built by the Spaniards until the construction of the Ozama in 1502 in Santo Domingo. It was a strategic location in the Spanish expansion through the island of Haiti.
What happened here?
The Spanish conquistadors in their advance through the new lands found in 1494 an immense and fertile valley called the Vega Real and in whose place they decided to build a fortress to facilitate their military control and protect the exploitation and transportation of gold they hoped to extract in the Cibao region. With this objective in mind, other fortresses were also built along a route that would lead to Santo Domingo, located to the south of the island.
It was of great importance in the Roldán as it was where the rebels took refuge at the beginning and where the capitulation between Roland and Christopher Columbus was signed that put an end to this rebellion.
Nearby, before the construction of the fortress, the Battle of the Royal Plain against Caonabo and the chieftains who did not accept the arrival of foreigners took place. In this battle the Castilians won, assuming almost totally the end of the Indian resistance in the Spanish.
How to visit it?
The truth is that finding the strength of the Concepcion requires a patient exercise to ask Dominicans in the area because the signposting to reach it is non-existent. But, please don’t ask about the Fortress of La Concepción because there are military installations with the same name in the same city of La Vega and they will send you to the other side of the city (I say it by my own experience). The best thing to ask for the ruins of the Concepción, the Vega Vieja or Santo Cerro, since this is located next to the old fortress.
The best way to get there is by motorway number 1 from Santo Domingo, when you get to the Vega exit on the right and take the road number 21 in the direction of Santo Cerro, when you reach the height of this place ask for the ruins of Concepción. These are located across a dirt road just behind a small military barracks. Do not try to look for a sign or sign that indicates how to access it because, as I said, it does not even exist at the same height as the ruins. Unbelievable.
The entrance fee is 50 Dominican pesos (1 dolar) charged by a gentleman at the entrance door and will serve as a guide. In the same historical enclosure you can visit the museum called Lourdes Cáceres Mendoza. Small house with samples of tools and different arts taínas and other Spanish objects found during the excavations carried out by the Natural History Museum of Florida, which says that some 200,000 objects from different periods were found but very few left there, but some of great interest such as plates, pots, bells, pins, some cutlery, some glass, were used by the following people? for Roland?
Interesting place that every lover of New World history must visit.
I add the Google Map of how to get to the fortress from the Duarte motorway (number 1):
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