Cuatro Puertas

About

The Four Doors (in Spanish Cuatro Puertas) site, also known as Montaña Bermeja, 'Vermillion Mountain', is a complex of caves in the south of the municipality of Telde, Gran Canaria. The Cuatro Puertas site is named after its most spectacular cave, the most emblematic of Gran Canaria due to its uniqueness and location. The site includes many other caves, some linked with each other. A small village nearby also bears that name, as well as a ravine (barranco de Cuatro Puertas). The site is listed as Spanish Heritage as a Property of cultural interest.

Cuatro Puertas and Montaña Bermeja are 6 km away from the east coast of the island of Gran Canaria, on the east side of the GC-100 road that links Telde (5 km north) to Ingenio (8 km south).

The Cuatro Puertas hamlet, situated near the top of Montaña Bermeja, is of easy access: the GC-1 highway and Gran Canaria airport are only 6 km east. The caves' site itself is to the east of the village, after about 500 m (~1,500 ft) of an easy footpath.

Beside its most spectacular cave that gave its name to the whole complex, the site includes several groups of caves, an uncommon ceremonial place, granaries, paths and alleys. The whole was dug in tuff with stone picks by the pre-Hispanic Canarians.

Other caves include the cueva de los Papeles ("the Papers' cave"), cueva de los Pilares ("the Pillars' cave"), cueva de la Audiencia ("the Audience cave") and the cantera de Molinos (quarry for grindstones). Most caves consist of a main central space with smaller rooms opening onto it. The caves were most likely shut off with dry stone walls. The main room may have been partitioned with light structures (for example of animal skins) or with stone alignments.

The site covers practically the whole of Bermeja mount, although only the upper part can be visited.

The chronicles of the conquest hardly mention it, even though it is only 4 km away from the Conquest tower that stands in Gando's sandy bay (nowadays this tower is used as the museum of Military Aviation).

The Four Doors cave, or Cuatro Puertas cave, in the northern part of Montaña Bermeja and near the summit, is a 17 X 7 metres man-made cave opening towards the north-east, dug in tuff and provided with four large doors, all opening onto the same large space. These doors may have been shut by some coverings, made of skins or other materials.

Outside, just beyond the porch thus formed, are a series of about 20 post-holes that show that the whole space was enclosed on the outside.

Numerous deliberate arrangements have been recently made to the tuff walls and floors of the Four Doors cave with the aim of achieving a correct orientation to observe the summer solstice.

The cave's use is not clear. But because of the type and position of the location, the cave's monumental aspect, the closeness of the almogarén, and the descriptions of other similar sites in the ethnohistoric chronicles of the conquest, most archaeologists believe that it may have been a sacred place where the worship and rituals were carried out directly by the faycán and the harimaguadas (virgin priestesses under the authority of the faycán, daughters of the nobles).

In the upper part of the mountain, above and not far east from the Four Doors cave, is another cave with a sacred site or ritual space ( cazoleta or almogarén ) where libations and offerings to the gods (such as Alcorac, the Sun) were practised in an enclosed space. Milk was also used in the course of these ceremonies. This is similar to the one found at Bentayga Rock [ es ].

The cueva de los Papeles ("Papers' cave") is in the south part of the mount. It is reached by a path cut in the tuff in the south face of the mount, going east from the ritual place.

Its floor plan is more or less circular. its walls bear various engraved triangles, a sign associated with fertility; this cave was probably used for rituals around that theme.

The same path coming from the ritual place to the Papers' cave leads further to the Pillars cave ( Cueva de los Pilares ), which is accessed through ramps, stairs and small tunnels.

The Pillars' cave ( cueva de los Pilares ) site is the heart and main part of the troglodyte village of Montaña Bermeja. It is south-orientated, sheltered from the dominant winds and commands a noticeably wide panorama that includes the coast. It may have been surrounded with a thick dry stone wall. Most of the caves are more or less circular inside, many with lateral rooms. There are depressions in the ground for cooking fires, cavities in the walls that would have been used as storage places, seats, holes for beams or posts and grooves for window frames and door frames that would have been shut off with pelts or vegetal cloths.

From it, a path going east passes through a rock arch and by a narrow "chimney" towards the Audience cave and, further up on the eastern slope, at an interesting grindstone quarry – but of difficult access as the path, neglected, has disappeared under opuntia.

The cave of the Audience ( cueva de la Audiencia ) has been used for various functions such as sleeping quarters, kitchens, silos, granary and others. It stands about 200 m away from the Four Doors cave, near a narrow and hard-to-locate "chimney".

The Mills' Quarry ( cantera de Molinos )

These mills, made of stone, were essential to and even emblematic of house life in the Canaries. Every day the gofio was served - some roasted flour - and barley was much used for this purpose; other flours were also much used, especially on Gran Canaria island where agriculture dominated the means of subsistence, contrary to the other islands of the archipelago where livestock farming bore the largest part in food production.