Torres d’en Lluc make up one of the great mysteries of the history of Ibiza: a fortified precinct in one of the most inaccessible zones of the island, protected by the cliffs of the Mola d’Albarca and which can only be reached via a pathway which forks off from es Camp Vei.
What’s more, this zone was never inhabited. 13 years ago, an excavation directed by the archaeologist Joan Ramon tried to unravel the enigma.
What is a defensive precinct doing on the jagged coast of San Mateo, one of the most remote points on the island, with nobody living in the surroundings? That’s the question that historians and archaeologists have been asking for decades, and which still has them baffled.
And probably always will because the Torres d’en Lluc have already been excavated some 13 years ago. But the work didn’t live up to the initial expectations to clear up the origin of this defensive wall (no signs of use or habitation were discovered).
But maybe that’s not such a bad thing, because this way we keep the mystery surrounding the wall, a metre and a half wide and of which a length of 90 metres is conserved (although it is believed that it reached 200 metres).
But the name comes from the two towers that are built off it at its eastern end, without equals in the island’s defensive architecture (they are rectangular with rounded ends).
A good part of the wall was dismantled at the start of the last century by the ‘payeses’ (local peasants), who took advantage of the stones to build walls to surround agricultural plots (poverty on the island meant that such steep, craggy land could only be used for the planting of carob or almond trees, and some hardier cereals).
The only thing that the excavations have been able to clear up, given the lack of remains and finds, is that the precinct was probably erected some time between the late Roman period and the Catalan domination.
But who needed protection and, from what, we’ll probably never know. One thing is for sure, it’s worth a visit for the breath-taking panoramic views of Cala Aubarca and the cliffs of es Ais.
Torres d’en Lluc make up one of the great mysteries of the history of Ibiza: a fortified precinct in one of the most inaccessible zones of the island, protected by the cliffs of the Mola d’Albarca and which can only be reached via a pathway which forks off from es Camp Vei. 
