Padul

History

The origin of the name of Padul comes from the Roman era, deriving from the Latin word palus-paludis and exactly from its accusative case paludem, which means wetland or bog, clearly referring to Padul's wetland. Due to the lack of known manuscripts talking about the name of the town along a period of time ranging several centuries, the phases of evolution of the Latin word are unknown, as well as the preceding definite article "El". In relation to this point, two plausible possibilities are proposed: (1) The article could have appeared directly from the Latin word ille, which originated the definite articles in all Romance languages. (2) The article could have appeared later with the Arabic article al. Regardless this controversy, during the Nasrid period, Ibn al-Khatib wrote the word "Al-Badul" (in Arabic spelling), with "B" because "P" does not exist in Arabic, although probably people used the sound "P". The modern name of Padul appears in the first manuscripts written in Spanish language in the 16th century. Among these manuscripts, the most important are the Parochial Archive and the Book of Surveying written in 1571. In the latter is possible to read this sentence: ...que era de vecinos moriscos del dicho lugar Padul.... In the 20th century, when the road signs started to be used, most of them were settled with the name of Padul without article, which has caused an important controversy about the real name of the town. Towards the end of the 20th century, a cultural movement formed by several writers and History teachers of the town proposed to the town council to restore officially the whole name of the town. The result of that cultural movement took place on 18 December 2000, when the Town Council chose the name Padul as the official of the town. The…

Geography

Padul borders on Alhendín, Villa de Otura and Dílar to the north, ; Dúrcal and Villamena to the east; Albuñuelas to the south and Jayena to the west. * Padul's wetland : One of the most important wetlands in south-eastern Spain, recently included in the Ramsar Convention. It has the greatest peatland of the Mediterranean basin and it has also several threatened species.

Most-observed species

• House Sparrow

  Passer domesticus (Linnaeus, 1758) · Aves
  3,252
• Common Wood-Pigeon

  Columba palumbus Linnaeus, 1758 · Aves
  3,185
• Eurasian Blackbird

  Turdus merula Linnaeus, 1758 · Aves
  3,167
• European Serin

  Serinus serinus (Linnaeus, 1766) · Aves
  2,643
• Spotless Starling

  Sturnus unicolor Temminck, 1820 · Aves
  2,518
• European Goldfinch

  Carduelis carduelis (Linnaeus, 1758) · Aves
  2,516
• Eurasian Magpie

  Pica pica (Linnaeus, 1758) · Aves
  2,497
• Sardinian Warbler

  Curruca melanocephala (J.F.Gmelin, 1789) · Aves
  2,325

Most recent

• M 4.3 — 2025-10-29
  29 km S of El Ejido, Spain
• M 2.8 — 2023-10-29
  4 km S of Lanjarón, Spain
• M 4.6 — 2021-08-12
  2 km W of Santafé, Spain
• M 4.3 — 2021-01-28
  2 km NW of Santafé, Spain
• M 4.3 — 2021-01-26
  2 km WNW of Atarfe, Spain
• M 4.1 — 2021-01-26
  2 km S of Atarfe, Spain