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The geographical location of Lorca, in the estribaciones of the mountain of the Pipe, he/she has made him be a place coveted for human establishments from old, since it constituted an it pierces strategic in the natural corridor between Levant and Andalusia. Fortuitous discoveries in the past and systematic excavations carried out in passed years, they have put without funds an intense occupation of the underground of the current Lorca, and of good part of their municipal term that embraces from the Paleolithic one Half until the final years of the Muslim Lorca.

Examples of these establishments are the town argárico of The Corner of Almendricos, the Roman village of The Limerick, with mosaics and painting mural, or the own plain of the Castle in the Sierra of the Pipe, one of the most interesting archaeological deposits in the Region of Murcia. The Municipal Archaeological Museum offers the possibility to know the prehistoric past and protohistórico of Lorca in some rooms of having taken care of exhibition at the moment.

Maybe the most brilliant moment in this whole period was that of the Roman world, when the first documental appointments that make reference to Lorca in the antiquity appear. The localization of Eliocroca one has come identifying with the current location of the city through the references that make the Itinerary of Antonino that locates this of this toponym "mansio" (military station) among Carthago Nova and Ad Morum, and the dockets of Elvira's Council (300-302 D.C.) where represented Eliocroca the bishop Event. The dispersion of ceramic tardorromanas (centuries IV to the I SAW D.C.) for the entirety of the space of the Castle, as well as recent discoveries in near plain to the river, allow to confirm the existence of an important populational nucleus of late time in Lorca. that starting from the s. III D.C. would welcome arrived people of the rural means in protection search in some crisis moments.

But the most abundant Roman establishments were dedicated to the agricultural exploitation of the vega of the Guadalentín. The old ones pierce Iberian they didn't give way, such and like he/she is being proven in the excavations, the creation of agricultural nuclei distributed by the whole district being potentialized, in areas with natural and next important resources to the main roads of communication. The excavations of The Limerick have allowed to document one of those important ones "villae" that counts with ornamentation in the residential part with the help of mosaics, paintings and sculptures, following the imported fashions of the italic peninsula, and with a wide area of services.

It is known very little of the beginning of the Half Age, but it is presumably that Lorca, under the Visigothic domain, experienced the urban and social decadence that supposed the end of the Kingdom of Toledo. The year 713 Abd-al-Aziz it would sign with Teodomiro a treaty for which Lorca passed to be part of a territory autonomous compound number "Cora of Tudmir" and apparently with the capital consideration. This same economic-administrative situation would not stay already many years beyond the death of Teodomiro and era a distant memory when with Abd-al-Rahman II the Muslim state is reorganized. This is the moment in that the city of Murcia was founded (year 825) that would become a dependent demarcation of the Caliphate of Córdoba.
To the death of Almanzor in 1002, the caliphate disintegrated appearing the taifas Kingdom. Lorca that ended up being one of these demarcations in some moment, was integrated in the Kingdom of Ibn Hud who, with base in Ricote, he/she tried to maintain the territorial unit.

During the Arab dominance Lorca can be defined as a "iqlin", this is, an administrative unit with a reduced territory, a capital and small population nuclei or alquerías surrounding, of among those that it is necessary to mention to Félix and Hangup. It was composed by a castle that had a small garnish to the orders of a military boss (the caid). The madina extended to the feet of the castle, being reinforced its defense with walls and doors. The main center constituted it the mosque, around which the zocos, alhóndiga and alcaicería were located. It is located traditionally in Santa María's area. The suburb, to the foot of the city, it was also protected with walls and in him the artisans and specialized zocos were located as that of the perfumes, fabrics, etc. Prepared the city of a cemetery, in the area that today occupies Santiago's parish, and of a "musara" or place of equestrian and pedestrian exercises of military character. The exit to the sea was made by the port of Eagles and the vegetable garden, apparently perfectly structured, it had a watering system. The economy was sustained in the ovino cattle raising and cabrío, an agriculture especially of cereals and the trade of lands for tint.

With the signature of the Pact of Alcaraz for Fernando III in 1243, all Murcia entered in a régime of Castilian protectorate to which Lorca, Mule and Cartagena didn't unite. The fall for blockade of these last two cities made that the following year, June 28, Lorca was welcomed to the pact surrendering peacefully. The warlike insecurity and the fact that the Muslims held in their power the earth and they occupied the fields, retrajo the Castilian poblamiento of the term and the city. To favor the castellanización of the village, Alfonso X grants diverse privileges to its residents, it donates them the castles and villages of Bridges and Félix and it organizes the border Town council.

Three intents repobladores are happened in the XIII century when the distributions of lands of 1257, 1270 and 1272 are made. All they would fail, the same as that of 1336, mainly for the insecurity of the area. Although a border line had settled down with Granada, this was not stable and it was subjected to the military, economic and political impulse of both sides. The border line in time of peace constituted it a series of strengths recognized in the treaties of suspension of hostilities. That official peace was broken however constantly had ridden and hand blows that made appear a no man's land, the frontier, favorable for adventurous and smugglers. The defensive system was composed of some few important nuclei where he/she was the thick of the garnish and a smaller series of strengths (you toast, fortified farms and watchtowers) that completed the masthead missions besides being starting points for the incursions, contention, domain of territories, the population's security and shortcut of retired.

The understood period between the reconquest of the city and the taking of Granada in 1492 is subordinate almost totally to the warlike activities of Lorca like frontier city. The first problems already arose with the rebellion of the Mudejar ones in 1264. The resistance of the garnish of the strength made that, after having appeased the rebellion Jaime I and expelled to the Mudejar ones (1265/66), Lorca received the kings' new privileges. In 1271 Alfonso X granted Lorca the Jurisdiction of Córdoba for which the Town council would be governed from now on.

The documentation absence prevents to trace the main characteristics of the century XIV lorquino. One can deduce, nevertheless that the failures repobladores, the pest of half-filled of century and the malas widespread crops, together with the warlike restlessness, they created big human deserts. The only well-known political activity is the participation of Lorca in the war civil murciana between Manueles and Fajardos. During this century it continued being configured the municipal term already acquiring big dimensions.

In the first years of the XV century the peace always relative of the frontier it breaks armed encounters that would finish with a shy adentramiento of Castile in the limits of the Kingdom of Granada taking place. In the decade 1430-39 the widespread offensive takes place, being conquered Xiquena, the Vélez and good part of the valley of the Almanzora then. In 1442 Juan II granted Lorca the title "Noble City" as recognition to have been maintained strong in front of the constant pressure of the Kingdom nazarita on the frontier.

The central part of the XV century is strongly marked for the political conflict among the family Fajardo. The important victory of the Alporchones that supposed to close the incursions of the Muslims definitively, gave even bigger splendor to the alcaidía of the castle that had Alonso Fajardo during these years "the brave one". it Arrived with its soldiers until Mojácar, to which took and it plundered. Finally it lost the real favor and it was defeated and subjected by the early Pedro Fajardo.

The border activity was summed up definitively in the last third of the XV century. The campaigns grenadines are undertaken in 1481 and to Lorca he/she is assigned the paper of constant harassment of the frontier to multiply the fronts and to weaken the gears. In 1488 Huércal and Ovary are conquered that will be given to Lorca, and the whole Cora of Pechina, what is at the moment Almería. The advances reconquistadores allow a certain stability in Lorca in the one that in 1490 reformations concejiles are undertaken by the corregidor Juan Goatherd. The year 1492, with the fall of Granada, it marks the end of the border period.

In the beginnings of the Modern Age the city has already gotten a space urban own envelope the structure of the previous one. The suburbs have disappeared, the high parishes are the most populous and the rooms of the Town council are still in the missing persons tower and door of Gil of Ricla. The castle has you refortificado and the walls still condition the growth of the city. The wide term is uninhabited or barely inhabited. The structure concejil makes a dominant class composed by the local oligarchy to appear, in many cases extended from Murcia. This possesses the earth and the livestock that it is almost since the only source of wealth the agricultural production he/she had fallen strongly for the recession of the area of irrigable to the surrounding lands to the city. The population's wide base was composed of a social class dominated with a very low rent