The Department of Culture is opening up the free guided tours to all citizens, tours that until now had been enjoyed only by students and neighborhood groups in the municipality.
The Department of Culture and Historical Heritage of the San Bartolomé de Tirajana City Council continues to promote awareness of the Arteara aboriginal necropolis through free guided tours. This year, it has expanded this experience to include neighborhood associations, community groups, and sports organizations, and since last Saturday, with a tour attended by 50 people from across the island, it has opened the initiative to the general public.
These guided tours of Gran Canaria's largest aboriginal cemetery, with 809 burial mounds spread across its 137.570 square meters, have been dedicated almost exclusively to public and private schools in the municipality for the past three years. This year alone, around 390 students from the fifth and sixth grades of primary school and the second year of secondary school have already visited. And another excursion is planned before the end of the school year for 90 students and 4 teachers from the El Tablero-Aguañac Secondary School.
The Department of Culture, led by Deputy Mayor Elena Álamo Vega and coordinated by Councillor Esther Delgado Sánchez, is developing this outreach initiative about this pre-Hispanic burial site with a grant of 20.000 euros from the Gran Canaria Island Council and through the company Tibicenas SL, which specializes in archaeology and heritage.
The aim of the Department of Culture with these two-hour educational visits, led by the specialized guide Octavio Rodríguez Viera, is to introduce the public, especially younger generations, to this heritage site of the municipality, which was declared an Asset of Cultural Interest in 1973. The San Bartolomé de Tirajana City Council plans to undertake the renewal of all the signage at the archaeological site soon.
