The beautifully preserved town of Carmona (24 miles east of Seville) is one of Spain’s oldest and a gorgeous, refined hub of boutiques, first-rate restaurants and classy hotels. The impressive mosaics and amphitheatre of Italica (Avenida de Extremadura 2, Santiponce, 955 996 583, closed Mon), once the third-largest city in the Roman Empire, are five miles north of Seville. The city rose to prominence during the reign of Hadrian in the second century AD and boasted a population of half a million.

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