Istán is a village in Málaga

Málaga

Málaga is a city and a municipality in the Autonomous Community of Andalusia, Spain. With a population of 568,507 in 2010, it is the second most populous city of Andalusia and the sixth largest in Spain. This is the southernmost large city in Europe...

 province, Andalusia

Andalusia

Andalusia is the most populous and the second largest in area of the autonomous communities of Spain. The Andalusian autonomous community is officially recognised as a nationality of Spain. The territory is divided into eight provinces: Huelva, Seville, Cádiz, Córdoba, Málaga, Jaén, Granada and...

, Southern Spain

Spain

Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...

, with an estimated population in 2005 of 1,422. It lies beneath the Sierra Blanca

Sierra Blanca

Sierra Blanca is a range of volcanic mountains in Lincoln and Otero counties of south-central New Mexico. The range is about from north to south and wide, and is dominated by Sierra Blanca Peak, whose highest point is at...

 in the valley of the Rio Verde about 15 km from Marbella

Marbella

Marbella is a town in Andalusia, Spain. It is situated on the Mediterranean Sea, in the province of Málaga, beneath the La Concha mountain. In 2000 the city had 98,823 inhabitants, in 2004, 116,234, in 2010 approximately 135,000....

 and the Mediterranean coast. It is also near the large reservoir created by the Presa de la Concepción dam, built in 1972 to provide drinking water to towns all along the Costa del Sol

Costa del Sol

The Costa del Sol is a region in the south of Spain, in the autonomous community of Andalusia, comprising the coastal towns and communities along the Mediterranean coastline of the Málaga province. The Costa del Sol is situated between two lesser known costas: Costa de la Luz and Costa Tropical...

.

History

It was originally a Moorish settlement and as with its near neighbour Ojen

Ojen

Ojen is a town which sits in the mountains behind Marbella in Andalusia, Southern Spain.Its name is oddly derived from an Arabic word, hoxán, meaning "rough" or "bitter" place, and therefore curious that the Moors should establish a settlement in a place they presumably did not care for...

, survived where others didn't largely because it was away from the coast. After the Reconquest, Moors were not allowed to live near the coast so as to be unable to communicate easily with their kinsmen in nearby North Africa

North Africa

North Africa or Northern Africa is the northernmost region of the African continent, linked by the Sahara to Sub-Saharan Africa. Geopolitically, the United Nations definition of Northern Africa includes eight countries or territories; Algeria, Egypt, Libya, Morocco, South Sudan, Sudan, Tunisia, and...

.

Sources and references

• http://www.juntadeandalucia.es/iea/sima/htm/sm29061.htm