Voted for by the travel website’s clients, in fourth place the Moorish hilltop white village of Vejer de la Frontera charmed visitors with its crooked streets and secret flower-filled patios.

Set in a fertile green valley surrounded by the orchards of Cadiz, this best-kept village has been declared a historical-artistic complex.

Carmona near Sevilla, whose stunning Roman necropolis is one of the best-preserved in Europe, came sixth on the shortlist of 20.

The village is loved for its impressive castle and Roman and Arab remains and lives up to the motto bestowed on it by King Ferdinand when he recaptured it from the Moors in 1247: ‘As the morning star shines in the dawn, so shines Carmona in Andalucia’.

The list was topped by the obscure hamlet of Robledillo de Gata in the Sierra de Gata mountain range near Casares. Chelva in Valencia came second, followed by Ribadesella, Asturias (3rd), Valderrobres, Teruel (5th) and Najera, La Rioja (7th).