The town has its origins in Phoenician, Roman and Arab civilisations.
The foothills of the mountain range behind the town to the south are the site of Sohail Castle, which contains remains of an early Phoenician settlement, later occupied by the Romans, which became a town known in antiquity as Suel. Suel was identified by the Roman historian, Pomponius Mela, as one of the towns of the coast, and was cited by Pliny in the 1st century AD as a fortified town or oppidum. A later historian,Ptolemy, identified it during the 2nd century as being located in the region of the bastulo-penos or Phoenicians.
The inscription on the pedestal of a statue found near the castle mentions Suel as being a Roman "municipium". A funeral urn found in the same area has an inscription containing the word "Suelitana". Roman baths were discovered in 1961 and, close by, the remains of a Roman villa containing two sculptures, one of which is the well known "Venus of Fuengirola" exhibited in the town's museum. A series of architectural components, probably transported from the Mijas quarry during the Roman era, were discovered in Los Boliches in 1984; these have now been mounted to form a temple entrance, and can be seen on the promenade at Los Boliches.
The castle was built by Abd-ar-Rahman IIIin the mid-10th century. The city of Suel ceased to be mentioned at the beginning of the Middle Ages. After several centuries, the name of the settlement changed from Suel to Suhayl, which became the name of the castle and surroundings during the Moorish era. Suhayl became a fairly large settlement, which included farmland and small villages. Most of the surrounding area seems to have been used as pasture for the Moorish rulers' camels. One of the most famous people from Fuengirola from this period is the famous writer and scholar Al-Suhayli (literally the man from Suhayl) who lived from 1114 to 1185 and is now especially well known as one of its seven saints of Marrakesh, where he
