Public transport

Barcelona is served by a comprehensive local public transport network that includes a metro, two separate tram networks, a bus network and several funiculars and aerial cable cars. The Barcelona Metro network comprises nine lines, identified by an "L" followed by the line number as well as by individual colours. Most of the network is operated by the Transports Metropolitans de Barcelona (TMB), but three lines inter-run with suburban lines and are operated by the FGC.

The TMB also operates the city's tram networks, known as Trambaix and Trambesòs, and the city's daytime bus network. The night bus network, known as Nitbus, is operated by Mohn SL. Transports Ciutat Comtal, who also operate other tourist oriented services within the city. Other companies operate services that connect the city with towns in the metropolitan area.

The Funicular de Montjuïc, operated by the TMB, climbs the Montjuïc hill. The Funicular de Vallvidrera, operated by the FGC, and the tourist oriented Funicular de Tibidabo both climb the Tibidabo hill. The city also has two cable cars: one to the Montjuïc castle (operated by TMB) and another that runs via Torre Jaume I and Torre Sant Sebastia over the port.

Road

The Estació del Nord (Northern Station), a former train station that was renovated for the 1992 Olympic Games, now serves as the terminus for long-distance and regional bus services.

Barcelona has a metered taxi fleet governed by the Institut Metropolità del Taxi (Metropolitan Taxi Institute), composed of more than 10,000 cars. Most of the licenses are in the hands of self-employed drivers.[37] With their black and yellow livery, Barcelona's taxis are easily spotted.

Rail

Barcelona is a major hub for RENFE, the Spanish state railway network, and its main intercity train station is Sants Estació. The AVE high-speed rail system was recently extended from Madrid to Tarragona in southern Catalonia, and is expected to reach Barcelona by 2007. Renfe cercanías/rodalies and the Ferrocarrils de la Generalitat de Catalunya (FGC) run Barcelona's widespread commuter train service.

Sea

Barcelona's port has a 2000-year history and a great contemporary commercial importance. It is the most important Mediterranean port for general cargo of containers and cruisers. The port is managed by the Port Authority of Barcelona. Its 7.86 km² are divided in three zones: Port Vell (the Old Port), the commercial port and the logistics port. The port is undergoing an enlargement that will double its size thanks to diverting the mouth of the Llobregat river 2 km to the south.

Air

Barcelona is served by Barcelona International Airport in the town of El Prat de Llobregat, about 3 km from Barcelona. It is the second-largest airport in Spain and the largest on the Mediterranean coast. The airport is connected to the city by highway, commuter train and scheduled bus service. The Sabadell Airport is a smaller airport in the nearby town of Sabadell, devoted to pilot training, advertising flights, aerotaxi and private flights. Some low-cost airlines, like Ryanair and Martinair, prefer to use the Girona-Costa Brava Airport, situated about 90 km to the north of Barcelona and the Reus Airport, situated 77 km to the south.

Sports

Barcelona has a long sporting tradition and hosted the successful 1992 Summer Olympics as well as several matches from the 1982 Football World Cup. It has also been host to the X FINA World Championships and, in two occasions, of the Eurobasket.

FC Barcelona is a sports club best known for its football team, one of the biggest in Europe and the 2006 champion of both the Spanish league and the UEFA Champions League. FC Barcelona also has teams in the Spanish basketball ACB league (Winterthur FCB), the handball ASOBAL league (FC Barcelona-Cifec), and the roller hockey league. The basketball team's stadium is the Palau Blaugrana, which is just across from the Nou Camp footbal stadium. It also has amateur teams in several other sports. The club also has a museum, the second most visited museum in Catalonia. RCD Espanyol is the city's other Liga football team and the 2006 holder of the Copa del Rey.

Barcelona has two UEFA 5-star rated football stadiums: FC Barcelona's Nou Camp and the Estadi Olímpic Lluís Companys, used for the 1992 Olympics and the current home of RCD Espanyol, pending completion of the club's new stadium. The Nou Camp is located in the Les Corts section of Barcelona, while Espanyol's Estadi Olímpic Lluís Companys is located in the Sants-Montjuïc part of Barcelona.

The Open Seat Godó, a 50-year-old ATP Tour International Series Gold tennis tournament, is held annually in the facilities of the Reial Club de Tenis Barcelona (Barcelona Royal Tennis Club). Several popular running competitions are organized year-round in Barcelona: Cursa del Corte Inglés (with about 60,000 participants each year), Cursa de la Mercè, Cursa Jean Bouin, Milla Sagrada Família and the San Silvestre. Also, each Christmas, a swimming race across the port is organized. Near Barcelona, in Montmeló, the 131,000 capacity Circuit de Catalunya racetrack hosts the Formula One Spanish Grand Prix and Moto GP races. Barcelona has also become very popular with skateboarders, which has led to a new anti-skateboarding law, which came into effect in 2006.

Music

Barcelona is home to the Sónar Music Festival[34] which takes place around June every year. This is an electronica music festival split into three days with two main events on each day (Sónar By Night and Sónar by Day). Sónar by day is held just off Les Rambles, whereas Sonar by night takes place in a complex just outside the main city.

The Barcelona and Catalonia National Symphonic Orchestra (Orquestra Simfònica de Barcelona i Nacional de Catalunya, usually known as OBC) is the largest symphonic orchestra in Catalonia. Founded in 1944 as Barcelona's Municipal Orchestra, it became the OBC in the 1994–95 season with the participation of the Generalitat de Catalunya. In 1999, the OBC inaugurated its new venue in the brand-new Auditorium (l'Auditori). It performs around 75 concerts per season and its current director is Eiji Oue

Media

El Periódico de Catalunya (Catalan and Spanish editions) and La Vanguardia (Spanish) are Barcelona's two major daily newspapers while Sport and El Mundo Deportivo (both in Spanish) are the city's two major sports daily newspapers, published by the same companies. The city is also served by a number of smaller publications such as Avui and El Punt (both in Catalan), by nation-wide newspapers with special Barcelona editions like El Pais and El Mundo (both in Spanish), and by several free newspapers like Metro, ADN, Que and 20 minutos (bilingual).

Several major FM stations include Catalunya Ràdio, RAC 105 and Cadena SER. Barcelona also has several local TV stations, among them 'www.barcelona.tv' [4], the first internet television in the city, BTV (owned by the city council) and TD8 (owned by the Godó group, that also owns La Vanguardia). The headquarters of Televisió de Catalunya, Catalonia's public network, are located in Sant Joan Despí, in Barcelona's metropolitan area.

World Heritage Sites in Barcelona

UNESCO World Heritage Sites in Barcelona:

Works of Lluís Domènech i Montaner, Palau de la Música Catalana and Hospital de Sant Pau, included in the list in 1997.
Works of Antoni Gaudí, including Park Güell, Palau Güell, Casa Milà, Casa Vicens, Sagrada Família (Nativity façade and crypt), Casa Batlló, Crypt in Colonia Güell. The first three works were inscribed as a World Heritage Site in 1984. The other four were added as extensions to the site in 2005

Architecture

The Barri Gòtic ("Gothic Quarter" in Catalan) is the centre of the old city of Barcelona. Many of the buildings date from Medieval times, some from as far back as the Roman settlement of Barcelona.

Catalan modernisme architecture (often known as Art Nouveau in the rest of Europe), developed between 1885 and 1950 and left an important legacy in Barcelona. A great number of these builidings are World Heritage Sites.

Especially remarkable is the work of architect Antoni Gaudí, which can be seen throughout the city. His best known work is the immense but still unfinished church of the Sagrada Família, which has been under construction since 1882, and is still financed by private donations: as of 2007, completion is planned for 2026. Other examples of his work are the Palau Güell, the Park Güell, the Casa Milà (La Pedrera) and the Casa Batlló.

Another notable architect was Lluís Domènech i Montaner, who designed the Palau de la Música Catalana, the Hospital de Sant Pau and the Casa Lleó Morera. Josep Puig i Cadafalch's well-known Casa Ametller can also be seen on Passeig de Gràcia.

Barcelona won the 1999 RIBA Royal Gold Medal for its architecture, the first (as of 2007, only) time that the winner has been a city, and not an individual architect.

Museums

Barcelona houses a great number of museums, which cover different areas and eras. The City History Museum, situated in a medieval building that used to be a royal residence, explains the story of the city, and includes a visit to the Roman ruins in the museum's basement. It also comprises the Museum-Monastery of Pedralbes, one of the best examples of Catalan Gothic architecture, the Museum-House Verdaguer, dedicated to poet Jacint Verdaguer, the Park Güell Interpretation Center and several other minor sites.[29]

The Museum of the History of Catalonia, open in 1996, covers the story of Catalonia since prehistoric times and administers the monuments that belong to the Generalitat de Catalunya.[30] The Archaeology Museum of Catalonia covers the story of Catalonia up to the Middle Ages, and of the cultures it came it contact with, and also runs several other archaeological sites in Catalonia.[31]

The National Museum of Art of Catalonia possesses a well-known collection of Romanesque art, including wall-paintings from Romanesque churches and chapels around Catalonia that have been transferred to the museum, Gothic art from the thirteenth–fifteenth centuries, Renaissance and Baroque art from the 16th-18th centuries, Modern art from the 19th century and the first decades of the 20th century, as well as the Thyssen-Bornemisza Collection.

The Barcelona Museum of Contemporary Art, usually known as MACBA (acronym of Museu d'Art Contemporani de Barcelona), focuses on post-1945 Catalan and Spanish art, though it also includes foreign works. Adjacent to the MACBA, the Centre de Cultura Contemporània de Barcelona, or CCCB, hosts temporary exhibitions, a cinema, concerts and other cultural events.

The works of Joan Miró are found in the museum of the Fundació Joan Miró, together with guest exhibitions from other museums around the world, while the Picasso Museum features early works by Pablo Picasso and his "Las meninas" series. The Fundació Antoni Tàpies holds a collection of Tàpies works.

The Museu Marítim de Barcelona,[32] founded in 1929, is a nautical museum situated in the historical Barcelona's royal shipyard complex, with the mission to illustrate Catalan seafaring culture and maritime history. Cosmocaixa (formerly the Science Museum) is a science museum run by the La Caixa Foundation that received the European Museum of the Year Award in 2006.

The Erotic museum of Barcelona[33] is the first Museum of erotic art and culture where the visitor can contemplate the development of eroticism through the various artistic and cultural facets of the human being. The Museum's assets consist of more than 800 pieces of great historical value, spanning various cultures' erotic manifestations of both a ritual/religious as well as recreational nature.

Culture

Barcelona's culture is rich, stemming from the city's 2000 years of history. To a greater extent than the rest of Catalonia, where Catalonia's native Catalan is more dominant, Barcelona is a bilingual city: Catalan and Spanish are both official and widely spoken. The Catalan spoken in Barcelona, Central Catalan, is the one closest to standard Catalan. Since the arrival of democracy, the Catalan culture (repressed during the dictatorship) has been promoted, both by recovering works from the past and by stimulating the creation of new works.

Barcelona has a number of theaters, including the world-renowned Gran Teatre del Liceu opera theater, the Teatre Nacional de Catalunya and the Palau de la Música Catalana concert hall. The GREC festival takes place every summer and brings highly renowned performers and companies to Barcelona.

Education

Barcelona, like Spain in general, has a well-developed higher education system of public universities. Most prominent among these is the University of Barcelona, a world-renowned research and teaching institution with campuses around the city. Barcelona is also home to the Technical University of Catalonia, the newer Pompeu Fabra University and, in the private sector, the Ramon Llull University. The Autonomous University of Barcelona, another public university, is located in Bellaterra, a town in the Metropolitan Area.

Districts and neighborhoods

Ciutat Vella ("Old City): El Raval (also known as the Barri Chino), the Barri Gòtic ("Gothic Quarter"), La Barceloneta and the Barri de la Ribera.
Eixample: Sant Antoni, Esquerra de l'Eixample ("the left side of the Eixample" facing away from the sea), Dreta de l'Eixample ("the right side of the Eixample"), Barri de la Sagrada Família, Fort Pienc
Sants–Montjuïc: Poble Sec, La Marina, La Font de La Guatlla, La Bordeta, Hostafrancs, Sants, Badal.
Les Corts: Les Corts, La Maternitat, Pedralbes.
Sarrià-San Gervasi: Tres Torres, Sarrià, Vallvidrera, Bonanova, Sant Gervasi, Putget-Farró, Galvany.
Gràcia: Vallcarca, El Coll, La Salut, Gràcia, El Camp d'en Grassot
Horta-Guinardó: Horta, El Carmel, La Teixonera, El Guinardó (Alt i Baix), La Clota, La Vall D'Hebron, Montbau
Nou Barris: Can Peguera, Porta, Canyelles, Ciutat Meridiana, Guineueta, Prosperitat, Vallbona, Verdum, Vilapicina, Roquetes, Trinitat Vella, Trinitat Nova, Torre Baró, Torre Llobeta and Turó de la Peira.
San Andreu: La Segrera, Trinitat Vella, Bon Pastor, Sant Andreu, Navas, Baró de Viver
San Martí: Diagonal Mar, Fort Pius, San Martí de Provençals, Poble Nou, La Verneda, El Clot

Administrative divisions

Since 1997, the city is divided into 10 administrative districts, each one with its own council directed by a city councillor. The council of each district depends of the number of votes each political party had in that district, so a district can be led by a councillor of a different party than the executive council.

The administrative divisions are based mostly on historical reasons. Several of the city's districts are former towns annexed by the city of Barcelona in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries that still maintain their own distinct character. The official names of these districs are in Catalan language.

Government and administrative divisions

Barcelona is governed by a city council formed by 41 city councillors, elected for a four-year term by universal suffrage. The executive (Comissió de Govern—Government Commission) is formed by 21 councillors, led by the Mayor, with 5 lieutenant-mayors and 15 city councillors, each in charge of an area of government.

The seat of the city council is on the Plaça Sant Jaume, opposite the seat of Generalitat de Catalunya. Since the coming of the Spanish democracy, Barcelona has been governed by the PSC, first with an absolute majority and more recently in coalition with ERC and ICV. The municipal opposition is formed by the CiU and the PP.

The city council has jurisdiction in the fields of city planning, transportation, municipal taxes, public highways security (through the Guardia Urbana or municipal police), city maintenance, gardens, parks and environment, facilities (like schools, nurseries, sports centres, libraries, etc.), culture, sports, youth and social welfare. Some of these competencies are not exclusive, but shared with the Generalitat de Catalunya or the central Spanish government.

Barcelona, as one of the two biggest cities in Spain, is subject to a special law articulated through the Carta Municipal (Municipal Law). A first version of this law was passed in 1960 and amended later, but the current version was approved in March 2006.[27] This law gives the local government a special relationship with the central government and it also gives the mayor wider prerogatives by the means of municipal executive commissions.[28] It expands the powers of the city council in areas like telecommunications, city traffic, road safety and public safety. It also gives a special economic regime to the city's treasury and it gives the council a veto in matters that will be decided by the central government, but that will need a favorable report from the council.[27]

Economy

Barcelona has a long-standing mercantile tradition. Less well known is that it was one of the earliest regions in continental Europe to begin industrialization, beginning with textile related works at the end of the eighteenth century but really gathering momentum in the mid nighteenth century, when it became a major center for the production of textiles and machinery. Since then, manufacturing has played a large role in its history. The traditional importance in textiles is still reflected in Barcelona's importance as a major fashion center. In summer 2006, Barcelona became an host for the prestigious Bread & Butter urban fashion fair.

As in other modern cities, the manufacturing sector has long since been overtaken by the services sector, though it remains important. The most important industries today are textile, chemistry, pharmaceutical, motor, electronic and printing. In the services sector, the most important are the logistics, publishing, telecommunications and computer sectors.

Drawing upon its tradition of creative art and craftsmanship, Barcelona is nowadays also known for its award-winning industrial design. Barcelona also has several congress halls, notably La Fira, that host a quickly growing number of national and international events each year, which had also meant the opening of new hotels each year. The Port of Barcelona is an important Mediterranean port, both for general containers cargo and for cruise ships.

Demographics

According to Barcelona's City Council, Barcelona's population as of 2006-06-01 was 1,673,075 people,[21] while the population of the Metropolitan Area was 3,161,081. The population density was 15,779 people per km²,[22] with Eixample being the most populated district. 62% of the inhabitants were born in Catalonia, with a 23.5% coming from the rest of Spain. Of the 13.9% from other countries, a proportion which has more than tripled since 2001 when it was 3.9%,[14] the majority come from (in order) Ecuador, Peru, Morocco, Colombia, Argentina, Italy, Pakistan and China.[23]

95% of the population understand Catalan, 74.6% can speak it, 75% can read it, and 47.1% can write it.[24] While the vast majority of the population profess to be of the Catholic religion (208 churches), there are also a number of other groups, including various Evangelist (71 locations, mostly professed by Roma), Jehovah's Witnesses (21 Kingdom Halls) and Buddhists (13 locations).[25]

Barcelona's population peaked in 1979 with 1,906,998 people, and descended through the 1980s and 1990s, where more people looked for a higher quality of life in the suburban cities of the Barcelona Metropolitan Area. After it bottomed out in 2000 with 1,496,266 people, it started to increase again when more younger people started to return, causing a great increase in housing prices.[26]

Other

The area around the Plaça Catalunya makes up the city's historical center. This includes Passeig de Gracia, the Rambla de Catalunya, the Barri Gòtic and the upper half of the Avinguda Diagonal, which is the main commercial area of the city.

Barcelona has several skyscrapers, the highest being the Hotel Arts and its twin the Torre Mapfre, both 154 m high. The latest artistic skyscraper is the Torre Agbar, 144 m high.

Beaches

Barcelona has seven beaches, totalling 4.5 km (2.8 mi) of coastline. Sant Sebastià and Barceloneta beaches, both 1100 m in length,[14] are both the largest and the most frequented beaches in Barcelona. The Olympic port separates them from the other city beaches: Nova Icària, Bogatell, Mar Bella and Nova Mar Bella. These beaches (ranging from 400 to 640 m) were opened as a result of the city restructuring to host the 1992 Summer Olympics, when a great number of industrial buildings were demolished. The 2004 Universal Forum of Cultures left the city a sandless bathing zone, a sort of sea pool.

Parks

Barcelona contains 68 municipal parks, divided into 12 historic parks, 5 thematic (botanical) parks, 45 urban parks and 6 forest parks.[18] They range from vest-pocket parks to large recreation areas. The parks cover 10% of the city (549.7 ha),[14] growing about 10 ha per year,[19] with a proportion of 18,1 m² of park area per inhabitant.[20]

Montjuïc Park is the largest, with 203 ha located on the mountain of the same name.[14] It is followed by Ciutadella Park (situated in the place of the old military citadel and which houses the Parliament building, the zoo and several museums; 31 ha including the zoo), the Guinardó Park (19 ha), Park Güell (designed by Antoni Gaudí; 17.2 ha), Oreneta Castle Park (also 17.2 ha), Diagonal Mar Park (13.3 ha, inaugurated in 2002), Nou Barris Central Park (13.2 ha), Can Dragó Sports Park and Poblenou Park (both 11.9 ha) and the Labyrinth Park (9.10 ha), named after the garden maze it contains.[14] A part of the Collserolla Park is also within the city limits.

Climate

Barcelona has a Mediterranean climate, with mild, dry winters and warm, humid summers. January and February are the coldest months, averaging temperatures of 10 °C (50 °F. Snowfalls are so rare that they are remembered as special events by people. July and August are the hottest months, averaging temperatures of 25 °C (77 °F). The highest recorded maximum temperature in the city itself is 38.6 °C (101.5 °F) on 2003-08-13.[16] At the Fabra Observatory, situated on the Tibidabo hill, the record is 39.8 °C (103.6 °F) in 1982.[17]

Geography

Barcelona is located on the northeast coast of the Iberian Peninsula, facing the Mediterranean sea, on a plateau approximately 5 km wide limited by the mountain range of Collserola, the Llobregat river to the south-west and the Besòs river to the north. It is 160 km (100 mi) south of the Pyrenees and the Catalonian border with France. It has an area of 101 km² (38.9 mi²).[14]

Collserola, part of the coastal mountain range, shelters the city to the north-west. Its highest point, the peak of Tibidabo, 512 m high, offers striking views over the city[15] and is topped by the 288.4 m Torre de Collserola, a telecommunications tower that is visible from most of the city. Barcelona is peppered with small hills, most of them urbanized and that gave name to the neighborhoods built upon them, such as Carmel (267 m), Putxet (181 m) and Rovira (261 m). The escarpment of Montjuïc (173 m), situated to the southeast, overlooks the harbour and is topped by Montjuïc castle, a fortress built in the 17–18th centuries to control the city as a replacement for the Ciutadella. Today, the fortress is a museum and Montjuic is home to several sporting and cultural venues, as well as Barcelona's biggest park and gardens.

The city borders the municipalities of Santa Coloma de Gramenet and Sant Adrià de Besòs to the north; L'Hospitalet de Llobregat and Esplugues de Llobregat to the south; the Mediterranean Sea to the east; and Montcada i Reixac and Sant Cugat del Vallès to the west.

19th century to present day

During the nineteenth century, Barcelona grew with the industrial revolution and the introduction of many new industries. During a period of weaker control by the Madrid authorities, the medieval walls were torn down and the citadel of La Ribera was converted into an urban park: the modern Parc de la Ciutadella, site of the 1888 Universal Exposition. The exposition also left behind the Arc de Triomf and the Museu de Zoologia (a building originally used during the fair as a cafe-restaurant). The fields that had surrounded the artificially constricted city became the Eixample ("extension"), a bustling modern city surrounding the old.

The beginning of the twentieth century marked Barcelona's resurgence, while Catalan nationalists clamoured for political autonomy and greater freedom of cultural expression.

Barcelona was a stronghold for the anarchist cause—anarchist opposition to the call-up of reservists to fight in Morocco was one of the factors that led to the city's "tragic Week" in 1909. Barcelona sided with the Republican government during the Spanish Civil War (1936–39). Finally, on 1939-04-01 the last reducts of republican forces in the Spanish Maquis were overrun by nationalist forces, which ushered in a reign of cultural and political repression that lasted more than three decades.

The protest movement of the 1970s and the death of Franco in 1975 turned Barcelona into a centre of cultural vitality. A decline in the inner city population and displacement towards the outskirts and beyond currently raises the threat of urban sprawl.

Barcelona underwent a massive and lasting transformation as a result of hosting the 1992 Summer Olympics. As well as proving a major catalyst to a stalling urban regeneration scheme[11] the Games led directly to the construction of the Palau Sant Jordi (by architect Arata Isozaki), the Torre de Collserola communication tower (Norman Foster), Torre de Montjuic (Santiago Calatrava) and ultimately a large-scale remodeling of the El Prat Airport (Ricardo Bofill). Entire beaches were created from nothing, the sewage system overhauled and the transport network updated. According to the city's chief architect, Jose Antonio Acebillo, "twenty-five years' worth of infrastructure upgrades were crammed into five years."[12] It sparked an economic boom in the city which has barely abated since, with tourist industry alone now five times bigger than it was prior to 1992.[13] To date, the largest event held in the city since has been the 2004 Universal Forum of Cultures, held between May and September and lasting a marathon 141 days.

17th & 18th centuries

The city was devastated after the Catalonian Republic of 1640–1652, and again during the War of the Spanish Succession in 1714. King Philip V of Spain demolished half of the merchants' quarter (La Ribera) to build a military citadel , the Ciutadella, as a way of both punishing and controlling the rebel city.

Official use of the Catalan language was suppressed, traditional Catalan institutions were abolished, and the university withdrew.

Barcelona and the province of Catalonia were annexed by the French Empire of Napoleon after he invaded Spain and put his brother Joseph on the Spanish throne. It was returned to Spain after Napoleon's downfall.

History

The foundation of Barcelona is the subject of two different legends. The first attributes the founding of the city to Hercules 400 years before the building of Rome, and that it was rebuilt by the Carthaginian Hamilcar Barca, father of Hannibal, who named the city Barcino after his family, in the 3rd century BC. The second legend attributes the foundation directly to Hamilcar Barca.[4]

About 15 BC, the Romans redrew the town as a castrum (Roman military camp) centered on the "Mons Taber", a little hill nearby the contemporary city hall (Plaça de Sant Jaume). Under the Romans it was a colony, with the surname of Faventia,[5] or, in full, Colonia Faventia Julia Augusta Pia Barcino[6] or Colonia Julia Augusta Faventia Paterna Barcino. Mela[7] mentions it among the small towns of the district, probably as it was eclipsed by its neighbor Tarraco (modern Tarragona); but it may be gathered from later writers that it gradually grew in wealth and consequence, favoured as it was with a beautiful situation and an excellent harbour.[8] It enjoyed immunity from imperial burdens.[9] The city minted its own coins; some from the era of Galba survive.

Some important Roman remains are exposed under the Plaça del Rei, entrance by the city museum (Museu d'Història de la Ciutat), and the typically Roman grid-planning is still visible today in the layout of the historical center, the Barri Gòtic ("Gothic Quarter"). Some remaining fragments of the Roman walls have been incorporated in the cathedral butted up against them;[10] the basilica La Seu is said to have been founded in 343. The city was conquered by the Visigoths in the early fifth century, by the Moors in the early eighth century, reconquered from the emir in 801 by Charlemagne's son Louis who made Barcelona the seat of Carolingian "Spanish Marches" (Marca Hispanica), a buffer zone ruled by the Count of Barcelona. Barcelona was still a Christian frontier territory when it was sacked by Al-Mansur in 985.

The Counts of Barcelona became increasingly independent and expanded their territory to include all of Catalonia, later formed the Crown of Aragon who conquered many overseas possessions, ruling the western Mediterranean Sea with outlying territories as far as Athens in the thirteenth century. The forging of a dynastic link between the Crowns of Aragon and Castile marked the beginning of Barcelona's decline.

Names

The name Barcelona comes from the ancient Levantine Iberian Barkeno; Greek: Βαρκινών[1]; Latin: Barcino, Barcelo,[2] and Barceno[3].

During the Middle Ages the city was variously known as Barchinona, Barçalona, Barchelona and Barchenona.

Barcelona

Barcelona (Catalan IPA: [bəɾsəˈlonə], Spanish IPA: [baɾθeˈlona]) is the capital of Catalonia, Spain and is the second largest city in Spain after Madrid, the national capital. It is located on the Mediterranean coast (41°23′N 2°11′E) between the mouths of the rivers Llobregat and Besòs, limited to the west by the Serra de Collserola ridge (512 m).

It is a major economic centre, with one of Spain's principal Mediterranean ports and its second largest airport, and also a cultural and tourist attraction. The architectural works of Antoni Gaudí and Lluís Domènech i Montaner are particularly renowned, and have been inscribed on the list of UNESCO World Heritage Sites.

As the capital of Catalonia, Barcelona houses the seat of the Catalan autonomous government, known as the Generalitat de Catalunya, notably its executive branch, the Parliament and the Supreme Court of Catalonia. It is also the capital of the province of Barcelona and of the comarca of the Barcelonès.