Barbastro

Last updated
Barbastro
Barbastro-Vero.jpg
Blason de Balbastro.svg
Spain location map with provinces.svg
Red pog.svg
Barbastro
Location in Spain
Coordinates: 42°2′10″N0°7′35″E / 42.03611°N 0.12639°E / 42.03611; 0.12639
CountrySpain
Autonomous community Aragon
Province Huesca
Comarca Somontano de Barbastro
Judicial district Barbastro
Government
  MayorFernando Torres Chavarría (PP)
Area
  Total
107.60 km2 (41.54 sq mi)
Elevation
341 m (1,119 ft)
Population
 (2018) [1]
  Total
16,944
  Density160/km2 (410/sq mi)
Demonym Barbastrenses
Time zone UTC+1 (CET)
  Summer (DST) UTC+2 (CEST)
Postal code
22300
Website Official website

Barbastro (Latin: Barbastrum or Civitas Barbastrensis, Aragonese: Balbastro) is a city in the Somontano county, province of Huesca, Spain. The city (also known originally as Barbastra or Bergiduna) is at the junction of the rivers Cinca and Vero.

Contents

History

An ancient Celtiberian city called Bergidum or Bergiduna, in Roman times Barbastro (now called Brutina) was included in the Hispania Citerior region, and later of Hispania Tarraconensis.

After the fall of the Western Roman Empire, it was part of the Visigoth kingdom. Barbastro and the Barbitaniya area were overtaken by Musa bin Nusair in 717, as part of the Umayyad push to conquer northern states of the Marca Hispanica and the name Madyar was given to the town.

It was later settled by the Banu Jalaf who made it the capital of the Emirate of Barbineta and Huesca until 862, and was known as the Emirate of Brabstra until 882.

In 1064, Sancho Ramírez, King of Aragón, and his Frankish Christian forces, led by William VIII of Aquitaine and Le Bon Normand, invaded the city, which at the time was part of the emirate of Zaragoza. This attack was known as the Siege of Barbastro. Contemporary sources state that 50,000 people were killed or captured in the attack, but modern historians view this as an exaggeration since the whole population of the town probably did not exceed 8,000. [2] [3] The following year, however, it was reconquered by the Moors. In 1101 it was captured permanently by Peter I of Aragon, who made it a bishopric seat. Barbastro since then has followed the history of Aragon and Spain.

In the Middle Ages, a Sephardic Jewish community thrived in Barbastro, suffering little compared to other Jewish populations in Spain. The first written record of a Jewish presence dates to 1144. After the Disputation of Tortosa, the Jewish community ceased to exist because they had all become conversos. The old synagogue, however, became a center for converso life. [4]

During the Spanish Civil War 51 Catholic Claretians were executed in Barbastro by militia of the Popular Front. Numerous socialist, republican and communist activists were jailed and executed in the following years after the end of the Spanish Civil War.

Barbastro's economy flourished until the early 20th century, when a period of decline began, ending only in the 1960s due to the growth of agricultural production.

Notable residents

Twin towns

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Huesca</span> Municipality in Aragon, Spain

Huesca is a city in north-eastern Spain, within the autonomous community of Aragon. It was the capital of the Kingdom of Aragon between 1096 and 1118. It is also the capital of the Spanish province of the same name and of the comarca of Hoya de Huesca. In 2009, it had a population of 52,059, almost a quarter of the total population of the province. The city is one of the smallest provincial capitals in Spain.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Peter I of Aragon and Pamplona</span> King of Aragon and Pamplona from 1094 to 1104

Peter I was King of Aragon and also Pamplona from 1094 until his death in 1104. Peter was the eldest son of Sancho Ramírez, from whom he inherited the crowns of Aragon and Pamplona, and Isabella of Urgell. He was named in honour of Saint Peter, because of his father's special devotion to the Holy See, to which he had made his kingdom a vassal. Peter continued his father's close alliance with the Church and pursued his military thrust south against bordering Al-Andalus taifas with great success, allying with Rodrigo Díaz de Vivar, known as El Cid, the ruler of Valencia, against the Almoravids. According to the medieval Annales Compostellani Peter was "expert in war and daring in initiative", and one modern historian has remarked that "his grasp of the possibilities inherent in the age seems to have been faultless."

<i>Marrano</i> Jews from the Iberian Peninsula forcibly converted to Catholicism

Marranos is a term for Spanish and Portuguese Jews who converted to Christianity, either voluntarily or by Spanish or Portuguese royal coercion, during the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, but who continued to practice Judaism in secrecy or were suspected of it. They are also called crypto-Jews, the term increasingly preferred in scholarly works over Marranos.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Pedro de Arbués</span> Spanish canon regular and inquisitor

Pedro de Arbués, also known as Peter of Arbués was a Spanish Roman Catholic priest and a professed Augustinian canon. He served as an official of the Spanish Inquisition until he was assassinated in the La Seo Cathedral in Zaragoza in 1485 by Jews and conversos. The veneration of him came swiftly through popular acclaim. His death greatly assisted the Inquisitor-General Tomás de Torquemada's campaign against heretics and crypto-Jews. His canonization was celebrated on 29 June 1867.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">La Franja</span> Catalan-speaking part of Aragon, Spain

La Franja is the area of Catalan-speaking territories of eastern Aragon bordering Catalonia, in Spain. It literally means "the strip" and can also more properly be called Franja d'Aragó, Franja de Ponent or Franja Oriental d'Aragó in Catalan.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Alhambra Decree</span> 1492 decree expelling Jews from Spain

The Alhambra Decree was an edict issued on 31 March 1492, by the joint Catholic Monarchs of Spain ordering the expulsion of practising Jews from the Crowns of Castile and Aragon and its territories and possessions by 31 July of that year. The primary purpose was to eliminate the influence of practising Jews on Spain's large formerly-Jewish converso New Christian population, to ensure the latter and their descendants did not revert to Judaism. Over half of Spain's Jews had converted as a result of the religious persecution and pogroms which occurred in 1391. Due to continuing attacks, around 50,000 more had converted by 1415. A further number of those remaining chose to convert to avoid expulsion. As a result of the Alhambra decree and persecution in the years leading up to the expulsion of Spain's estimated 300,000 Jewish origin population, a total of over 200,000 had converted to Roman Catholicism in order to remain in Spain, and between 40,000 and 100,000 remained Jewish and suffered expulsion. An unknown number of the expelled eventually succumbed to the pressures of life in exile away from formerly-Jewish relatives and networks back in Spain, and so converted to Roman Catholicism to be allowed to return in the years following expulsion.:17

<span class="mw-page-title-main">History of the Jews in Spain</span>

The history of the Jews in the current-day Spanish territory stretches back to Biblical times according to Jewish tradition, but the settlement of organised Jewish communities in the Iberian Peninsula possibly traces back to the times after the destruction of the Second Temple in 70 CE. The earliest archaeological evidence of Hebrew presence in Iberia consists of a 2nd-century gravestone found in Mérida. From the late 6th century onward, following the Visigothic monarchs' conversion from Arianism to the Nicene Creed, conditions for Jews in Iberia considerably worsened.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Roman Catholic Diocese of Jaca</span> Roman Catholic diocese in Spain

The Diocese of Jaca is a Latin ecclesiastical territory or diocese of the Catholic Church in the northeastern Spanish province of Huesca, part of the autonomous community of Aragón. The diocese is a suffragan in the ecclesiastical province of the metropolitan Archdiocese of Pamplona y Tudela.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Roman Catholic Diocese of Huesca</span> Latin Catholic ecclesiastical territory in Spain

The Diocese of Huesca is a Latin Church ecclesiastical territory or diocese of the Catholic Church located in north-eastern Spain, in the province of Huesca, part of the autonomous community of Aragón. The Diocese of Huesca is a suffragan diocese in the ecclesiastical province of the metropolitan Archdiocese of Zaragoza.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Zaragoza</span> Roman catholic archdiocese in Spain

The Archdiocese of Saragossa is a Latin diocese of the Catholic Church located in north-eastern Spain, in the province of Zaragoza, part of the autonomous community of Aragón. The archdiocese heads the ecclesiastical province of Saragossa, having metropolitan authority over the suffragan dioceses of Barbastro-Monzón, Huesca, Tarazona, and Teruel and Albarracín.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Roman Catholic Diocese of Barbastro-Monzón</span> Roman Catholic diocese in Spain

The Diocese of Barbastro-Monzón is a Latin diocese of the Catholic Church located in north-eastern Spain, in the province of Huesca, part of the autonomous community of Aragón. The diocese forms part of the ecclesiastical province of Zaragoza (province), and is thus suffragan to the Archdiocese of Zaragoza.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Roman Catholic Diocese of Lleida</span> Roman Catholic diocese in Spain

The Diocese of Lleida, or Diocese of Lerida is a Latin Church diocese of the Catholic Church located in north-eastern Spain, in the province of Lleida, part of the autonomous community of Catalonia. The diocese forms part of the ecclesiastical province of Tarragona, and is thus suffragan to the Archdiocese of Tarragona.

The crusade of Barbastro was an international expedition, sanctioned by Pope Alexander II, to take the Spanish city of Barbastro, then part of the Hudid Emirate of Lārida. A large army composed of elements from all over Western Europe took part in the siege and conquest of the city (1064). The nature of the expedition, famously described by Ramón Menéndez Pidal as "a crusade before the crusades", is discussed in historiography, and the crusading element of the campaign is still a moot point.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ermengol III</span> 11th-century Catalonian nobleman

Ermengol or Armengol III, called el de Barbastro, was the Count of Urgell from 1038 to his death. He was the son of Ermengol II, Count of Urgell and his wife Velasquita "Constança", probably the daughter of Bernard I, Count of Besalú.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Damián Iguacén Borau</span> Spanish Catholic bishop (1916–2020)

Damián Iguacén Borau was a Spanish bishop of the Roman Catholic Church.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Barbastro Cathedral</span> Catholic Cathedral in Barbastro, Spain

The Cathedral of Barbastro is a Roman Catholic cathedral in the town of Barbastro in the province of Huesca, Aragon, Spain.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Monzón Cathedral</span>

The Cathedral of Monzón is a Roman Catholic church located in the town of Monzón in the province of Huesca, autonomous community of Aragon, Spain.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Upper March</span> Historic name for a region of northern Spain

The Upper March was an administrative and military division in northeast Al-Andalus, roughly corresponding to the Ebro valley and adjacent Mediterranean coast, from the 8th century to the early 11th century. It was established as a frontier province, or march, of the Emirate, later Caliphate of Córdoba, facing the Christian lands of the Carolingian Empire's Marca Hispanica, the Asturo-Leonese marches of Castile and Álava, and the nascent autonomous Pyrenean principalities. In 1018, the decline of the central Cordoban state allowed the lords of the Upper March to establish in its place the Taifa of Zaragoza.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Massacre of 1391</span> Antisemitic violence in the Iberian Peninsula peaking in 1391 massacre

The Massacre of 1391, also known as the pogroms of 1391, refers to a murderous wave of mass violence committed against the Jews of Spain by the Catholic populace in the kingdoms of Castile and Aragon, both in present-day Spain, in the year 1391, during the regency period between the reigns of John I of Castile and his successor, Henry III of Castile. It was one of the most lethal outbreaks of violence against Jews in medieval European history. Anti-Jewish violence similar to Russian pogroms then continued throughout the "Reconquista", culminating in the 1492 expulsion of the Jews from Spain. The first wave in 1391, however, marked the extreme of such violence.

References

  1. Municipal Register of Spain 2018. National Statistics Institute.
  2. Ibn Hayyan (1981). "La Cruzada contra Barbastro (1064)". In Ubieto Arteta, Antonio (ed.). Historia de Aragón: La formación territorial. Anubar Ediciones. pp. 53–67. ISBN   8470131818.
  3. Philippe Sénac (2003). "Un château en Espagne: notes sur la prise de Barbastro (1064)". Études d’histoire médiévale offertes à Pierre Toubert par ses élèves. p. 548.
  4. "Barbastro, Spain". Jewish Virtual Library. Retrieved 25 June 2024.

Sources