History of Spain

The history of Spain encompasses the period from the first prehistoric human colonization of the Iberian Peninsula to the present day. The formation of the Spanish State began at the end of the Middle Ages with the union or invasion (in the case of Navarra and Granada) of the kingdoms that would end up forming Castilla, León, Aragón, Navarra and Granada.

Introduction

The first hominids arrived in the territory of present-day Spain approximately 1.2 million years ago. Several species followed one another, such as Homo antecessor, the pre-Neanderthals of Sima de los Huesos (originally identified as Homo heidelbergensis) and the Neanderthals (Homo neanderthalensis), until about 35,000 years ago when modern humans (Homo sapiens) entered the Iberian Peninsula and gradually displaced the latter, with whom they would still coexist for nearly 10,000 years. About 27,000 years ago, the last Neanderthal populations in the south became extinct. During the following millennia the territory was a place of settlement for Iberian, Celtic, Phoenician, Carthaginian and Greek peoples and around 200 B.C. C. the peninsula began to form part of the Roman Republic, constituting the Roman Hispania. After the fall of Rome, the Visigothic Kingdom was established. This Visigothic monarchy began in the V century and lasted until the beginning of the VIII. In the year 711 the first Muslim conquest from North Africa took place; Within a few years, Islam dominated a large part of the Iberian Peninsula. For the next 750 years, the Muslim-dominated kingdom would be known as al-Andalus, and while much of the rest of Europe remained in the dark ages, Al-Andalus experienced a multicultural, scientific, and artistic flourishing.

Gradually, the Reconquest took place, and the Christian kingdoms progressively seized the territory from the Muslims. Beginning in about 722 with the rebellion of Don Pelayo and starting from the north, it progressed over the VIII to XV culminating in the conquest of Granada in 1492. During this period the Christian kingdoms developed remarkably; the union of the two most important, Castile and Aragon, by the marriage in 1469 of the Catholic Monarchs, Isabella I of Castile and Fernando II of Aragon, would make possible the unification of Spain and the end of the Reconquest.

In 1492 the Catholic Monarchs financed the project of the navigator Christopher Columbus in search of a new trade route with Asia through the Atlantic Ocean, and they would proclaim the expulsion of the Jews. The arrival in the New World and the subsequent conquest of America forged the creation of the Spanish Empire. During the following centuries, Spain would rise as the main actor in the Western world and the leading power of the time. During the 16th and 17th centuries" The period of greatest heyday of Hispanic culture and arts, known as the Golden Age, would also take place.

The Spanish Empire in 1580, after the unification of the Iberian Peninsula under a single Spanish king, Philip II, comprised South America, Central America and the Caribbean, large areas of North America in varying degrees of influence or control, the Philippine islands in Asia, as well as enclaves of varying importance on the coasts of Africa and India. It also included numerous possessions in Europe, the Spanish Netherlands, the Duchy of Milan or the Kingdom of Naples, most of them lost after the peace of Utrecht in 1713.

On May 3, 1808 in Madrid, painting of Goya, showing the shootings of the Spanish resistance at the hands of the troops of Napoleon.

Catholic and imperial Spain was involved during this period in numerous conflicts especially against the Ottoman Empire, the Netherlands, the Protestants, England and France. With the death of Carlos II in 1700, the house of Austria became extinct to make way for that of the Bourbons after the war of the Spanish succession. Spain was progressively losing its military preponderance and after successive crises the country gradually reduced its power; by the early 19th century it had already become a second-rate power.

Napoleon Bonaparte's First French Empire invades the peninsula; months later, on May 2, 1808, the popular uprising that would lead to the Spanish War of Independence began. As the main consequence of the war and after the expulsion of the French in 1814, Spain suffered the Spanish-American wars of independence. The century continued to be characterized in the metropolis by political instability and the struggle between liberals and supporters of the Old Regime. Between 1873 and 1874 the First Republic took place. The arrival of the Industrial Revolution and the Canovista system at the end of the century raised the standard of living of a middle class that was beginning to consolidate in the main urban centers; however, the Spanish-American war or "disaster of 98" meant the loss of most of the last colonies of the former empire (such as the Philippines, Cuba and Puerto Rico), thus generating a profound shock in Spanish society.

As living standards and integration with the rest of Europe progressed, political instability marked the first third of the 20th century. When the victory in the main cities of the republican candidacies was known in the municipal elections, on April 14, 1931 the Second Republic was proclaimed, King Alfonso XIII abandoning the country, in order to avoid a civil war, which would last five years. later, in 1936, with the Coup d'état of July 1936. The Spanish civil war would end in 1939 with the victory of the Francoist side. Spain was officially neutral during World War II; After the war, a period marked by scarcity and international isolation, followed a period of strong economic development and a certain openness during the 1960s and 1970s.

After the death of the dictator Franco, the Spanish monarchy was recovered in the figure of the head of state, King Juan Carlos I, and the 1978 Constitution was approved during the period known as transition, which guaranteed a gradual evolution of the nation towards the consolidation of the parliamentary democratic monarchy. Spain joined the European Economic Community, currently the European Union, in 1986, organizing important international events such as the 1982 Soccer World Cup or the 1992 Barcelona Olympic Games, and in 2002 it would adopt the euro as its official currency.

From Hispania to Spain

Historical and geographical map of the kingdoms of Spain and Portugal, in the Atlas historique of Henri Abraham Chatelain (1705-1739). National Library of Spain.

The exact historical moment in which Spain is referred to for the first time is not clearly defined, there being writings from the VI century in which the word Spain already appears, such as the «Laus Spaniae» of the History of the Gothic, Vandal and Swabian Kings by San Isidoro de Sevilla. In Other European countries began to know the group of Christian kingdoms of the peninsula as Spain, in the singular, from very early times. The Spanish term itself appears documented at the beginning of the XV century at the Council of Constance, when the kingdoms of Portugal, Aragon, Castile and Navarra appear forming a single entity, "the Spanish nation" and sharing the same vote.

In the Iberian Peninsula, the kingdoms of León, Navarra, Castilla, Aragón and Portugal would be referred to as Hispanic kingdoms, of Hispania (Spain in Latin) therefore; and when for dynastic reasons or conquest one of them managed to having under his scepter most of Christian Spain, he called himself emperor of Spain, like Alfonso VI and Alfonso VII of León. The Catholic Monarchs were known as kings of Spain (or of the Spains). The historian Hernando del Pulgar comments how in 1479 the Royal Council considered whether to designate the Catholic Kings as Kings of Spain; finally it was agreed not to use said title. In 1493 the municipal government of Barcelona referred to Don Ferdinand as the "king of Spain, nostre senyor". Nicholas Machiavelli in his most recognized work The Prince (1513) refers to the king of Spain, just as Lope de Vega cites Carlos I as king of Spain.

From Carlos I, all kings are called King of Spain (or of the Spains), although they use all their titles, from King of Castile to Lord of Vizcaya and of Molina. Until the 19th century, Spanish coins used to bear the legend «Hispaniarum» next to the name of the king. (et Indiarum) Rex». Likewise, monarchs such as Ferdinand VII of Spain and Isabella II of Spain used the title of king or queen of Spain in constitutional references.

Prehistory

Homo heidelbergensis: skull n.o 5 of the Sima of the bones of the Sierra de Atapuerca, of about 500 000 to 350 000 years old, the so-called "Miguelon".

The presence of hominins in the Iberian Peninsula dates back at least 1.3 or 1.2 million years, dating of the jaw found in the Sima del elefante, one of the sites in the Sierra de Atapuerca (province of Burgos). It corresponds to a Homo still to be determined, close to the most primitive African Homo and Dmanisi man but with some characteristics derived from it. The site would also be from this age with a lithic industry typical of the Archaic Lower Paleolithic (Pre-Acheulean) of Fuente Nueva 3, in the Guadix-Baza basin (Granada province).

The remains of the Gran Dolina site, also in Atapuerca, date from around 900,000 years ago, defining a key species for understanding human evolution, named Homo antecessor. The following This discovery, dated to around 430,000 years, is the huge amount of remains of Homo heidelbergensis (precursor species of Homo neanderthalensis ) found in the chasm of the Bones of Atapuerca, site that has provided, among an exceptional bone variety, numerous very well preserved skulls. There are numerous sites with Acheulean lithic industry from this period in the peninsula, such as those of Torralba and Ambrona (province of Soria) or those of the terraces del Manzanares (Madrid province).^{[citation required]}

The presence of the Neanderthal man, associated with the Mousterian culture, dates back about 60,000 years to his first remains in Gibraltar. In the Cueva de Nerja (Málaga), some organic remains associated with paintings of seals have been dated to 42,000 years old, which could be the first known work of art in the history of humanity.

The arrival to the peninsula of Homo sapiens, the "modern" man, is located in the Upper Paleolithic around 35,000 years ago, manifested by the remains of the Gravettian culture found in Cantabria. They cohabited the peninsula for several thousand years with the Neanderthals, until the extinction of the last Neanderthal populations in the south about 27,000 years ago. About 16,000 years ago, the Magdalenian culture was present in Asturias, Cantabria and part of the country Basque, whose most notable contribution is represented by the cave paintings of the Cuevas de Altamira.

Rock art developed in two stylistically and chronologically distinct areas: Franco-Cantabrian art and Levantine art.

The Neolithic revolution, which diffusionist theory understands as a cultural diffusion from its beginning in the Fertile Crescent of the Near East, supported by the simultaneous diffusion of cardial ceramics, reached the Mediterranean coast around 6000 BC. C., causing the abandonment of the traditional hunter-gatherer way of life for a sedentary lifestyle, focused on agriculture and livestock, extended to the rest of the peninsula during the following two millennia. Around 5000 B.C. C. the megalithic culture appears in the western third of the peninsula.

Cultures that used metals (Metal Age) appeared in the Iberian Peninsula around 3000 to 2500 BC. C. Its geographical distribution is greater and it is considered that the search for metals brought important migratory flows, highlighting Los Millares in Almería, with a large fortification, and in the course of the Tagus river in the current Portuguese area.

Old Age

Indigenous peoples and historical colonizations

Lady of ElcheIbera sculpture. Museo Arqueológico Nacional de España (Madrid).

The Iron Age began in the Iberian Peninsula with the penetration of the Indo-European population and cultural influence from the beginning of the I millennium BC. c.; determining the Celtic ethnic and linguistic identity of most of the indigenous peoples of the north, west and central areas, with some exceptions: Lusitanos and Vetones, also Indo-Europeans, are described as "pre-Celtic", while the Vascones are described as " pre-Indo-Europeans." Despite the similarity of their way of life to that of other peoples in the northern zone (Galaic, Asturian and Cantabrian), their language (the "protoeuskera") is supposed to be similar to those spoken in the eastern part of the peninsula; those of the group of towns called Iberians, with the greatest economic development. The classical sources called the group of peoples located in an intermediate position (geographically) Celtiberians.

The southern peninsular coast and the Tartessian area (centered in the Guadalquivir valley -the Turdetania- and with projection to very distant areas, from the mouth of the Tagus to that of the Segura), the richer in metals and more economically and socially developed (a true civilization), it was profoundly influenced by the Phoenician colonization. The mythical foundation of Gadir (Cádiz) dates back to 1104 BC. C., although there is no archaeological basis to support such a chronology until several centuries later. In the 8th century B.C. C. there is already evidence of the presence of an abundant group of Phoenician factories and colonies, such as Malaka (Málaga), Sexi (Almuñécar) and Abdera (Adra).

Greek colonies settled further north, in Akra Leuké (Alicante), Hemeroskopion (Denia), Emporion (Ampurias) and Rhodes (Roses). Their contact with the Iberians made them give the first written references to these towns. The same Greek sources indicate that the Greek navigators had established contacts with the "kingdom" of Tartessos and with its "king" Argantonius, who would have given them enough silver to build walls against Persian attacks. Such contacts did not bear fruit, precisely because of the Phoenician control of this route, and it has not been possible to verify archaeologically the Greek presence on the Mediterranean coast of Malaga, in a colony that would have carried the name of Mainake.

Carthaginian Spain

Carthage and Rome will finally enter into a series of wars (Punic Wars) for hegemony in the western Mediterranean. After the defeat in the first Punic war, Carthage tries to make up for its losses in Sicily, Sardinia and Corsica, increasing its dominance in Iberia.

Amílcar Barca, Aníbal and other Carthaginian generals placed the former Phoenician colonies of Andalusia and the Levant under their control and then proceeded to conquer or extend their area of influence over the indigenous peoples. At the end of the III century B.C. C., most of the cities and towns south of the Duero and Ebro rivers, as well as the Balearic Islands, recognize Carthaginian rule. They founded Qart Hadasht (Cartagena), which quickly became an important naval base, due to the interest in controlling the wealth generated by the silver mines in Cartagena. The latter is clear from the words of archaeologist Adolf Schulten.

With the silver of the mines of Cartagena they paid their mercenaries, and when for the taking of it in 209 a. C. Carthago lost these treasures, Aníbal was no longer able to resist the Romans, so that the take of Cartagena also decided the war of Aníbal.

Schulten A. Fontes Hispaniae Antiquae

In the year 219 B.C. C. Hannibal's offensive against Rome takes place, taking the Iberian Peninsula as his base of operations and including a large percentage of Hispanics in his army.

It is in this process that they will try to subdue the Greek colony of Sagunto, located to the south of the agreed border of the Ebro but allied with Rome, giving rise to the second Punic war, which will culminate with the incorporation of the civilized part (Iberian) from the peninsula to the Roman Republic.

Roman Spain (206 BC – 5th century)

Roman Empire, CenturyIII.

Segovia aqueduct.

After the Second Punic War between 218 B.C. C. and 201 B.C. C., the Iberian Peninsula can be considered subject to the power of Rome. The occupation campaign, after the Carthaginian expulsion, was rapid, except in the interior (Numancia) and the Cantabrian people who resisted until the arrival of Augustus at the beginning of the Roman Empire.

In 197 B.C. C., the Romans divided the Iberian territory into two zones: Hispania Citerior and Hispania Ulterior.

The total subjugation of the peninsula takes place in the year 19 B.C. C. (after the end of the Cantabrian wars), after which it is divided into three provinces: Bética, Tarraconense and Lusitania, an organization that lasted until the Lower Empire, when the territory was divided into Bética, Carthaginense, Gallaecia, Lusitania and Tarraconensis.

The romanization process, understood as the incorporation of the Roman language, customs and economy, began around 110 B.C. C. and would last in full force until the middle of the III century B.C. c.

At this time, the Hispanics formed a very prominent part of the Roman Empire, contributing notable figures during the historical period such as the emperors Trajan, Hadrian, Marcus Aurelius and Theodosius, the philosopher Seneca, the theologians Paulo Orosio or Prisciliano, the Quintilian rhetorician, the poets Marcial, Lucano or Prudencio, the agronomist Columela, the geographer Pomponio Mela or politicians such as Marco Annio Vero or Lucio Cornelio Balbo, among others.

Middle Ages

The barbarian invasions and the Visigothic kingdom (5th century-711)

The Fall of the Roman Empire

In the Iberian Peninsula, as in other provinces, the Empire fell gradually, with the almost simultaneous processes of the "de-romanization" of the Roman Empire in Hispania, that is, a weakening of the central authority over the centuries III, IV, and V, and of the "Romanization" of the Germanic tribes, for example, the adoption of Roman law which is evident in the Lex Gothorum (Law of the Goths), the conversion to Christianity, and the affinity that some kings had for Latin, even composing poetry in this language.

Toledo, capital of the Visigodo Kingdom.

Despite all this, between the centuries VI and VII and thanks to Justinian I the Great's quest to restore the power of the Western Roman Empire, he established the province of Spania in the southern fringe of the Iberian Peninsula. This Visigothic territory was donated to the Byzantine Empire when it was called for help by one of the parties in the civil dispute of the Visigothic Kingdom that was existing between Agila and Atanagildo and had been devastated by the disappeared Vandal people. Its capital was established in Carthago Spartaria, present-day Cartagena.

The invasions

In the winter of 406, taking advantage of the freezing of the Rhine, the Vandals, Suevi, and Alans invaded the empire with great force. After three years, they crossed the Pyrenees and reached the Iberian peninsula, and divided among themselves the western parts, which roughly corresponded to modern Portugal and western Spain up to Madrid. Meanwhile, the Visigoths, who had captured Rome two years earlier, arrived in the region in 412, founding the kingdom of Toulouse (Toulouse, in southern France), and gradually extended their influence on the peninsula, displacing the Vandals. and Alanos in North Africa, without these leaving much of an imprint on Iberian culture. Then, after the conquest of Toulouse by the Franks and the loss of a large part of the territories in what is now France, they moved the capital of the Visigothic kingdom to Toledo.

You are, O Spain, the ever happy holy and mother of princes and peoples, the most beautiful of all the lands that extend from the West to India. You, by right, are now the queen of all the provinces, of whom they receive their lights not only the sunset, but also the East. You are the honor and ornament of the orb and the most illustrious portion of the earth, in which the glorious fruitfulness of the Goda nation is greatly enjoyed and splendidly flourished. With justice he enriched you and was with you more indulgent nature with the abundance of all created things, you are rich in fruits, in couture grapes, in joyful harvests... You are located in the most pleasant region of the world, and do not embrace yourself in the tropical slope of the sun, nor do you feel glacial rigours, but, girded by temperate sky area, nourish yourself with happy and soft céfiros... And for this reason, for a long time now that the aurea Rome, the head of the nations, desired you and, although the same Roman power, the first victor, possessed you, however, at last, the flourishing nation of the gods, after countless victories throughout the world, eagerly conquered you and loved you and until now enjoys you safely among all the joys and joys.

History of the Godos, Vedalos and Suevos of San Isidoro de Sevilla, century VI-VII. Trad. de Rodríguez Alonso, 1975, León, pp. 169 and 171.

Visigothic Kingdom

The exact number of Visigoths who migrated to the peninsula is not known, but they were possibly around 5% of the population of the peninsula.^{[citation needed]} This implies that the Visigoths were basically a ruling elite that never made up a significant part of the population. This is one of the reasons why their Arian religion and their Visigothic language did not have a major effect on the population.

Despite the fact that the Visigothic nobility practiced Arianism, it enjoyed very little popularity among the Hispano-Roman population of the peninsula, most of whom were faithful to Catholic doctrine. From the Visigothic crown, specifically in the year 587, King Recaredo I, already converted to Catholicism, tried to reconcile the Arian religious hierarchy with the Catholic one, but with little success. Finally, the Catholic option was imposed by force, dispossessing the Arian church of its assets in favor of its antagonist.

The Muslim conquest

In 711 the Muslim armies entered the peninsula by the Strait of Gibraltar and conquered it in a very few years, compared to the long process of the Reconquista.

Interior of the mosque of Cordoba, capital of the caliphate of Al-Andalus.

The Muslim conquest of Spain can be summarized in a brief chronology:

• Year 696: the city of Melilla is conquered by the Omeya caliphate.
• Year 709: the city of Ceuta is conquered by the Omeya caliphate.
• Year 711: After the death of King Witiza, the nobles and bishops of the peninsula elect Roderico by king (known in history by Don Rodrigo), Duke of the Bética. The sons of Witiza wanted Aquila, Duke of the Tarraconense king, so they agreed with the Arabs through Don Julián, Count of Ceuta.

Roderico, who was then fighting against an uprising by the Basques, upon learning of the Arab invasion, went with his army. He loses in the battle of Guadalete due to the disloyalty of the witizanos. With his death, and with the bulk of the Gothic army defeated, the Arabs are encouraged to continue the fight.

Tariq ibn Ziyad conquered Toledo and reached León; Muza ibn Nusair conquered Seville and reached Merida (712). Later they would join forces to take Zaragoza. Muza's son will complete the conquest of the peninsula, with the exception of the Cantabrian and Pyrenean mountainous areas (716), passing into Frankish territory. Carlos Martel stopped the Muslim advance in Poitiers in 732, so from there the Muslims will basically concentrate on the Iberian Peninsula.

In 756, Abderramán I proclaimed the emirate of Córdoba, making the peninsula politically independent from the rest of the Islamic world, although cultural and commercial contacts continued. In 929 Abderramán III proclaimed the Caliphate of Córdoba, which meant the definitive separation of the Caliphate of Baghdad. In the year 1031 the Cordovan caliphate is fragmented, forming numerous taifa kingdoms frequently at odds with each other.

She was Muslim

The gigantic battle of the Navas de Tolosa in 1212 meant the beginning of the end of the Muslim kingdoms in Spain.

Al-Andalus coincided with the «Coexistence», a time of relative religious tolerance, and with the golden age of Jewish culture in the Iberian Peninsula. (See: the emir Abd al-Rahmán III, 912; Massacre of Granada of 1066).

Muslim interest in the peninsula returned with force around the year 1000, when Al-Mansur (known as Almanzor), sacked Barcelona (985). According to his son, other Christian cities were the object of numerous raids.

After the death of his son, the caliphate plunged into civil war and divided into the so-called "Taifa Kingdoms". The kings of the taifas competed with each other not only in warfare, but also in the protection of arts and culture, which enjoyed a brief recovery. The Taifa kingdoms had lost ground to the Christian kingdoms to the north, and after the loss of Toledo in 1085, the Muslim rulers reluctantly invited the Almoravids, who invaded Al-Andalus from North Africa and established a new empire.. In the 12th century the Almoravid Empire broke apart again, only to be taken over by the Almohad invasion, who were defeated at the decisive battle of Las Navas de Tolosa in 1212.

Medieval Spain was the scene of almost constant warfare between Muslims and Christians. The Almohads, who had taken control of the Maghrebis, the Almoravids and the Andalusian territories by 1147, far surpassed the Almoravids in fundamentalist perspective, and treated the Dhimmis harshly. The treatment of the Jews at this time in the Iberian Peninsula had varied greatly between the different Muslim and Christian kingdoms. The mid-13th century emirate of Granada was the only independent Muslim kingdom in Spain, lasting until 1492.

At this time, the kings of Aragon ruled territories that consisted not only of the Kingdom of Aragon, but also the Principality of Catalonia, and later the Balearic Islands, the Kingdom of Valencia, Sicily, Naples, and Sardinia (see Crown of Aragon). The Catalan Company proceeded to occupy the Duchy of Athens, which was placed under the protection of a prince of the House of Aragon, who ruled it until 1379.

The Reconquest

Don Pelayo.

Around 722, a Muslim detachment was defeated by a group of Christian refugees in the forests of Covadonga (Asturias) in the battle of the same name. Don Pelayo, probably a Gothic nobleman, is named king. The first court was established in Cangas de Onís. Pelayo died in 737. Two years later (739), his son-in-law Alfonso I, son of Pedro de Cantabria, taking advantage of the fights between the Arabs and the Berbers, gave new impetus to the reconquest, reaching La Rioja and the Duero. But he has no chance to repopulate, leaving a vast strategic desert, no man's land on the northern plateau.

Stages of the reconquest:

1. Fixing the border of the Asturian kingdom in the Arlanzón and the middle and low course of the Duero. It is achieved at the beginning of the centuryX.
2. Leon and Castile go beyond the Central mountain range and occupy the Tagus basin. Toledo was reconquered in 1085. Reconquest of Zaragoza in 1118.
3. Domain of the Guadiana valley and the footsteps of Sierra Morena. Battle of Las Navas de Tolosa (1212).
4. Occupation of the Guadalquivir valley by Fernando III el Santo (1252) and Valencia, and the Balearics by Jaime I de Aragón, beginning with the conquest of Mallorca in 1229. A Muslim reduct will remain in Granada until 1492.

Between the years 718 and 1230 the main Christian nuclei were formed on the peninsula in the kingdoms of Asturias, Navarra, León, Galicia, Portugal, Aragon and Castile.

In the 13th century, there was a great Christian advance, the expansion of the Crown of Aragon across the Mediterranean and the union of Castile with León.

Union of León and Castilla

Castle of Manzanares el Real. The castle was the most common form of fortification in a conflicting borderland that gave name to the Kingdom of Castile (the land of castles).

In the year 1037, Bermudo III, King of León, died on the battlefield against his brother-in-law, Fernando I. Since Bermudo III had no descendants, his brother-in-law considered that he was the successor and therefore unified the Kingdom of León and the County of Castilla. In the year 1054 Fernando I fights against his brother García Sánchez III de Nájera, King of Navarra, in the battle of Atapuerca, the Navarrese monarch also dying and annexing, among others, the region of Montes de Oca, near the city of Burgos.

On the death of Fernando I, which occurred in 1065, the County of Castilla became a kingdom, inherited by the eldest son Sancho II; Alfonso VI inherits that of León. Sancho II is assassinated in 1072 and his brother accedes to the throne of Castile, being the first monarch of both kingdoms.

When he died, his daughter Urraca succeeded to the throne. She married Alfonso I of Aragon for her second nuptials, but failing to achieve the unification of the kingdoms and due to the great class conflicts between the two kingdoms, Alfonso I repudiated Urraca in 1114, which exacerbated the confrontations between the kingdoms. Although Pope Paschal II had previously annulled the marriage, they had remained together until that date. Urraca also had to confront her son, King of Galicia, the result of her first marriage, to assert her rights over that kingdom, and on his death he succeeded him as Alfonso VII. Alfonso VII manages to annex territories of the kingdoms of Navarre and Aragon (taking advantage of the weakness of these kingdoms since they split on the death of Alfonso I of Aragon). He renounces his right to the conquest of the Mediterranean coast in favor of the new union of Aragon and the County of Barcelona (which occurs with the marriage of Petronila and Ramón Berenguer IV). In his will he returns to the royal tradition of dividing his kingdoms among his sons. Once again the union between León and Castile was broken, with Fernando II being King of León and Sancho III being King of Castile.

In 1230 the definitive union between León and Castile took place (with some later parentheses of little relevance), when Ferdinand III the Saint received the Kingdom of Castile from his mother Berenguela in 1217 and, after the death of his father Alfonso IX In 1230, he agreed with his heiresses, Sancha and Dulce, the transfer of León to La Concordia de Benavente.

Late medieval crisis

Battle of Nájera or Navarrete (1367)

The confluence of various adverse factors made the XIV century a time of general crisis, not only in Spain but throughout Europe. These factors include a general worsening of the climate —with its consequences for agriculture—, the appearance of the Black Death in 1348, and the outbreak of numerous wars.

From the end of the XIII century, internal conflicts, expressed in succession disputes, led to constant civil wars in all kingdoms peninsular, both Muslim and Christian, especially in Navarre (Guerra de la Navarrería, Navarra civil war), and in the crown of Castile (among the supporters of Alfonso X el Sabio and those of his son Sancho, among the supporters of the Infantes de la Cerda and those of Fernando IV the Summons, among those of Pedro I the Cruel and Enrique II the Fratricida —of the new Trastamara dynasty—, among those of Juana la Beltraneja and those of Isabel la Católica). Many of them were involved in conflicts of a European dimension, such as the Hundred Years War, or between peninsular Christian kingdoms, such as the War of the Two Pedros (1356-1369, between Castile and Aragon) and the battle of Aljubarrota (1385, between Castile and Portugal). The Anglo-Portuguese alliance (1373) proved to have an extraordinary projection (it has continued, in different forms, to this day). In the Crown of Aragon, the absence of a direct heir led the Cortes to choose Fernando el de Antequera as king, related to the Castilian Trastámara (Caspe compromise of 1412).

At the same time, the last centuries of the Middle Ages saw a true flowering of intellectual life, multiplying educational institutions, with the competitive presence of religious orders (especially Dominicans, Franciscans and Augustinians). Universities and residence halls were becoming a training mechanism for ecclesiastical and bureaucratic elites, through which clientelist networks were established. To those already existing in Salamanca, Valladolid and Murcia, and to the institutions known as studium arabicum et hebraicum (Toledo, Murcia, Seville, Barcelona); The University of Lleida (1,300), the University of Coimbra (1,308, transferred from Lisbon), the University of Perpignan (1,350), the Sertoriana University of Huesca (1,353), the University of Valencia (1,414), the University of Barcelona (1450) and the University of Santiago de Compostela (1495).

The rise of Spanish

Until the 13th century, many languages were spoken in the territories that today make up Spain, including Spanish, Arabic, Aragonese, Catalan, Basque, Galician, Ladino, Aranese and Astur-Leonese. In addition, in the Christian territories, Latin was the official language of the church and of the administration. Throughout that century, Castilian (also known today as Spanish) gained more and more prominence in the Kingdom of Castile as a language of culture and communication. An example of this is the composition of great epics such as Cantar de mio Cid. In the last years of the reign of Ferdinand III of Castile, Spanish began to be used for certain types of administrative documents and during the reign of his successor Alfonso X it became the official language of the kingdom of Castile (along with Latin which continued to be used). for numerous religious and secular purposes).

Starting in the XIII century, a large part of public documents were written in Spanish, and translations were preferably done in Spanish instead of Latin. On the other hand, in the XIII century, many universities were founded in the kingdoms of León and Castilla; some, like those of Salamanca and Palencia, were among the first universities in Europe. In 1492, during the reign of the Catholic Monarchs, the first edition of Antonio de Nebrija's Grammar of the Castilian Language was published. Outside of Castile, the autochthonous Romance languages continued to be widely used, although they often coexisted with Spanish. By 1600 Castilian Spanish was the dominant language in Zaragoza and much of eastern Aragon, and a similar shift was observed in the eastern regions of the former Kingdom of León. However, in Galicia, Asturias, the Basque Country, Valencia, Catalonia and the Balearic Islands, Spanish would not penetrate significantly until two or three centuries later, depending on the region.^{[citation required]} On the other hand, Andalusian Arabic remained the dominant language in many regions until the expulsion of the Moors at the beginning of the XVII.

Modern history of Spain

Christopher Columbus taking possession of the West Indies

In 1469, with the marriage of Isabel and Fernando, crown prince of Aragon, the dynastic union of the kingdoms of Castile and Aragon was consummated in 1479, although both territories would maintain their own laws and institutions until 1707 (see Nueva Planta Decrees), yes, under the mandate of the same monarch.

Before that, between 1474, the year of the death of Enrique IV, and 1479, a civil war began for the succession of the crown of Castile between supporters of Isabella and supporters of Juana la Beltraneja, stepsister and legitimate daughter of Enrique IV, respectively, married to the King of Portugal, which had Juana's supporters won, would have produced the union of Castile with Portugal.

The reconquest ended in 1492 with the capture of Granada by the Catholic Monarchs. In this same year the expulsion of the Jews and the discovery of America take place; The expedition of La Pinta, La Niña and La Santa María commanded by the navigator Christopher Columbus and paid for by the Spanish crown, would arrive at an island called Guanahani on Friday, October 12, 1492.

In the 15th and XVI, the population of the Iberian Peninsula was concentrated in the territories of the crown of Castile, mainly the Duero Valley, Andalusia and La Mancha. The population of the Crown of Castile grew from about 3.4 million in 1400 to 4.5 million in 1530 and 6.5 million in 1590. Since the beginning of the century XV saw the boom of Castilian merino wool, which, thanks to the development of new spinning techniques, achieved great international diffusion and became the raw material main source of fabrics made in Flanders. Castilian merchants established themselves in the main cities of Western Europe and introduced commercial techniques such as bills of exchange and maritime insurance.

Conquest of the Canary Islands

Bencomo was a mencey guanche of Tenerife that led the Aboriginal resistance on this island in front of the Castro conquest.

The conquest of the Canary Islands by the Crown of Castile took place between 1402 (with the conquest of Lanzarote) and 1496 (with the conquest of Tenerife). Two periods can be distinguished in this process: the stately Conquest, carried out by the nobility in exchange for a vassalage pact, and the royal Conquest, carried out directly by the Crown, during the reign of the Catholic Monarchs.

It was not an easy undertaking in the military, given the aboriginal resistance on some islands. Neither was it politically, since the particular interests of the nobility (determined to strengthen their economic and political power through the acquisition of the islands) and the states, particularly Castilla, in the midst of a phase of territorial expansion and in a process of strengthening of the Crown against the nobility.

For their study, historians distinguish two periods in the conquest of the Canary Islands:

• Sirial conquest. It is known with this name to the conquest carried out by the nobility, for its own benefit and without a direct participation of the Crown, which grants the right to conquer in exchange for a pact of vassal of the noble conqueror towards the Crown. We will distinguish within it the one known as Conquista Betancuriana or Normanda, carried out by Jean de Bethencourt and Gadifer de la Salle between 1402 and 1405 and that affected the islands of Lanzarote, El Hierro and Fuerteventura. The other phase is known as Conquista Señorial Castellana, carried out by Spanish nobles who appropriated, through purchases, cessions and marriages, the first conquered islands and incorporated the island of La Gomera into 1450.
• Real conquest. This term defines the conquest carried out directly by the crown of Castile, during the reign of the Catholic Kings who armed and partly financed the conquest of the islands that were missing to dominate: Gran Canaria, La Palma and Tenerife. In 1496, the conquest came to an end with the dominance of the island of Tenerife, integrating the Canario Archipelago in the Crown of Castile. The royal conquest took place between 1478 and 1496.

Spanish Empire

After the proclamation of Philip II, King of Spain and Portugal (1580-1640).

The Spanish Empire was one of the first modern world empires and one of the largest empires in history, being considered the first global empire, since for the first time an empire encompassed possessions on all continents (except Antarctica), the which, unlike what happened in the Roman Empire, the Carolingian Empire or the Mongol Empire, did not communicate with each other by land.

In the 15th century, the Spanish crown sought to open new trade routes across the seas and oceans. In 1492 the Catholic Monarchs financed the project of the navigator Christopher Columbus in search of a new trade route with Asia through the Atlantic Ocean. The arrival in the New World and the subsequent conquest of America forged the creation of the Empire.

During the following century, Spain would be the main power in the Western world and the leading power of the time, although around 1650 it would be in decline, being surpassed by other European powers. The Spanish conquerors reached numerous territories belonging to different cultures in America and other territories in Asia, Africa and Oceania. The incorporation of the Kingdom of Portugal in 1580 marked the moment of maximum formal extension of the Spanish Empire.

Spain's area of influence expanded, becoming the largest economic power in the world during the 16th century, the Trade flourished across the Atlantic between the Iberian Peninsula and the Americas, and in the Pacific from East Asia and the Philippines to Mexico, and militarily, for several centuries the Spanish Empire would dominate the seas and oceans with its navy and ships. battlefields with the infantry of the tercios. Although from the XVII century, its power and influence in central Europe and Italy was widely challenged.

During its economic heyday, the empire had great cultural prestige and military influence. Many things that came from Spain were often imitated. The most cultivated artistic expressions in Spain were literature, plastic arts, music and architecture, while knowledge was accumulated and taught from prestigious universities such as those of Salamanca or Alcalá de Henares. However, unlike what happened in other European countries, science did not have such a vigorous resurgence.

Golden Age

Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

The Spanish Golden Age was a flourishing period in Hispanic arts and letters spanning chronologically from the publication of Nebrija's Gramática castellana in 1492 to Calderón's death in 1681.

Spanish literature with Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra gave birth to what is considered the first modern novel, Don Quixote de la Mancha, the most edited and translated book in universal history; as well as the picaresque genre whose initiatory work was Lazarillo de Tormes. Among the endless list of notable poets, playwrights and prose writers during the Spanish Golden Age, we could highlight Quevedo, Góngora, Lope, Calderón, Tirso de Molina, Fernando de Rojas, San Juan de la Cruz, Fray Luis de León, Santa Teresa de Avila, Mateo Alemán, etc. or humanists, theologians or philosophers such as Baltasar Gracián, Antonio de Nebrija, Juan Luis Vives, Fray Bartolomé de las Casas or Miguel Servet.

Diego Velázquez, considered one of the most influential painters in history, cultivated a relationship with King Felipe IV and his prime minister, the Count-Duke of Olivares, who bequeathed several portraits that demonstrate his extraordinary mastery and skill. El Greco, after settling in Spain, would carry out his most important Mannerist works. And other great painters such as Murillo, Ribera or the tenebrist Zurbarán are sons of this period. In sculpture, figures such as Alonso Berruguete, Gregorio Fernández, Francisco Salzillo, Alonso Cano or Pedro de Mena should be highlighted.

The Habsburgs, both in Spain and Austria, were the great patrons of art in their countries. El Escorial, the great royal palace and monastery built by the architect Juan Bautista de Toledo by order of Felipe II, and in which Juan de Herrera, Juan de Minjares or Giovanni Battista Castello later collaborated, provoked the admiration of some of the greatest European architects. Other notable architects would be Pedro Machuca or Diego de Siloé.

Musicians of the period such as Tomás Luis de Victoria, Luis de Milán, and Alonso Lobo helped shape the music of the Renaissance and styles of counterpoint and polychoral music, and their influence continued well into the Baroque era..

Austrian House

Emperor Charles I in Mühlberg by Titian

With Carlos I began the reign of the Habsburg dynasty, or House of Austria, with which Spain experienced its greatest territorial expansion thanks to the conquest of extensive territories in America and other overseas colonies. In addition, King Carlos I was crowned Holy Roman Emperor as Carlos V, which added extensive European territories to the Crown; later, Felipe II, increased his territories in America and encircled the crown of Portugal with his overseas territories, beginning a period (1580-1640) in which the domains of the Catholic Monarch became the largest economic and military power in the world.

After the War of Spanish Succession, it lost military preponderance in Europe, although it remained the world's greatest economic power and retained control of the seas until the end of the century XVIII.

We can divide this period according to the reigning monarchs in:

• Reinado de Carlos I de España (1516-1556).
• Reinado de Felipe II (1556-1598).
• Reinado de Felipe III (1598-1621).
• Reinado de Felipe IV (1621-1665).
• Peace of Westphalia (1648). Spain recognizes the independence of the Netherlands.
• Reign of Charles II (1665-1700).

Portrait of King Charles III (1759-1788), monarch who during his reign tried to modernize Spanish society under an illustrated program.

The House of Bourbon and the Enlightenment

The House of Bourbon began to reign in Spain in 1700, with the coronation of Felipe V. Shortly after, in 1702, the War of the Spanish Succession began, in which Aragon participated, but not those of the Basque provinces and Navarra which, as part of Castile, remained faithful. He also made extensive administrative reforms to bring his new kingdom closer to the centralized mode of his home country.

It is known as the period of the political Enlightenment in Spain, which covers the reigns of the Bourbons from Felipe V in 1700 to Carlos IV, who ended his reign abruptly in 1808, picking up the movement of the Age of Enlightenment that began in France and it is the prelude to the French Revolution.

• Reinado de Felipe V (1700-1746), with a brief reign of Luis I of Spain in 1724.
• Treaty of Utrecht (1713).
• Reinado de Fernando VI (1746-1759).
• Queen of Charles III (1759-1788).
• Reign of Charles IV (1788-1808).

Absolutism and centralization of Spain

Philip V signed several Nueva Planta Decrees between 1707 and 1715, new laws that revoked most of the historical rights and privileges of the different kingdoms that formed the Spanish Crown, especially the Crown of Aragon, unifying them under the laws of Castile, where the Cortes had been more receptive to the royal will. Spain became culturally and politically a follower of absolutist France. Felipe V made reforms in the government and strengthened the central authority in relation to the provinces. The reforms initiated by the first Bourbon culminated in much more important ones by Carlos III. The economy generally improved in the 18th century from the depression of the second half of the XVII, with higher productivity and fewer famines and epidemics.

Contemporary history of Spain

The burden of the MamluksFor Goya

War of Independence (1808-1813)

Augustine of Aragon fighting against Napoleonic troops. Estampa de Juan Gálvez y Fernando Brambilla, published in Cadiz by the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in 1812-1813.

• 1801-1813 Kingdom of Spain, power struggle between Carlos IV and Fernando VII. War of Spanish Independence (1801-1813).
• 1808: Uprising of May 2 in Madrid.
• 1808-1813: Queen of Joseph I Bonaparte.
• 1808-1810: Central Supreme Board.
• 1810-1814: Courts of Cadiz.
• 1810-1830: Hispanic American Independence.

Reign of Ferdinand VII (1814-1833)

• The liberal triennium (1820-1823).
• The Ominosa Decade (1823-1833).

Reign of Elizabeth II (1833-1868)

Magnicidio of the president of the Council of Ministers of Spain Juan Prim on the street of the Turk, the night of December 27, 1870.

• Regency of María Cristina de Borbón-Dos Sicilias (1833-1840).
• First Carlist War (1833-1840).
• General's Regency Spartaero Baldomero (1840-1843).
• Personal reign of Isabel II (1843-1868).
• Revolution of 1868

Democratic Six-Year Period (1868-1874)

The period in the history of Spain that elapsed from the triumph of the revolution of September 1868 until the pronouncement of December 1874, which marked the beginning of the stage known as Restoration, is known as the Democratic Six-Year Period.

Reign of Amadeo of Savoy (1870-1873)

After the revolution of 1868 in Spain a constitutional monarchy was proclaimed. There is an inherent difficulty in regime change and that is finding a king who will accept the post. Finally, on November 16, 1870, with the support of the progressive sector of the Cortes, Amadeo de Saboya was elected king as Amadeo I of Spain, succeeding Isabel II.

Amadeo had serious difficulties due to the instability of Spanish politicians, republican conspiracies, Carlist uprisings, Cuban separatism, disputes between his own allies and the occasional assassination attempt. He abdicated on his own initiative on February 11, 1873. At his departure the First Spanish Republic was proclaimed.

First Spanish Republic (1873-1874)

The First Spanish Republic was proclaimed on February 11, 1873 by the Cortes Generales, plunging the nation into a deep instability in which four presidents followed one another, Figueras, Pi y Margall, Salmerón and Castelar, in eleven months. The weakness with which it was born caused the immediate Bourbon restoration due to several factors, including the Carlist uprisings and the lack of a bourgeoisie, social base and tradition that supported it.

Alfonso XII photographed in 1884

Bourbon Restoration (1875-1931)

The period from the pronouncement of General Martínez Campos in 1874 to the proclamation of the Second Republic in 1931 is known as the Bourbon Restoration. The period is characterized by institutional stability, the formation of a liberal model of the State and the incorporation of social and political movements, the result of the industrial revolution, which began its decline with the dictatorship of Miguel Primo de Rivera in 1923.

Antonio Cánovas del Castillo, key figure in the second half of the century XIX Spanish, promoter of the Spanish Constitution of 1876, which was the beginning of a period of institutional stability. He was killed on August 8, 1897, in Mondragon, by gunshots of the anarchist Michele Angiolillo.

María Cristina de Habsburg exercised regent during the minority of her son, Alfonso XIII.

Although the former queen, Elizabeth II, was still alive, she recognized that she was too divisive as a leader, and abdicated in 1870 in favor of her son, Alfonso XII. After the failure of the First Spanish Republic, the Spanish were willing to accept a return to governmental stability under Bourbon rule. Republican armies resisting a Carlist insurrection declared their allegiance to the new king in the winter of 1874-1875. The Republic was dissolved and Antonio Cánovas del Castillo, a trusted politician and intellectual of the King, was appointed Prime Minister on New Year's Eve 1874, promulgating the new Constitution on June 30, 1876.

The Carlist insurrection was vigorously suppressed by the new king, who took an active role in the war and quickly won the support of most Spaniards. A shift system was established in Spain in which the liberals, led by Práxedes Mateo Sagasta, and the conservatives, led by Antonio Cánovas del Castillo, alternated in control of the government. Stability and economic progress was restored in Spain during the reign of Alfonso XII.

It is worth noting the drafting of the autonomous government projects for Cuba and Puerto Rico carried out successfully by the politicians Maura, Abárzuza and Cánovas, which crystallized during the government of Sagasta, with Segismundo Moret in the Ministry of Overseas, granting the island full autonomy with the sole reservation of the position of Governor General, plus the royal decrees establishing equal political rights for Spaniards residing in the Antilles and peninsulars, extending universal male suffrage to Cuba and Puerto Rico.

In 1885 Alfonso XII died of tuberculosis giving way to the reign of Alfonso XIII preceded by the regency of María Cristina de Habsburgo-Lorena, but above all, it would be the assassination of Cánovas del Castillo in 1897, which would shock the nation, due to the disastrous immediate consequences derived from the Spanish-American War of 1898.

Spanish-American War

Spain loses Cuba, the Philippines and Puerto Rico: Cuba rebelled against Spain at the start of the Ten Years' War in 1868, resulting in the abolition of slavery in the Spanish colonies in the New World. US interests on the island, along with concern for the Cuban people, worsened relations between the two countries. The explosion of the USS Maine launched the Cuban War in 1898, in which Spain suffered a disaster. Cuba gained independence from it and Spain lost its last New World colonies: Puerto Rico, along with Guam and the Philippines were ceded to the United States for $20 million. In 1899, Spain sold its remaining share of the Pacific islands, the Northern Mariana Islands, Caroline Islands, and Palau, to Germany, and Spanish colonial possessions were reduced to Spanish Morocco, Spanish Sahara, and Spanish Guinea, all in Africa. The "disaster" of 1898 created the generation of '98, a group of statesmen and intellectuals who demanded liberal change in the new government.

World War I

Spain's neutrality in World War I allowed it to become a supplier of material for the contenders, which caused an economic bubble during the war years. The Rif War, the outbreak of the Spanish flu in Spain and elsewhere, coupled with a major economic slowdown in the postwar period, hit Spain particularly hard, and the country fell into crisis. As an attempt to overcome this situation, King Alfonso XIII decided to support the dictatorship of General Miguel Primo de Rivera.

Restoration Crisis

Starting in 1917, an internal decomposition of the Canovista political regime of the restoration was verified, characterized by the atomization into personalist factions of the political parties, the rise of subversive movements from the military juntas, paid gunmen and the revolutionary committees and finally the generalized discontent of the population.

• CNT Foundation: In 1910 the CNT was founded, following the union of different Anarchist trade unions of the whole state that already had a tradition of several decades. Unlike the communists, the CNT union repudiated the idea that States existed.
• 1919: Foundation of the Communist Party of Spain. On the occasion of the Third International, convened by Lenin. The most radical sectors of the PSOE political party (then Marxist ideology) joined the PCE.

Alfonso XIII and Primo de Rivera in 1930

Dictatorship of Primo de Rivera (1923-1930)

On September 13, 1923, the Captain General of Catalonia, Miguel Primo de Rivera, revolted against the Government and carried out a coup with the support of the majority of the military units. The scheduled meeting of the Cortes Generales for immediately subsequent dates with the aim of analyzing the problem of Morocco and the role of the army in the conflict was the ultimate trigger for the uprising. Added to this situation is a serious crisis of the monarchical system that does not quite fit into a XX century marked by the accelerated industrial revolution, an unrecognized role for the bourgeoisie, nationalist tensions and some traditional political parties incapable of facing a full democratic regime.

Soft dictation by General Berenguer (1930-1931)

After the economic crisis of 1927 accentuated in 1929, the violent repression of workers and intellectuals and the lack of harmony between the bourgeoisie and the dictatorship, the monarchy, an accomplice, will be the object in question from the union of all the opposition in August 1930 in the so-called Pact of San Sebastián. The governments of Dámaso Berenguer, called the "dictablanda", and Juan Bautista Aznar-Cabañas, will do nothing but lengthen the decadence. After the municipal elections of 1931, on April 14 the Second Republic was proclaimed, thus ending the Bourbon restoration in Spain.

Second Spanish Republic (1931-1936)

Members of the interim government of the Second Republic; from left to right: Alvaro Albornoz, Niceto Alcalá-Zamora, Miguel Maura, Francisco Largo Caballero, Fernando de los Ríos and Alejandro Lerroux.

The electoral victory of the Republicans in the cities brought with it the fall of the monarchy. The regime change was carried out without bloodshed on April 14, 1931, after the proclamation of the Republic in Madrid, Barcelona and other Spanish capitals. Convinced that the municipal elections had been a national demonstration against the monarchy, the Count of Romanones, Minister of State, recommended that the King leave Spain and negotiated with the revolutionary committee for the transfer of government. When General Sanjurjo, head of the Civil Guard, made it known that his men would not fight for the monarchy, Alfonso XIII took the path of exile.

Republican fervor had emerged from marginalization and had conquered large moderate sectors of the urban middle classes, who had been counting in politics until then. In most capitals, the electoral result was celebrated with jubilant peaceful demonstrations.

The history of the Second Republic is usually divided into three stages:

• First biennium (including or not the Interim Government), from its proclamation on 14 April 1931 until the general elections of November 1933 took place in the second biennium. Includes the following important events:
  • 1931: proclamation of the Catalan Republic in April 1931. Drafting and approving December of the 1931 Constitution.
  • 1932: revolt in Seville of General Sanjurjo. Agrarian Reform Bases Act. Approval of the Statute of Autonomy of Catalonia, Triumph of Republican Esquerra in the first elections to the Parliament of Catalonia. Francesc Macià, President of Generality.
  • 1933: Law on Religious Congregations. Anarchist insurrection. Fundación de la Falange Española. Basque Statute.
• Second biennium: initiated by the victory of the right center in the November elections.
  • 1933: first Lerroux government with CEDA support.
  • 1934: Revolution of Asturias. Institutional break with the Generality of Catalonia. Repression in Asturias led by General Franco.
• Government of the Popular Front: after the triumph of the Popular Front in the elections of February 16.

Spanish Civil War (1936-1939)

General map of war development Initial national area - July 1936 National advance until September 1936 National advance until October 1937 National advance until November 1938 National advance until February 1939 Last area under Republican control Main national centres
Major Republican Centers
Earth battles
Naval battles
Cities bombed
Masacres
Concentration camps
Refugee camps

The Spanish Civil War (July 17, 1936-April 1, 1939) has been considered, along with the Second Sino-Japanese War, as a preamble to World War II.

Development of the war

On July 17, 1936, General Francisco Franco led the Spanish Army of Africa towards the peninsula, while another army from the north under General Mola moved to the south of Navarre. Military units were also mobilized elsewhere to take over government institutions. Franco's movement was intended to seize power immediately, but the successful resistance of the Republicans in places like Madrid, Barcelona, Valencia, Malaga and the Basque Country, meant the beginning of a cruel, fratricidal and protracted civil war. In a short time, much of the south and west was under the control of the rebel army, whose forces from Africa were the most professional troops in the conflict. Both parties received foreign military aid, the insurgents of Nazi Germany, Fascist Italy and the Portuguese dictatorship, while the popular republican army was aided by the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), Mexico led by Lázaro Cárdenas del Rio president of the Party of the Mexican Revolution, and the International Brigades, made up of socialists, communists and anarchists from different countries of the world.

The siege of the Alcazar of Toledo at the beginning of the war was a turning point. The Republicans managed to hold out in Madrid, despite the national assault in November 1936, and frustrated subsequent offensives such as the battles of Jarama and Guadalajara in 1937.

Soon, however, the Nationalists began to penetrate Republican territory, making inroads in the east. The north of the peninsula was occupied at the end of 1937 and the Republican Aragon front collapsed shortly thereafter. The bombing of Guernica was the cruelest air attack on civilians of the war, carried out by the Condor Legion of the German Luftwaffe.

The Battle of the Ebro in July and November 1938 was the last desperate attempt by the Republicans to turn the tide of the war. When Barcelona fell into the hands of the nationalists at the beginning of 1939, the war was decided. The remaining Republican fronts collapsed and Madrid was taken in March 1939. The war, which cost between 300,000 and 1,000,000 lives, ended the Republic giving way to the dictatorship of Francisco Franco.

The conduct of the war was fierce on both sides, with murders and summary executions of civilians, ecclesiastics and prisoners by nationals and republicans. After the war, thousands of republicans were punished or imprisoned in concentration camps, and many others went into exile.

Dictatorship of Francisco Franco (1939-1975)

Francisco Franco Bahamonde was head of state under a dictatorship, known as Francoism, from 1939 to 1975.

More than 400,000 political prisoners were used as slave labor. According to the historian Javier Rodrigo:

Much of the post-war construction policies are made with forced labour of prisoners of war. These prisoners come from concentration camps that are born with the logic of overcoming a policy of repressive violence, transformation and re-education to this logic of annihilation and direct elimination.

"'Franch slaves': Spain has not yet repaired political prisoners." RT in Spanish. Consultation on 20 September 2017.

During the Franco regime, Spain actively sought the return of Gibraltar from the UK, and gained some support for their cause at the United Nations. During the 1960s, Spain began to place restrictions on Gibraltar, culminating in the closure of the border in 1969. It was not fully reopened until 1985. Spanish rule in Morocco ended in 1967. Despite the military victory in the 1957-1958 Moroccan invasion of Spanish West Africa, Spain gradually relinquished its remaining African colonies. Independence was granted to Spanish Guinea, which would become Equatorial Guinea in 1968 and with which a sharp diplomatic crisis would develop barely a year later, while the Moroccan enclave of Ifni had been ceded to Morocco in 1969. That same year the closure of the Gibraltar gate would begin, the Spanish-British border in Gibraltar being closed for decades.

The last years of the Franco regime saw some economic and political liberalization, the so-called Spanish miracle, including the birth of a tourist industry. Spain began to catch up economically with its European neighbors. Franco ruled until his death on November 20, 1975, when control was handed over to King Juan Carlos I. In the last months before Franco's death, the Spanish state went into a state of paralysis. This was capitalized on by King Hassan II of Morocco, who ordered the green march in Western Sahara, Spain's last colonial possession.

Main events

Francisco Franco Bahamonde together with Dwight D. Eisenhower in Madrid in 1959.

• 1942: Constitutional Law of the Courts.
• 1945: the Spanish Fuero and the National Referendum Act are enacted.
• 1947: the power of France is achieved through external contacts.
  • Law on Succession to the Head of State.
  • Spain closes the last concentration camp in Miranda de Ebro.
• 1950: Spain entered FAO.
• 1952: Spain enters the Unesco.
• 1955: Spain enters the UN.
• 1958: Spain enters the IMF. Law on Movement Principles.
• 1959: Visit of the President of the United States. U.S. Dwight D. Eisenhower.
• 1966: Organic Law of the State.
• 1969: Proclamation before the Courts of Prince John Charles of Bourbon, as successor to the head of State, Francisco Franco, as king.
• 1973: On December 20, the terrorist band ETA murders Admiral Luis Carrero Blanco, president of the government.
• 1974: Southeast Congress.
• 1975: the latest executions of Francoism provoke the international isolation of Spain.
• 1975: Death of General Franco (20 November). Up to the throne of Juan Carlos I.

Reigns of Juan Carlos I and Felipe VI

Transition to democracy (1975–1982)

SS.MM. Juan Carlos I and Sofia of Greece.

The Spanish transition to democracy marks a new era in which Spain passed from the dictatorship of Francisco Franco to a democratic and legal state. The transition is usually said to have begun with the death of Franco on November 20, 1975, while its completion is marked by the electoral victory of the PSOE on October 28, 1982. Between 1978 and 1981, Spain was led by the government of Adolfo Suárez, first president of the Government, in the Unión de Centro Democrático party. In 1981, there was an attempted coup, the so-called 23-F.

On February 23, Antonio Tejero, with members of the Civil Guard, entered the Congress of Deputies, and the session stopped, where Leopoldo Calvo-Sotelo was about to be appointed president of the government. Officially, the coup failed thanks to the intervention of King Juan Carlos I.

Spain joined NATO before Calvo-Sotelo left office. Along with the political change, there was a change in society that gave an absolute majority to a social democratic government, led by Felipe González, which would last four legislatures. Spanish society was extremely conservative under Francoism, but the transition to democracy also began the liberalization of society's values and customs.

Timeline: Beginnings (1975–1978)

• 1975: After the so-called Green March (November 1975, while the dictator agonized), Spain signed with Morocco the Tripartite Agreements of Madrid, abandoning his fate to Western Sahara, violating UN resolutions, which called for a referendum since 1965; the territory is rapidly invaded by Morocco and Mauritania.
• 1976: On 15 December, the referendum on political reform was held, which gave way to democracy in Spain.
• 1977: On January 24, the massacre of Atocha in which five PCE labor lawyers are killed by a group of ultra-right gunmen.
• 1977: First general elections after the dictatorship, in which the Union of Democratic Center (UCD), party led by Adolfo Suárez, succeeds.
• 1977: Pacts of the Moncloa.
• 1978: Approved by referendum and entered into force on 29 December, the Spanish Constitution of 1978.

Timeline: Democratic Consolidation (1979–1982)

Spain's autonomy, one of the greatest changes introduced with the 1978 Constitution.

• 1979:
  • New legislative elections, in which UCD retains the relative majority in Congress and the absolute in the Senate.
• 1981:
  • Dimission of Adolfo Suárez as President of Government.
  • On February 23, during the investiture vote of Leopoldo Calvo-Sotelo as new president of government, Lieutenant Colonel Antonio Tejero heads an attempted coup d'etat, which in his day some skeptical sectors qualified as a pantomime^{[chuckles]required]}especially in the British press specialized in geopolitical issues.
  • On February 25, Leopoldo Calvo-Sotelo is invested president of the government by the absolute majority of Parliament, partly as a response to the coup attempt.
• 1982:
  • Income from Spain to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.
  • PSOE's electoral triumph, which achieves the absolute majority in both the Congress and the Senate. First socialist government chaired by Felipe González.

Recent history (1982-present)

The former presidents of the Government, José María Aznar, Mariano Rajoy, Felipe González and José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero with the emeritus king Juan Carlos I in June 2015.

Main articles: II Legislature of Spain, III Legislature of Spain, IV Legislature of Spain, V Legislature of Spain, VI Legislature of Spain, VII Legislature of Spain, VIII Legislature of Spain, IX Legislature of Spain, X Legislature of Spain, XI legislature of Spain and XII legislature of Spain.

• 1986:
  • On January 1, Spain officially entered the European Economic Community.
  • On 22 June, general elections are held: new absolute majority of the PSOE. Felipe González is still at the head of the second socialist government.
• 1987:
  • Two ETA terrorist attacks caused enormous social shock: on June 19, the Hipercor attack in Barcelona, the largest massacre in the organization, killing 21 civilians in a shopping centre, and on December 11 the attack on the Saragossa quarter-house, in which 5 children and 6 adults lose their lives.
• 1989:
  • General elections: new absolute majority of the PSOE, third socialist government.
  • Camilo José Cela, Nobel Prize in Literature.
• 1992:
  • Celebration of the Olympic Games in Barcelona.
  • Universal Exhibition of Seville.
  • Madrid, European Capital of Culture.
  • Launch the first line of the AVE whose tour unites Madrid with Seville.
• 1993:
  • General elections: relative majority of the PSOE being elected president of the Government Felipe González for a pact of legislature with CiU and PNV. Fourth socialist government in democracy and in a row.
• 1995:
  • Luis Roldán, looking for and capturing from April of the previous year, is delivered to the Spanish authorities at Bangkok airport.
  • The newspaper The World It reveals the scandal of the hearings of the Higher Center for Defence Information (CESID) to politicians, entrepreneurs, judges and members of the Government since 1984: the vice president of the Government, Narcís Serra and the Minister of Defense, Julián García Vargas (in June).
• 1996:
  • General elections: relative majority of the Popular Party (PP) being elected president of the José María Aznar Government for a pact of legislature with CiU, PNV and CC. First government of the Popular Party.
• 1997:
  • The ETA terrorist gang kidnaps and murders the popular councillor of Ermua, Miguel Angel Blanco, which caused a social mobilization against terrorism (Ermua Spirit).
• 1998:
  • With an annual immigration rate of +0.28 %, the phenomenon of immigration in Spain begins to take strength. In the next seven years, 3,730,610 immigrants enter Spain, five foreign national residents multiply.
  • ETA declares a ceaseless fire for the first time in its history that would break in November of the following year.
• 2000:
  • General elections: absolute majority of PP. José María Aznar continues to head the government. Second Popular Party government.
  • ETA terrorist escalation that perpetrates 23 murders.
• 2001:
  • War of Afghanistan.
• 2002:
  • On January 1, the euro became the official currency of the country, leaving the peseta.
  • Salamanca, European Capital of Culture. Spanish Presidency of the European Union during the first semester of the year.
  • Incident aramado and diplomat between Spain and Morocco, after the Moroccan occupation of the islet of Perejil.
  • Ecological catastrophe for the collapse of the Prestige in Galicia.
• 2003:
  • The government's support for the Iraq war provokes multiple protests throughout the country.
  • In the Iraq war, journalists Julio Anguita died The World (7 April) and the camera of Telecinco José Couso (8 April); in the post-Iraq war 7 agents of the CNI would be killed (November).
• 2004:
  • On Thursday, 11 March, the most serious jihadist attack in the history of Spain and Europe took place. The explosions of ten bombs on four nearby trains in Madrid caused 192 fatalities and more than 1500 wounded. This tragedy shocked Spanish society. The attacks provoked bitter divisions in the political landscape.
  • On March 14, the Spanish Socialist Workers Party (PSOE) won the elections, so José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, after making various agreements, becomes president of the government. In addition, a woman, María Teresa Fernandez de la Vega, becomes the first vice president of the government in Spain; the fifth socialist government will be parity.
  • The first step of the socialist government is the withdrawal of the Spanish troops from Iraq.
• 2005:
  • Spain was the first country to hold the referendum of the European Constitution, in which it won the "yes" for 77 % of the suffrages despite a low participation — more than 42 %.
  • The plenary of the Congress of Deputies approves, on first reading, the draft divorce law and the same-sex marriage, thus becoming the third country in the world to do so.
• 2006:
  • Entry into force of the Anti-Tabaco Act.
  • Two people were killed in an attack by the terrorist organization ETA at the car park at Barajas Airport (Madrid) which broke its “permanent fire” declared on 22 March of that same year.
• 2008:
  • Beginning of a serious economic crisis.
  • On March 9, the Spanish Socialist Workers Party again won the general elections with 169 seats (5 more than in the 2004 elections) compared to 154 of the People's Party. Sixth socialist government.
  • From 14 June to 14 September in Zaragoza, the 2008 International Exhibition was held as a central theme "Water and Sustainable Development".
  • Fall of the Madrid Stock Exchange unprecedented during that year.
• 2009:
  • Agudization of the economic crisis by reaching the 4 million unemployed for the first time in history, which would reach 6 million in 2013.^{[chuckles]required]}
• 2010:
  • Fourth Spanish Presidency of the European Union in the first semester of the year.
  • Government Adjustment Plan (12 May).
  • A strike by air controllers causes the nation's government to declare the State of Alarm for the first time.
  • Spain Wins South Africa World Against Holland
• 2011:
  • 15M, Indignados, Spanish Revolution. Manifestations in 58 Spanish cities in the face of the seriousness of the economic and social crisis.
  • The terrorist group ETA announces the "definite date of its armed activity".
  • On November 20, the Popular Party won the general elections with an absolute majority, being elected President of the Mariano Rajoy Government. Third Popular Party government in democracy. They've got 13 matches.
• 2012:
  • The EU grants Spain a ransom of up to €100 billion for the financial system.
• 2014:
  • On June 2, King Juan Carlos I announced on television his decision to abdicate the throne for his son Felipe.
  • On June 19, Philip VI was proclaimed king of Spain before the General Courts.
• 2017:
  

  A teenager voting for the independence referendum of Catalonia
  • Murdered 16 persons in a double jihadist attack perpetrated by the Islamic State terrorist organization in Las Ramblas de Barcelona and Cambrils (17 and 18 August).
  • On 1 October, the Government of Catalonia, chaired by Carles Puigdemont, organizes a referendum declared illegal by the Constitutional Court, for the independence of Catalonia.
  • On 10 October, Carles Puigdemont made the unilateral declaration of independence in the Parliament of Catalonia, but he asked the same to suspend its effects in the same act, in a constant pulse with the Spanish government chaired by Mariano Rajoy
  • On 21 October, for the first time in 40 years of democracy, the process of implementing article 155 of the Constitution is initiated.
  • On 27 October, the Parliament of Catalonia unilaterally declares the independence of Catalonia and the Senate approves by absolute majority the application of Article 155 to take control of the autonomous community. Members of the Catalan Government or flee to Belgium or enter pretrial detention for the offence of rebellion.
• 2018:
  • On 25 March, the former Catalan President, Carles Puigdemont, was arrested in Germany, but the justice of that country denied his extradition to Spain.
  • Total dismantling of ETA on May 3.
  • On June 1, the motion of censorship presented by Pedro Sánchez was approved in which he was elected president of the Government, becoming the first one approved since the beginning of Spanish democracy.
  • The Andalusian elections of December 2nd: the results give a parliamentary majority to the conservative parties, which govern the community for the first time in their history, thus banning the socialists of the Andalusian government for the first time in 36 years.
• 2019:
  • General elections of April 28: the PSOE is the winner of the elections, which were convened by President Pedro Sánchez after the rejection of the Congress of the General Budgets of the State. Important fall of the Popular Party, which reduces its number of seats by half. Entry of the extreme right party, Vox. Vox's entry into the congress collaborates in this fall of the Popular Party.
  • Municipal, autonomous and European elections of May 26: the PSOE wins in the three elections, and expands its territorial power.
  • On October 17, the protests began in Catalonia due to the ruling of the Procés.
  • Election repetition in November. The first coalition government is formed from the Second Republic, between the PSOE and the United Podemos.
  • Pedro Sánchez's government approves and carries out the exhumation and relocation of Francisco Franco's body on October 24, 2019.
• 2020:

• • COVID-19 pandemic in Spain. Declaration of the state of alarm and limitation of the movement of citizens.
  • The Emeritus King Juan Carlos I —Investigated by Justice for alleged illicit activities — leaves Spain and goes to live in Dubai.
  • It fails Vox's motion of censorship against the PSOE-We can with the least historical support.
  • The vaccination of Spanish citizens against coronavirus began in December.
• 2021:
  • In May the state of alarm ends throughout the country.
  • Frontier between Spain and Morocco after the reception in Spanish of the leader of the Frente Polisario, sick of coronavirus.
  • The European Union approves the economic recovery plan presented by the Spanish government to access European funds in the face of the coronavirus crisis.
  • Pedro Sánchez's government approves pardons for the leaders of the case, in prison since 2017.
  • Spain becomes the sixth country in the world to legalize euthanasia.

Timeline