Catalonia has lived a convuluted history. Very recently they have found a settlement under Barcelona from the Neolithic, 5000 years ago. Due to its climate, many have been the peoples who've settled in the region. Iberians, Basques, Greeks, Carthiginians, Romans, Visigoths, Arabs, Catalans, Gascons, French, Spanish and recently everyone else in the globe. All these groups of people left their mark, many times destroying what the previous settlers had left of splendour.
Lleida is a crossroads. The Ilergetes, local Iberians, were the strongest Iberian tribe that may have existed, there dominance came from trade with Greeks along the coast. The Romans used Lleida as a military base, as did the Carthiginians. The Ilergetes used one nation against the other to attain privileges. In the end Rome won and of course taught the Ilergetes a lesson, making many slaves. However it continued as a municipium and its strategic location was used by Ceasar to win the Civil War against Pompey the Great. When Rome started to fall, Lleida and Catalonia fell with it. They were ravaged by the Germanic tribes as these fought for land. As one tribe passed through they would steal the crops and then burn the land, or throw salt on it so it would not serve the next. The reign of the Visigoths is one of the least known periods of Spanish history. Very few of their buildings remain, and all we know is that they destroyed what they received from the Romans. The Arabs settled in Lleida, now Larida. They rebuilt the city and both fortified it and brought in luxuries. The rest of Catalonia was in the hands of the Francs and Lleida was the biggest city on the border with the Catalan Counties. The Catalans fought for it for centuries as they tried to get rid of Islam. When Ramon Berenguer IV finally conquered the city once and for all, he left the important buildings and castles, but destroyed the mosques and repopulated the city with Gascons. In Lleida the Crown of Aragon was formed and Lleida, being in the centre between the two kingdoms, again grew in importance. This is when the cathedral was made, one of the most spectacular of Europe. The city was given the first university of the crown and the queen made the city her official residence and with her came all the nobles. During this period between the 13th and 16th centuries Lleida was the second most important city of the Crown, the most important kingdom of Europe. The university was also a place where many advancements in medicine and phyiscs either took place or were introduced to Europe. Jews, Muslims and Christians all had the right to study and their co-operation gave the city huge importance.
However, when the Catalan dynasty of kings died out in the 15th century, both the city and Catalonia started to lose influence. The Mediterranean lost importance to the Atlantic and Catalans and the rest of the Aragonese Crown were not allowed to travel or conquer the Americas. Soon the Catalan language would also be prohibited and as a result Catalonia as a distinct nation started to fade. In the 18th century the Spanish dynasty collapsed. Catalonia and Aragon backed the Austrian pretender to the throne. The French, backed by Castille defeated after 13 years of war. Again Catalonia was made suffer. All universities were to be taken down, Catalan officially prohibited and Lleida had its fortifications destroyed and the Cathedral and noble quarters ceased or destroyed as well because of its resistance to the French. Lleida in a few years went from a still honourable university city, comparable to Oxford or Cambridge, to a city with no rights and few people. Many had left and the economy was once again destroyed. It is said that only 900 people were left, in a hitherto important and influential city in Europe. The nobility and church practically ceased to exist as a result, and the farms had few people to work on the fields. The Castilians destroyed Catalonia and the rest of Aragon out of envy, now there was nothing. Less than a hundred years later the French would be back and this time destroyed the castle, which was first made by the moors. The city had hardly had any time to rebuild, but again it was punished because the citizens had armed themselves to stop Napoleon.
You see this is the history of Catalonia. Again and again we can see resistance. Catalans celebrate the day they were defeated by the Castilians. Why? Because it shows that they fought until there was no one left.
In the end of the 19th century, maybe 70 or 80 years after the last destruction, Catalan literature was reborn. Before it had mainly come from Lleida, where the good university was. Now it came from Barcelona. Catalan nationalism started to brew. Its curtains would again be taken down by Castille. This time the two Spainsh dictators of the 20th century: Primo de Rivera and Francisco Franco. With Franco the city was destroyed for the last time. Schools that taught liberal values were bombed and squares and markets too; in total 13 tonnes fell upon the city. And Lleida, it could be said, was spared. We were lucky. The Spanish troops were going for Barcelona so Lleida only suffered until its defences broke. Again the city was left with only a few thousand people. It had been a marxist stronghold, so the citizens escaped into the mountains or to France.
Lleida and Catalonia rebuilt though. We are now multicultural places, where history is created but always remembered. Still when you come to Lleida, from 15 kms out you can see the silhouette of the old cathedral, turned military quarters, now museum. Its shadow is its history, through which pass the waters that use to gleam with gold and now slide under the bridges that again unite the two sides of the city. The old with the new. Its history with its future.
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