Spain is a large country in Western Europe, with a rich history dating back to the arrival of modern humans a million years ago. It has been ruled by various empires, including the Romans, Visigoths, Islamic Arabs, and Habsburgs. Spain became a global empire in the 15th century, but lost much of its power in the 19th century. After a civil war and the rule of Franco, Spain became a democratic state in 1982 and is now a major tourist destination with beautiful cities, architecture, and landscapes. It is accessible by flights, buses, and boats.
Spain is a large country in Western Europe. It covers 195,400 square miles (506,000 sq km), making it about twice the size of the state of Oregon and larger than the state of California. It shares borders with Andorra, France, Gibraltar, Morocco and Portugal and has coastlines along the Atlantic Ocean, the Cantabrian Sea and the Mediterranean.
The ancestors of modern humans first arrived in Spain about a million years ago, and humans began settling the area about 35,000 years ago. The Phoenicians began establishing cities and trading posts in the area in the 11th century BC, and the Greeks arrived soon after, in the 9th century BC The Carthaginians supplanted many of the Greek outposts in the 6th century BC, as part of their developing Mediterranean empire .
Rome conquered the country in the second century BC, subtracting it from the Carthaginians in the second Punic war. The Romans developed it as no one had before, adding massive infrastructure, expanding the economy and turning it into a powerful trading center in the Mediterranean. By the 1st century Spain had acquired great importance for Rome and the Iberian people had obtained Roman citizenship.
Christianity emerged in the 1st century and by the 4th century it had dominated most of the region. When the Western Roman Empire came to its final collapse in the 5th century, Spain was conquered by the Visigoths. In the 8th century Islamic Arabs from North Africa crossed the Strait of Gibraltar and conquered the country for the Umayyad Caliphate. The Arabs maintained control for the next few centuries, reconquering the Christian kingdoms within the Emirate when they became too powerful. In the early 13th century a powerful confederation of Christian kingdoms drove out the Arab powers and re-established their own kingdoms.
In the late 15th century the two kingdoms of Castile and Aragon were united when their monarchs married, creating the unified Kingdom of Spain. Queen Isabella then went on to further consolidate the power of the new kingdom, arranging marriages for each of her five children to bring the kingdom closer to the major European powers, including the Holy Roman Empire, the Habsburg dynasty, Portugal and the England.
Spain then went on to expand her kingdom into a global empire, claiming land throughout the New World and establishing trade routes with a number of powerful nations. In the 15th century, a Habsburg, Charles I, also known as Charles V, ascended the throne. Under this Holy Roman Emperor, and with enormous wealth coming from his colonies in the New World, the country would go on to conquer parts of North Africa and expand its territories throughout the rest of the world, creating a truly powerful empire.
When the Habsburgs died out in Spain in the 18th century, a battle for the crown began between the major European powers. Eventually France won and Philip V of the Bourbon dynasty seized power. In the late 18th century Spain began to lose its grip on its empire, culminating in the loss of much of its New World possessions to independence in the early 19th century.
Much of the rest of Spanish history in the 19th century was characterized by civil war in an attempt to force the government to liberalize, eventually forcing the king to flee, and in the 19th the First Spanish Republic was formed. In 1873 the monarchy was restored under King Alfonso XII, a Bourbon. The rest of the Empire was broken up over the following decades and kept only three colonies, all in Africa.
In 1931, a second Republic was declared and a number of forces began vying for control within the Republic, including anarchist, communist and fascist factions. Civil war broke out in 1936, and with the help of Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy, the Fascists eventually prevailed, with Franco as their leader.
Franco continued to rule the country until his death in 1975, at which time leadership again passed to a Bourbon, King Juan Carlos. The nation immediately began moving towards becoming a democratic state and achieved this goal in 1982
Spain is a beautiful country with millennia of cultural heritage expressed in its architecture, people and landscape. It is one of the major tourist destinations in Europe. Major cities like Barcelona and Madrid offer amazing food, beautiful architecture, and a depth of culture that could take a lifetime to truly experience. San Sebastian offers a more upscale vacation for those with the money. And castles and fortresses like Castillo de Santa Barbara or the Alhambra are great for lovers of majestic architecture.
Flights arrive daily in Spain from all major hubs around the world and it is also accessible by bus. The boat trip is available from both Morocco and the UK.
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