Barcelona or Barcino?
To answer this question I’ll ask you to take a seat in our time machine, fasten your seat belts and do not get up during the flight. Let’s go to prehistoric times.
We’re landing between the Besòs and Llobregat river deltas, the site of today’s Barcelona. (Don’t applaud the pilot.) And what do we see? We see various settlements of native people, mainly Laietani.
One of the main thoroughfares of the city, Via Laietana, is named after the Laietani.
The founding of Barcelona is the subject of two different legends. According to the first one Hercules had a nine-ship expedition.
They were caught in a severe storm and were forced to search for land. They found it. But they lost all the ships except one, the ninth. That’s why they call the land Barca Nona, which means “9th boat”.
There is another more realistic version of the origin of the name, according to which it was Carthaginian general, Hamilcar Barca, father of Hannibal, who supposedly named the city Barcino after his family in the 3rd century BC.
Inside the walls
Like almost every ancient city, the territory of Barcelona was bounded by walls. The Roman colony Barcino had a wall that surrounded the city. The second wall was built between the 2nd and 4th centuries, and finally, the third wall was constructed in the 13th and 14th centuries. But in the 19th century like an obese woman in a tight corset, the city began to suffocate within its own walls.
Back then, the city was quite dirty, because all the sewage simply drained into the streets of the city, there was not enough light, fresh air, people lived extremely close to each other in the narrow and dark streets. As a result, diseases spread at lightning speed. And that was one of the reasons to demolish the city walls in the 19th century.
But you can still find some parts of the walls in the city and “touch the history”. For example, in Ramon Berenguer Square, next to Via Laietana, you can find a section of the second wall with the quadrangular defence towers that have been preserved. Or between the Paral·lel avenue and the Portal de Santa Madrona street, there is part of the third wall, built in the 13th century by Jaume II.
Let’s take a train!
Sensation! Sensation! Fanfare sounds, confetti flies in the air. And that’s all because, in October 1848, the first train journey on the Iberian peninsula took place. It lasted only 35 minutes. And it was a small journey between Barcelona and Mataró.
This line is still in use today and it linkd Barcelona, Mataró, San Adrián de Besós, and Badalona. But the opening of the line was a very important event and a huge success. Of course, it contributed a lot to Barcelona’s history and the economic development of the entire region.
Universal exhibitions
From 1860 an urban project in the neighbourhood of L’Eixample laid down the guidelines for the fast and beautiful expansion of the city, which would include Barcelona’s first trams. Plaça de Catalunya was also born at that time.
Later, the 1888 Barcelona Universal Exhibition motivated the building of many famous city landmarks and grand avenues, such as Saló de Sant Joan, which is now called Passeig de Lluís Companys, and its starting point, the Arc de Triomf.
At the beginning of the 20th-century modernism stretched its magnificent wings over the whole of Europe and Barcelona was a bright gemstone among many other European cities. As a consequence in 1929, Barcelona hosted the International Exhibition again. One of the most significant buildings which were created for that exhibition was Palau Nacional on Montjuïc.
Ghost stations
The development of the metro naturally coincided with the emergence of new areas in the city at the end of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th century. But not all the stations that were built were used. Some stations were closed immediately after their construction, and some others were used for a time and then closed.
For example, Banco Station, which was built in 1911, was located between Santa Eulalia’s Cathedral and the Mercat de Santa Caterina. Look out the window when you are riding the Metro, you can see it between Urquinaona and Jaume I. According to the legend it served some of the banks in the area, but now it is completely abandoned.
Another ghost station is Gaudí Station. It was built in 1968, but never opened officially . It is located just next to the Sagrada Família under Avinguda Gaudí. You can see it traveling on Line 5 to the current Sagrada Família stop. Look carefully, the legend says that you can see a ghost of Gaudi there.
An artificial beach and much more
Yes, yes… it is hard to believe now but Barceloneta was just the home to a handful of factories and the homes of local fishermen. But the Olympic Games of 1992 brought a radical transformation that permanently changed the face of Barceloneta and the whole city as well.
Barceloneta was not the only area which changed before the Olympic Games. Poblenou was another example of a great transformation from a collection of industrial warehouses and factories, which was even called “the Catalan Manchester”, into a trendy, modern hub.
Montjuïc mountain became home to the city’s Olympic Stadium and Olympic swimming pools, which you can see in the music video of Kylie Minogue called “Slow”.
Also, two big city’s ring roads, known as the Rondas, (Ronda de Dalt and Ronda Litoral), were specifically designed for the 1992 Olympics. It was made to reduce traffic congestion and facilitate movement through the city.
Fanfares again
The Royal Institute of British Architects since 1848 has awarded prizes to outstanding people in the field of architecture. In 1999 precedent was broken to award the Royal Gold Medal to the City of Barcelona.
Do you see now how bright the history of Barcelona is? It is time to get into the time machine, come back to the present, and enjoy this gorgeous city!
By Lilya Syromiatnikova
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