Today, The Grandma has been reading about Thecla,the saint of the early Christian Church, who is venerated on a day like today in places like Sitges and Tarragona.
Thecla, in Ancient Greek Θέκλα, Thékla, was a saint of the early ChristianChurch, and a reported follower of Paul the Apostle. The earliest record of her life comes from the ancient apocryphal Actsof Paul and Thecla.
The Acts of Paul and Thecla is a 2nd-century text (c. AD 180) which forms part of the Acts of Paul, but was also circulated separately. According to the text, Thecla was a young noble virgin from Iconium who chose to leave her fiance so she could convert to Christianity and follow Paul.
In the text, it is said that Thecla spent three days sitting by her window, listening to Paul speak about the Christian God and the importance of living in chastity. Thecla's mother, Theoclia, and fiance, Thamyris, became concerned that Thecla was going to follow Paul's teachings. They turned to local authorities to punish Paul for being a Christian and mak[ing] virgins averse to marriage. Paul was sent to prison, where Thecla visited him, kissed his bonds, and refused to leave him and return to her mother and fiance. Paul was made to leave the city and Thecla was condemned to be burned.
However, Thecla was miraculously saved from burning at the stake by the onset of a storm. She then encountered Paul outside of Iconium, where she told him, I will cut my hair off and I shall follow you wherever you go.
She then traveled with Paul to Antioch of Pisidia. There, a nobleman named Alexander desired Thecla and attempted to rape her. Thecla fought him off, tore his cloak, and knocked his coronet off his head, which caused her to be put on trial for assault. She was sentenced to be eaten by wild beasts, but was again saved by a series of miracles. In one scene, female beasts, particularly lionesses, protected her against her male aggressors. While in the arena, she baptized herself by throwing herself into a nearby lake full of aggressive seals, who were all killed by lightning before they could devour her.
Thecla rejoined Paul in Myra, wearing a mantle that she had altered so as to make a man's cloak. As she traveled, she preached the word of God and encouraged women to imitate her by living a life of chastity. According to some versions of the Acts, Thecla lived in a cave in Seleucia Cilicia for 72 years, where she continued to spread Christianity.
It is also said that Thecla spent the rest of her life in Maaloula, a village in Syria. There, she became a healer and performed many miracles, but remained constantly persecuted. In one instance, as her persecutors were about to get to her, she called out to God, a new passage was opened in the cave she was in, and the stones closed behind her. Before her death, she was able to go to Rome and lie down beside Paul's tomb.
Thecla is counted as the patron saint of Sitges and Tarragona in Catalonia, where the cathedral has a chapel dedicated to her. Her feast day remains the town's major local holiday.
Today, The Grandma has received news from Mayte, one of her closest friends.
Mayte has met Mazinger Z in Tarragona, and she has shared her memories and photos with TheGrandma.
Mazinger Z, in Japanese: マジンガーZ, known briefly as Tranzor Z in the United States, is a Japanese super robot manga series written and illustrated by Go Nagai.
The first manga version was serialized in Shueisha's Weekly Shōnen Jump from October 1972 to August 1973, and it later was reissued in Kodansha TV Magazine from October 1973 to September 1974.
It was adapted into an anime television series which aired on Fuji TV from December 1972 to September 1974. A second manga series was released alongside the TV show, this one drawn by Gosaku Ota, which started and ended almost at the same time as the TV show.
Mazinger Z has spawned several sequels and spin-off series, among them being Great Mazinger, UFO Robot Grendizer and Mazinkaiser.
Mazinger Z: Infinity, a theatrical film sequel, taking place 10 years after the Great Mazinger series, was animated by Toei Animation and released in theaters on January 13, 2018.
In his Manga Works series, Go Nagai reveals that he had always loved Tetsuwan Atom and Tetsujin-28 as a child, and wanted to make his own robot anime. However, for the longest time he was unable to produce a concept that he felt did not borrow too heavily from those two shows.
One day, Nagai observed a traffic jam and mused to himself that the drivers in back would surely love a way to bypass the ones in front. From that thought came his ultimate inspiration: a giant robot that could be controlled from the inside, like a car.
In his original concepts, the titular robot was Energer Z, which was controlled by a motorcycle that was driven up its back and into its head, an idea which was recycled for the Diana A robot. However, with the sudden popularity of Kamen Rider, Nagai replaced the motorcycle with a hovercraft. He later redesigned Energer Z, renaming it Mazinger Z to evoke the image of a demon god (Ma, 魔,meaning demon and Jin, 神, meaning god).
The motif of the Hover Pilder docking itself into Mazinger's head also borrows from Nagai's 1971 manga Demon Lord Dante, the prototype for his more popular Devilman, in which the titular giant demon has a human head of Ryo Utsugi, the young man who merged with him in his forehead. Koji Kabuto takes his surname, the Japanese word for a helmet, because he controls Mazinger Z from its head.
Mazinger Z helped to create the 1970s boom in mecha anime. The series is noteworthy for introducing many of the accepted stock features of super robot anime genres, including the first occurrence of mecha robots being piloted by a user from within a cockpit.
In 2001, the Japanese magazine Animage elected Mazinger Z TV series the eleventh best anime production of all time.
Guillermo del Toro has cited the show -which was a huge success in his native Mexico during the 1980s- as an important influence on Pacific Rim.
Today, The Grandma wants to congratulate the people of Tarragona,who arecelebrating Santa Tecla,their major festival. If you have the opportunity of visiting this wonderful and ancient city, do not doubt it and you will enjoy its Catalan culture and its charming people.
The Santa Tecla Festival, in Catalan Festes de Santa Tecla, is a festivalheld in Tarragona, Catalonia.
Plunging into the festivities of SantaTecla of Tarragona unavoidably involves becoming impregnated with fragrances that link the present times with history, with heritage legacy.
This is precisely the route, maintained through the centuries, that defines the personality of the festivities are rock music, jazz, drama plays, music-hall, movies, parties, sport activities and so on. However, the essence of it still is the collection of dances, the bestiary, the entremesos, interlude or short farce, the spoken dances and the human castles, all of which shape the Popular Retinue of the city, as a genuine corpus, particular of the celebration.
It has been named as a Traditional Festival of National Interest (Festa Tradicional d'Interès Nacional, in Catalan), by the Government of Catalonia.
Although in Tarragona the cult to Santa Tecla has existed since ancient times, it was not until the period of the Reconquest that the festivities outline the embryonic structure that will be perpetuated, and that adopt the streets of the city as the essential physical space in which such festivities are to take place.
In 1091, the Pope Urban II restored, if only juridically, the metropolitan seat of Tarragona and declared the festivities of Santa Tecla as a day of obligation and main celebration of the year. However, this was only a phase previous to the effective restoration, which took place several years, later, in 1118, when the count of Barcelona, Ramon Berenguer the Great offered the city to the bishop Oleguer of Barcelona. It was from that moment on that we refer to a real repopulation of Tarragona.
The pontifical bull of Gelasius II ratified the day of Santa Tecla as the main festivity of the year and, of course, as a day of obligation.
The relevance of the path which had been started was confirmed in year 1239 at the first Provincial Council, presided by the archbishop Pere d'Albalat, and in year 1277, at the Council, of archbishop, Bernat d'Olivella. Until that moment, however, the festivity is confined within the strictly liturgical framework.
The increasing popularity of the celebration leads to a fact that will become extremely important for the evolution of the Festivities.
On 17 May 1321, the relic of the arm of the patroness saint arrives inTarragona, from Antioch, located in the Orient. The city carried out an absolutely spectacular and overwhelming welcome reception, in such a way that this would become the point of reference for the subsequent structuration of the festivity.
For the first time ever, the population, by means of all of its integrating social classes or strata -political, ecclesiastical, soldiers or military men and working class- fills the streets and takes possession of it. Space is filled with the new dances performed by the local guilds which, in a process of syncretism of pre-christian and Christian rituals, are always made functional the service of the sacred.
The civic significance that this ceremony had, as well as the comparison of the festivity of Santa Tecla to that of Corpus Christi -which was already the object of an outstanding celebration since 1357, at the request of the archbishop Sanç López d’Ayerbe- will lead to the establishment of the solemn celebration of the octave of Santa Tecla from 1359 onwards, and to the publication of a document which is essential to understand the Festivities: the Bylaws of Santa Tecla, which on 26 July 1370, archbishop Pere Clasquerí establishes at the request of the consuls of the city.
The philosophy of the text puts on the same level the festivity of Santa Tecla and that of Corpus Christi, the essential dates of the local calendar. The structure of the Festivities established for the eve and the day of the patroness saint is maintained until the present times.
22 September is the date set for the singing of vespers at the Cathedral, which is the centre of the festivity, as well as the performance of dances by the guilds throughout the city, that is, the Cercavila (the big parade in the streets) of nowadays.
On 23 September, the attendance to religious service is to take place, with the dances and the establishment of the Procession of the Holy Arm, under a canopy, through the streets and preceded by the dances.
Besides, according to the bylaws,
the streets of the city should be cleaned up and decorated, particularly
those through which the procession is to pass by. The bylaws in
question also mention the attendance of the clergy to the procession and
the carrying of twenty candles bearing the signal of the city, that the
consuls of the town council are to pay for, in order to keep the Arm
illuminated.
Besides the dances, which are the embryo of the PopularRetinue, there will be a whole collection of elements which will become core complicated and will progressively complete the spectacular dimension of the festivity.
From 1381, we find documentary evidence on the fantastic and popular bestiary; since year 1385, biblical characters; since year 1399, the lifeless hagiographic characters; since year 1402, the games or allegorical performance representations, which already bore a certain dramatic action; from the second quarter of the 15th century, the roques or castles -moveable platforms in the fashion of the current floats of the Holy Week- and the entremesos. Often enough, the ludic purposes and the catechistical purposes are mixed up with the struggle to exteriorize the municipal and the archiepiscopal powers, and generate an overwhelming growth of the spectacular nature and complexity of the Festivities.
The onset of the 16th century and the outbreak of spoken dances -some of which are new while others are redefined from ancient entremesos and dances- shaped the last part of one of the structures of the festivity that essentially survived without any outstanding alterations until the onset of the 19th century. In any case, we must point out its increasing significance, which is provincial council that is held in Barcelona in year 1564, under the chairmanship of the patriarch of Antioch, D. Fernando de Loazes, who ratifies the feast day of Santa Tecla as an obligation day in all of the ecclesiastical province of Tarragona.
The 19th century will be decisive for the analysis of the evolution of the festivities of Santa Tecla. During the first half of the mentioned century, the morphology, of the castells (human towers) will be defined, as well as the role that these play within the celebration. That relatively new moment, in spite of the fact that the writer Rafael d’Amat, Baron of Maldà, regretted its absence as early as year 1794, will become essential in the festivities of Santa Tecla. In his novel entitled La familia dels Garrigas, Josep Pin i Soler makes a magnificent description of the festivity in the middle of the 19th century.
At that time, besides the performances and elements that still survived from the Middle Ages, the extremely significant role played by the groups of human towers was undeniable, and the same applies to the activities that nowadays are essential, such as the Matinades (Early Mornings), with the grallers and the drummers, or the fireworks display of the celebration day of Santa Tecla, or even activities which remain more unknown such as the general chiming of the bells or the chanting of the goigs, in the Cathedral. Also, an emblematic character has been shaped, formed in the festivity: the Magí de les Timbales, the Council drummer.
The second half of the 19th century entailed a new amalgamation of the festivities. On one hand, the Town Hall introduced its own defining elements in the Popular Retinue with a highly impressive artistic level.
In
this sense, the Moorish Giants, the Negritos Giants (Black Giants) and
the Old Nanos, all of them chiselled by Bernat Verderol, seem to want to
separate from the most simple and popular elements: dances, which will
suffer a remarkable recession, particularly due to the upheaval
undergone by the institutions that supported them; guilds, during the
first half of the century, as well as the constant attacks that they
suffered from the wealthier classes or strata.
On
the other hand, pyrotechnics become more relevant in the festivity.
Noise and rustle play a great role as opposed to that of colour, and
this is the reason why the firing of storms increase.
The Ball de Diables (Devils' Dance) seems to balance the relationship between light and noise, and is performed for the first time during independent exhibitions, out of the retinue, and is undoubtedly a precedent of the current correfoc. In the last instance, the sardana dance is imported from other Catalan region (Empordà), which will thus be on its way to becoming a national symbol.
The 20th century, until the establishment of the democratic town halls which took place during the seventies and the eighties, will be a somewhat dark period for the collection of the festivities of Santa Tecla.
In 1911, Pope Pius X abolishes the festive quality of the saint's day, which becomes a labour day. It was not until 10 July 1917 that pope Benedict XV restored it, upon request of the Town Hall presided by the mayor Robert Guasch, and with technicians as outstanding as Emili Morera. On 3 September, the Spanish government of Eduardo Dato consented to the restitution of the festivity.
The Spanish Civil War of 1936 and the subsequent postwar period cast a dark and gloomy outlook on the main festivity, to the extreme of consigning it to a secondary condition. The authorities of that period distorted and misrepresented the history of the city and promoted the small festivity of Sant Magí to the condition of main festivity, with the idea in mind of using it for attracting tourists in the summer season and thus, to the detriment of the inhabitants of Tarragona.
The arrival of democratic town halls has entailed the vindication of the festivities of Santa Tecla as the celebration of and for the inhabitants of Tarragona.
Nowadays, the recovery of the Popular Retinue, which until then had been almost banished, the restoration of the thundering displays, the redemption of the manual tolling of the bells, the diffusion, spreading and improvement of the playing of the gralla and of the drum, the manifoldness of the traditional instruments as well as their application, are some of the peculiarities of the festivities of Santa Tecla that will be noticed when listening to the recordings that we hereby present. In short, the recovery of a city heritage which begins with the use of streets as a space for entertainment.
The Grandma & Joseph visit L'Observatori de l'Ebre
Today, The Grandma has visited Roquetes, a beautiful town in El Baix Ebre County, in Tarragona.
The Grandma has visited accompanied by Joseph de Ca'th Lon, her closer friend. They have arrived to visit L'Observatori de l'Ebre, the astronomical centre that is sited there.
Joseph has explained lots of things to The Grandma. They have been talking about planets and paying a lot of attention to the first planet orbiting another sun, 51 Pegasi b that was discovered on a day like today in 1995.
The Observatori de l’Ebre (OE) is a Research Institute founded by the Society of Jesus in 1904 to study Sun-Earth relationships. Over the years it has excelled in the study of earth currents, atmospheric electricity, seismology, solar and geomagnetic activity, and the terrestrial Ionosphere, and continues to do so today in the latter two fields.
The OE is governed by a Non Profit Foundation. At present it forms part of the Ramon Llull University (URL) as a University Institute. It is located in Roquetes, in El Baix Ebre, Tarragona. The town is located on the eastern side of the Ports de Tortosa-Beseit. A great part of its municipal territory is located in the Els Ports Natural Park, including many important peaks of the Ports de Tortosa-Beseit Range, such as Mont Caro and Castell de l'Airosa.
51 Pegasi b, abbreviated 51 Peg b, unofficially dubbed Bellerophon, later formally named Dimidium, is an extrasolar planet approximately 50 light-years away in the constellation of Pegasus. It was the first exoplanet to be discovered orbiting a main-sequence star, the Sun-like 51 Pegasi, and marked a breakthrough in astronomical research. It is the prototype for a class of planets called hot Jupiters. In 2017, traces of water were discovered in the planet's atmosphere.
51 Pegasi is the Flamsteed designation of the host star. The planet was originally designated 51 Pegasi b by Michel Mayor and Didier Queloz, who discovered the planet on December 1995. The following year it was unofficially dubbed Bellerophon by astronomer Geoffrey Marcy, who followed the convention of naming planets after Greek and Roman mythological figures. Bellerophon was a figure from Greek mythology who rode the winged horse Pegasus.
51 Pegasi b
In July 2014, the InternationalAstronomical Union launched a process for giving proper names to certain exoplanets and their host stars. The process involved public nomination and voting for the new names.
In December 2015, the IAU announced the winning name for this planet was Dimidium. The name was submitted by the Astronomische Gesellschaft Luzern (German for Astronomical Society of Lucerne), Switzerland. Dimidium is Latin for half, referring to the planet's mass of at least half the mass of Jupiter.
The exoplanet's discovery was announced on October 6, 1995, by Michel Mayor and Didier Queloz of the University of Geneva in the journal Nature. They used the radial velocity method with the ELODIE spectrograph on the Observatoire de Haute-Provence telescope in France and made world headlines with their announcement.
The planet was discovered using a sensitive spectroscope that could detect the slight and regular velocity changes in the star's spectral lines of around 70 metres per second. These changes are caused by the planet's gravitational effects from just 7 million kilometres' distance from the star.
Within a week of the announcement, the planet was confirmed by another team using the Lick Observatory in California.
This was the first discovery of an exoplanet orbiting a Sun-like star, the first exoplanet discovery was made by Aleksander Wolszczan in 1992, around pulsar PSR 1257. It marked a turning point and forced astronomers to accept that giant planets could exist in short-period orbits.
Once astronomers realized that it was worth looking for giant planets with the currently available technology, much more telescope time was devoted to radial velocity planet searches, and hence many more exoplanets in the Sun's neighborhood were discovered.
After its discovery, many teams confirmed the planet's existence and obtained more observations of its properties. It was discovered that the planet orbits the star in around 4 days. It is much closer to it than Mercury is to the Sun, moves at an orbital speed of 136 km/s, yet has a minimum mass about half that of Jupiter, about 150 times that of the Earth.
Earth & 51 Pegasi b & Jupiter Comparison
At the time, the presence of a huge world so close to its star was not compatible with theories of planet formation and was considered an anomaly. However, since then, numerous other hot Jupiters have been discovered and astronomers are revising their theories of planet formation to account for them by studying orbital migration.
Assuming the planet is perfectly grey with no greenhouse or tidal effects, and a Bond albedo of 0.1, the temperature would be approximately 1000°. This is between the predicted temperatures of HD 189733 b and HD 209458 b (1180–1392 K), before they were measured.
In the report of the discovery, it was initially speculated that 51 Pegasi b was the stripped core of a brown dwarf of a decomposed star and was therefore composed of heavy elements, but it is now believed to be a gas giant. It is sufficiently massive that its thick atmosphere is not blown away by the star's solar wind.
51 Pegasi b probably has a greater radius than that of Jupiter despite its lower mass. This is because its superheated atmosphere must be puffed up into a thick but tenuous layer surrounding it. Beneath this, the gases that make up the planet would be so hot that the planet would glow red. Clouds of silicates may exist in the atmosphere.
The planet is tidally locked to its star, always presenting the same face to it. The planet, with Upsilon Andromedae b, was deemed a candidate for direct imaging by Planetpol. It is also a candidate for near-infrared characterisation.... with the VLTI Spectro-Imager.
The first ever direct detection of the visible light spectrum reflected from an exoplanet has been made by an international team of astronomers on 51 Pegasi b. The astronomers studied light from 51 Pegasi b using the High Accuracy Radial velocity Planet Searcher (HARPS) instrument at the European Southern Observatory's La Silla Observatory in Chile.
Today, Claire Fontaine and The Grandma have visited the sanctuary of Mare de Déu de Montserrat in Montferri, a little municipality in Tarragona. They are very interested in visiting this sanctuary because of its architect, Josep Maria Jujol i Gibert is one of the most admired artists of the Catalan Modernism.
Jujol was a closer friend of Antoni Gaudí and both of them built some of the most incredible buildings you can visit around the world.
Modernisme, Catalan for Modernism, also known as Catalan Modernism, is the historiographic denomination given to an art and literature movement associated with the search of a new entitlement of Catalan culture.Nowadays it is considered a movement based on the cultural reivindication of a Catalan identity.
Its main form of expression was in architecture, but many other arts were involved and especially the design and the decorative arts (cabinetmaking, carpentry, forged iron, ceramic tiles, ceramics, glass-making, silver and goldsmith work), which were particularly important, especially in their role as support to architecture. Modernisme was also a literary movement (poetry, fiction, drama).
Although Modernisme was part of a general trend that emerged in Europe around the turn of the 20th century, in Catalonia the trend acquired its own unique personality.
Sanctuary of Mare de Déu de Montserrat, Montferri
Modernisme's distinct name comes from its special relationship, primarily with Catalonia and Barcelona,whichwere intensifying their local characteristics for socio-ideological reasons after the revival of Catalan culture and in the context of spectacular urban and industrial development.
It is equivalent to a number of other fin de siècle art movements going by the names of Art Nouveau in France and Belgium, Jugendstil in Germany, Sezession in Austria-Hungary, Liberty style in Italy and Modern or Glasgow Style in Scotland.
Modernisme was active from roughly 1888 (the First Barcelona World Fair) to 1911 (the death of Joan Maragall, the most important Modernist poet). The Modernisme movement was centred in the city of Barcelona, though it reached far beyond, and is best known for its architectural expression, especially in the work of Antoni Gaudí, but was also significant in sculpture, poetry, theatre and painting.
Notable painters include Santiago Rusiñol, Ramon Casas, Isidre Nonell, Hermen Anglada Camarasa, Joaquim Mir, Eliseu Meifrèn, Lluïsa Vidal and Miquel Utrillo. Notable sculptors are Josep Llimona, Eusebi Arnau and MiquelBlai.
Montferri is a municipality in the county of Alt Camp, province of Tarragona, Catalonia. It is home to the sanctuary of Mare de Déu de Montserrat (Our Lady of Monsterrat), a small Modernist church by Josep Maria Jujol.
Josep Maria Jujol i Gibert (16 September 1879-1 May 1949) was a Catalanarchitect. Jujol's wide field of activity ranged from furniture designs and painting, to architecture.
Josep Maria Jujol i Gibert
He worked with Antoni Gaudí on many of his most famous works. Among Jujol's projects are CasaBatlló, Casa Milà, Park Güell, and Our Lady of Montserrat, and among his design styles are Modernisme and Art Nouveau.
Josep Maria Jujol was born in Tarragona where he lived until age 9. He was the son of Andreu Jujol, a school director, and of Teresa Gibert i Vives. He was born on the top floor of the public school, Sant Joan, where his father worked.
He began to draw at an early age, and always had an admiration for nature. According to his biography, he would roam the hills of Tarragona and its Roman ruins. They lived at the school for nine years before his father was transferred in 1888 to Carrer Zurbano in Gràcia,which is now integrated into the City of Barcelona.
Jujol's father was transferred once again in 1893 to the City of Barcelona.There Jujol began to walk the medieval district, developed an admiration for gothic architecture and began to draft the buildings.
The family moved to the Gran Via in the Eixample District of Barcelona, where he experienced modern and modernist buildings.
In 1901, he was accepted in the Architectural program in Barcelona. While attending school, he first worked with Antoni Maria Gallissa i Soqué (Don Antoni), whom he admired as a person and an architect.
His first project was a commission for Don Antoni to decorate the street called Carrer Fenen for the Mercè Festival (Festes de la Mercè).
Old memories in Montferri during its construction
Jujol had to
create the metal frames and stained glass windows. He continued to work
for Don Antoni until 1903. He then began to work in the studio of Josep Font i Gumà where he collaborated with him on the Trinity altar in the Basilica de SantaMaria del Mar.
In his spare time he completed plans for an amusement park that was to emulate the solar system. The plan was never revived.
In 1906 he received his certificate as an architect and was able to work on his own. One of his first projects was to decorate Don Antoni's entrance stairway with his trademark sgraffito.
Jujol became acquainted with Antoni Gaudí through their mutual friend, Dr. Santaló. Gaudí soon worked in partnership with Jujol. Their first project together was Casa Batlló.
It is speculated in Jujol's biography that he had a great influence on Gaudí's use of colour and shapes. However, this is not for certain.
In any case, Gaudí had great respect for Jujol's views and entrusted him as a collaborator on his projects for many years.
What have in common Eli Poppins and The Grandma? Lots of things but mainly their passion for numbers, Science, stones and History. There's something that can unite all of these terms in one: The Knights Templars.
Since Eli Poppins decided to live in Miravet, a small village in the Catalan county of La Ribera d'Ebre in Tarragona, The Grandma tries to visit her as many times as she can.
Today, The Grandma is in Miravet enjoying a wonderful day with Eli Poppins who is going to explain to us the History of this amazing place.
Miravet is a little village located in the middle of the Terres de l’Ebre, in the middle of a beautifull landscape between mountains, the River Ebro and a leafy bank forest. You can enjoy the view by crossing the river with the ferry.
Miravet i son Castell Templer by Leonardo di Ferrari.
Arriving in Miravet on the ferry that crosses the Riber Ebro, the last one of its type that has been conserved in the Terres de l’Ebre, is an unique experience.
Today, of course, a medieval tax is no longer charged for the crossing, and though cars are now transported, the ferry still uses the river current as its only driving force.
Making use of a crag, the Moors decided to found the, nowadays, Old Village, and crowning the rock, the great castle, rebuilt by the Knights Templars and transformed into a fortress-monastery, after the conquest of 1153.
It is considered to be the largest fortified complex in Catalonia, and one of the best examples of Romanesque, religious and military, architecture of the Templar order in the whole Western world. It keeps alive the memory of the end of the Knights at the Crown of Aragon, who suffered a 12 month siege, between 1307 and 1308.
Catalan painter Joaquim Mir in Miravet, 1929
The other architectural treasures are in the Old Village, the Old Church by the Hospital order, dating from the Renaissance and unique in its style throughout the Terres de l’Ebre, it conserves the original stone altar from the castle, the remains of wall paintings and somes expositions. In contrast to this, we find the Islamic Arch for the Aljama-mosque in the backside of the church, and the Sanaqueta balcony over the river.
The clay pottery, the most ancestral tradition that is conserved in Miravet and in the Terres de l’Ebre, has for centuries seduced visitors who came to this town, and can now be see in Miravet.
There are still eight workshops, which are located toghether in the Raval quarter. There masters can be found making pieces by hand and still using the potter’s wheel; with shapes and glazes introduced from the Islamic world, such as pitchers,vats and jars.
-The traditional ferry crossing the river without motor.
-The Old village: dockyard, watermill, arcades, Aljama arch, Jewish street, watchtower and Sanaqueta balcony.
-The Old Church (XVI-XVII c.): nowadays, a cultural monument for concerts and exhibitions, temporary and permanent. You can visit it with a local guide from the Information Point.
-The Templar Castle (XII c.): a Government of Catalonia heritage site.
-Blores Route: following medieval paths through archaeological remains to the watermill.
-The potters workshops and the traditional pottery, in Raval Quarter.
Templar is truly a fearless knight, and secure on every side, for his soul is protected by the armor of faith, just as his body is protected by the armor of steel. He is thus doubly armed and need fear neither demons nor men.
The Grandma in el Palau de la Generalitat, Barcelona
The Grandma is visiting the downtown of Barcelona. She likes the city a lot and she enjoys spending some time paying attention about old buildings, ancient cathedrals, spectacular streets and unforgettable statues and gargoyles.
She has stopped her walk to look at the façade of the Catalan Goverment, el Palau de la Generalitat, a beautiful Gothic building which hides an incredible treasure: four Trojan columns.
During the second century (122-123 AC), to celebrate the arrival of Adriano Emperor to the city of Tarraco, nowadays Tarragona, four granite columns arrived from Troja to the capital of the Iberian Empire to be stayed in the Forum.
One thousand nine hundred years later, these columns are visible in the façade of the Catalan Goverment Building named el Palau de la Generalitat.
The granite columns of the Trojan region, nowadays Tróade in Turkey, were during some centuries some of the most known of the Mediterranean. The rich Romans used them to show their social status and economic power.
When the Roman Empire fell, some of their architectural treasures disappeared or were transported to other parts of the old continent.
This is the case of these four columns which stayed in Tarragona until 1598 when the architect Pere Blai, who is considered the most important architect of the Renaissance, transported them to be a part of the façade of el Palau de la Generalitat.
Nowadays, some Trojan columns, sisters of these four can be observed in the Archaeologic Avenue in Tarragona.
Tarraco is the ancient name of the current city of Tarragona in Catalonia. It was the oldest Roman settlement on the Iberian Peninsula, founded during the Second Punic War by Scipio Calvus, and became capital of the Roman province of Hispania Citerior, and of Hispania Tarraconensis during the Roman Empire.
The municipality was inhabited in pre-Roman times by Iberians who had commercial contacts with the Greeks and Phoenicians who settled on the coast. The Iberian colonies were mainly located in the Ebro Valley. Evidence of Iberian colonies in the municipality of Tarragona has been dated to the 5th century BC.
During the Roman Republic, the legal status of Tarraco is not entirely clear. It was probably organized as conventus civium Romanorum during the Republic, with two magistri at its head. Gaius Porcius Cato, consul in the year 114 BC, chose Tarraco as the place of his exile in the year 108, indicating that Tarraco was a free city or perhaps an ally at that time.
In 68 AD Galba, who lived in Tarraco for eight years, was proclaimed emperor in Clunia Sulpicia. The territory, which since ancient times consisted of urban areas and a land divided by tribal organizations, was transformed into areas organized around urban centers, whether in colonies or municipalities, thereby facilitating tax collection. A rapid increase in construction took place, possibly due to the reorganization of the province. The amphitheater, the temple area and the provincial forum at the top of the city were probably built during this period. Most of the statues at these locations were probably placed there between 70 and 180 AD.
In 476, following the collapse of Roman defenses along the Rhine, Tarraco was occupied by the Visigoths and King Euric. There is no evidence of destruction and apparently the capture of the city was relatively quiet. The Visigoths probably took over existing structures by establishing a small group of nobles, which the existence of Christian tombs in this period seems to confirm. The end of the ancient history of the city came with the arrival of the Muslims in 713 or 714.
In 2000, the archaeological ensemble of Tarraco was declared a World heritage site by UNESCO because they meet two criteria:
I. The Roman remains of Tarraco are of exceptional importance in the Roman development of planning and urban design and served as model for provincial capitals elsewhere in the world.
II. Tarraco provides an eloquent and unparalleled testimony in the history of the Mediterranean lands in the Ancient times.
Tarraco urbs est en his oris maritimarum opulentissima - Pomponius Mela
CASTELLERS: FORCE, STRENGTH, BALANCE & COMMON SENSE
Castells, an ancient tradition
A castell is a human tower built traditionally in festivals at many locations within Catalonia. At these festivals, several colles castelleres, group of people who do these towers, often succeed in building and dismantling a tower's structure.
The tradition of building castells originated in the Ball dels Valencians in Valls, near the city of Tarragona, first documented in 1712. Over the course of the 18th century, they spread to other towns and cities in the area, including Vilafranca del Penedès and Tarragona, though it wasn't until the last 50 years that the practice of building castells began to spread to the rest of Catalonia.
A castell is considered a success when stages of its assembling and disassembling, can be done in complete succession. The assembly is complete once all castellers have climbed into their designated places, and the enxaneta, the smallest child, climbs into place at the top and raises one hand with four fingers erect, in a gesture said to symbolize the stripes of the Catalan flag. The enxaneta then climbs down the other side of the castell, after which the remaining levels of castellers descend in highest-to-lowest order until all have reached safety.
Aside from the people who climb to form the upper parts of the tower, others are needed to form the pinya, or bottom base of the castell, to sustain its weight. Members of the also act as a safety net if the tower structure collapses, cushioning the fall of people from the upper levels.
The castell is built in two phases. First, the pinya, the base of the tower, is formed. People forming higher levels of the tower move to a position from which they can easily get to their place in the tower. This is done slowly and carefully, and as subsequent base levels are completed the castellers in the pinya determine if their base is solid enough for construction to continue. Then, when the signal to proceed is given, bands begin to play the traditional Toc de Castells music as a hush comes over spectators of the event. The upper layers of the tower are built as quickly as possible in order to put minimal strain on the lower castellers, who bear most of the weight of the castell. The disassembly of the castell, done amidst the cheering of the crowd, is often the most treacherous stage of the event.
Castellers de Vilafranca in Tower Bridge, London
There is a form of the Castell, generally referred to as rising, in which each successive layer is added from the bottom by lifting the castell into the air, stage by stage. It is held that this form takes even more skill and strength and a great deal of practice.
The sash, faixa, is the most important part of their outfit, since it supports the lower back and is used by other castellers in the team as a foothold or handhold when climbing up the tower. This tasselled piece of cloth varies in length and width and depends on the casteller's position inside the tower and also on choice. The length of the sash ranges from 1.5 to 12 m, and usually is shorter for those higher up in the castell. Performing castellers usually go barefoot as to minimise injuries upon each other as they climb to their position and also for sensitivity when balancing and to have better feel and hold each other.
The arrangement of castellers can be into a multi-tiered structure and the highest has a height spanning of nine or ten people from ground up.
The motto of Castellers is Força, equilibri, valor i seny (Strength, balance, courage and common sense).
Castellers in front of Big Ben
Strength: A casteller is usually a stocky person. The first castellers were peasants that were accustomed to holding great weights and were under much physical exertion.
Courage: The most important characteristic for castellers, especially for young children forming the highest levels of the castell.
Balance: For supporting other above in the castell while relying on those below for support requires a strong sense of balance and trust.
Common sense: Rehearsing and performing requires a great deal of planning and reasoning. Any error can cause the structure to fail and break apart.
Nowadays, there are more than 100 colles castelleres, some of them are placed out of Catalonia: London (UK), Andorra, París (France), Montreal (Canada), Hangzhou (China) or Santiago (Chile).
On November 16, 2010, castells were declared by UNESCO to be amongst the Masterpieces of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity with these criteria:
I. Human towers are recognized by Catalan people as an integral part of their cultural identity, transmitted from generation from generation and providing community members a sense of continuity, social cohesion and solidarity.
II. Their inscription on the Representative List could promote intangible cultural heritage as a means of reinforcing social cohesion, while encouraging respect for cultural dialogue and human creativity.
.jpg)
.JPG)
