Region of Murcia
The Region of Murcia is an autonomous community of Spain located in the southeastern part of the Iberian Peninsula, on the Mediterranean coast. The region has an area of and a population of 1,568,492 as of 2024. About a third of its population lives in the capital, Murcia. At, the region's highest point is Los Obispos Peak in the Revolcadores Massif.
A jurisdiction of the Crown of Castile since the Middle Ages, the Kingdom of Murcia was replaced in the 19th century by territory primarily belonging to the provinces of Albacete and Murcia. The former two were henceforth attached to a 'historical region' also named after Murcia. The province of Murcia constituted as the full-fledged single-province autonomous community of the Region of Murcia in 1982.
The region is bordered by Andalusia, Castile La Mancha, the Valencian Community, and the Mediterranean Sea. The autonomous community is a single province. The city of Murcia is the capital of the region and the seat of the regional government, but the legislature, known as the Regional Assembly of Murcia, is located in Cartagena. The region is subdivided into municipalities.
The region is among Europe's largest producers of fruits, vegetables, and flowers, with important vineyards in the municipalities of Jumilla, Bullas, and Yecla that produce wines of Denominación de origen. It also has an important tourism sector concentrated on its Mediterranean coastline, which features the Mar Menor saltwater lagoon. Industries include the petrochemical and energy sector and food production. Because of Murcia's warm climate, the region's long growing season is suitable for agriculture; however, rainfall is low. As a result, in addition to the water needed for crops, there are increasing pressures related to the booming tourist industry. Water is supplied by the Segura River and, since the 1970s, by the Tagus-Segura Water Transfer, a major civil-engineering project that brings water from the Tagus River into the Segura under environmental and sustainability restraints.
Notable features of the region's extensive cultural heritage include 72 cave art ensembles, which are part of the rock art of the Iberian Mediterranean Basin, a World Heritage Site. Other culturally significant features include the Council of Wise Men of the plain of Murcia and the tamboradas of Moratalla and Mula, which were declared intangible cultural heritage by UNESCO. The region is also the home of Caravaca de la Cruz, a holy city in the Catholic Church that celebrates the Perpetual Jubilee every seven years in the Santuario de la Vera Cruz.
Toponymy and denomination
The toponym Murcia is of uncertain origin. According to Francisco Cascales, it could refer to the Roman goddess Venus Murcia, from the myrtles on the banks of the Segura River. Historical studies conclude that, like the deity, Murcia is of Latin origin deriving most likely from Myrtea or Murtea. Furthermore, Mursiya, was the adaptation in the Arabic of the pre-existing Latin. According to Bienvenido Mascaray, it is also possible that the name originates from the Iberian language in the form m-ur-zia, meaning 'the water that empowers or moistens.'The use of "Murcia" to define the present region has its origin in the Taifa of Murcia, an Arab kingdom that existed at different times in the 11th, 12th, and 13th centuries. After the Christian conquest of Murcia between 1243 and 1266, the Kingdom of Murcia emerged, a territorial jurisdiction that formed its own institutions until its demise in 1833.
After the provincial administrative reform of 1833, the first Region of Murcia was formed from the provinces of Albacete and Murcia. In the first attempt at decentralization, during the First Republic, this region was one of the 17 member states that were contemplated by the Spanish Draft Constitution of 1873, proclaiming during that year the so-called Cantón Murciano, as an attempt to form a regional canton in the context of the Cantonal rebellion.
In 1978, the Regional Council of Murcia was created as a pre-autonomous body, in effect until 1982, when the Statute of Autonomy of the Region of Murcia was approved. The province of Murcia was then granted autonomy under the official name of the Autonomous Community of the Region of Murcia in the framework of the political process in place during the Spanish transition to democracy.
History
Prehistory and Ancient Era
Since the Lower Paleolithic era, the Region of Murcia has been inhabited by humans, with Neanderthal remains found in the Sima de las Palomas site in the south east of the region. The Argaric culture one of the most developed cultures of the Metal Ages, flourished into the early Bronze Age, with the site of La Bastida in the southwest of the region being a prominent example. Later, the Iberians were present in this territory during the Middle and Late Bronze Age and remained until very early in ancient history, before the Romans conquered a large part of the Iberian Peninsula.Image:Teatro romano cartagena.jpg|thumb|left|upright=1.14|Roman Theatre, Cartagena
In 227 BC, Carthaginians settled in what is now Cartagena with the mountainous territory merely the hinterland of their seacoast empire although in 209 BC it was conquered by the Romans and was incorporated into the province of Hispania Carthaginensis. During the Roman era, Carthago Nova was the most important place in the region, and there are still remains of ancient villas in the Campo de Cartagena. The Romans built a salt factory and settled in a little town called Ficaria, in the current municipality of Mazarrón. Altiplano and Noroeste comarcas both contain surviving dwellings of the Romans.
In the early 5th century, the Vandals together with the Suebi and Alans invaded the Iberian Peninsula with the Vandals settling in the region. The Roman Empire successfully proposed an alliance with the Visigoths to recover its lost Spanish land in return for goods and territory. The Vandals fled to North Africa and the Visigoths federated to the Roman Empire in a kingdom that stretched from Gibraltar to the Loire River. The Visigothic kingdom became independent of the Roman Empire in 476.
In 555 AD, the Byzantines, under the emperor Justinian the Great, conquered the southeastern coast of the Iberian Peninsula and established the province of Spania. Part of the current Region of Murcia belonged to the province and therefore to the Eastern Roman or Byzantine Empire. The current of Campo Cartagena-Mar Menor and Alto Guadalentín also belonged to the province.
Moorish Middle Ages
In the early 8th century there was a disputed succession to the Visigothic throne. The king Wittiza wanted his son Agila to be his successor, but the nobles of the court elected Roderic, duke of Baetica, as king. The people in favour of Agila conspired to overthrow Roderic. They asked the Moors for help and promised spoils of war in return.The Moors began conquering the Iberian Peninsula in 711. Roderic was killed, and the Visigothic kingdom disappeared. Consequently, the Moors quickly conquered much of the peninsula.
Theodemir led a nucleus of resistance in almost all the current region and the south of Alicante province. In 713, he signed the Treaty of Orihuela, because the resistance could no longer endure. The territory came under Muslim rule, but the conquerors granted it political autonomy.
Under the Moors, who introduced the large-scale irrigation upon which Murcian agriculture relies, the province was known as Todmir. According to Idrisi, the 12th century Arab cartographer based in Sicily, it included the cities of Orihuela, Lorca, Mula, and Chinchilla.
File:Ibn Hud, Cantigas de Santa Maria 169.jpg|thumb|upright|Ibn Hud as depicted in the Cantigas de Santa Maria
In the early 11th century, after the fall of the Umayyad Caliphate of Córdoba, a territory centered on the city of Murcia became an independent principality, or taifa. At one point, the taifa included parts of the present-day provinces of Albacete and Almería, as well.
After the 1086 Battle of Sagrajas, the Almoravid emirate swallowed up the taifas. When Almoravid rule ultimately declined, Abu ʿAbd Allāh Muḥammad ibn Saʿd ibn Mardanīš established a taifa—including the cities of Murcia, Valencia, and Dénia—that opposed for a time the spread of the Almohads, but ultimately succumbed to the latter's advance in the 1170s. Conversely, when the Almohads receded after their defeat in the 1212 Battle of Las Navas de Tolosa, another taifa-prince based in Murcia, Ibn Hud, rebelled against Almohad rule and briefly controlled most of Al-Andalus.
Christian Middle Ages and early modern period
received the submission of the Moorish king of Murcia under the terms of the 1243 Treaty of Alcaraz and made the territory a protectorate of the Crown of Castile. There were towns that rejected compliance with the treaty, such as Qartayanna-Al halfa, Lurqa and Mula. There were also towns where governors accepted the treaty but the inhabitants did not, such as Aledo, Ricote, Uruyla, and Medina La-Quant,. In 1245, a Castilian army and a fleet from the Cantabrian Sea conquered Qartayanna. Consequently, the rest of the rebellious towns were also taken by the Castilians. Following the support of local Muslims for the Mudéjar revolt of 1264–1266, in 1266 Alfonso X of Castile annexed the territory outright with critical military support from his uncle Jaime I of Aragon.The Castilian conquest of Murcia marked the end of the Aragon's southward expansion along the Iberian Mediterranean coast. The kingdom of Murcia was repopulated with people from Christian territories by giving them land.
James II of Aragon broke an agreement between the Castile and Aragon regarding the division of territory between the two kingdoms and, from 1296 to 1302, conquered Alicante, Elche, Orihuela, Murcia, Cartagena, and Lorca. In consequence of those victories, James II and Ferdinand IV of Castile agreed to the Treaty of Torrellas, which stipulated the return of the conquered territory to Castile, save for the towns of Cartagena, Orihuela, Elche, and Alicante. In 1305, Cartagena was returned to Castile. The kingdom of Murcia lost the territory of the current province of Alicante.
The Castilian monarchs proceeded to delegate power over the whole Kingdom of Murcia to a senior officer called the Adelantado. The kingdom of Murcia was divided into religious manors, nobility manors, and señoríos de realengo. There were two noble lineages during the Late Middle Ages and the modern period: Los Manueles and Los Fajardos.
The Kingdom of Murcia was adjacent to the Emirate of Granada, which provoked several Muslim raids and wars that occurred mainly during the 15th century.
In the early 16th century, the population increased in the Kingdom of Murcia. There were three plague epidemics during the century, but they did not severely affect the region. In the first third of the century, the Revolt of the Comuneros occurred. Some places that supported the revolt were towns in the present-day Castile and León and Castilla-La Mancha regions. In the Kingdom of Murcia, the revolutionary towns were Murcia, Cartagena, Lorca, Caravaca, Cehegín, and Totana. The castle of Aledo defended the monarchy. In 1521, the Revolt of the Comuneros was defeated.
In the early 17th century, King Philip III of Spain expelled all the Moriscos from Valencia, Aragon, and Castille. During this century, two plague epidemics also occurred.
During the 18th century, Francisco Salzillo was a notable Baroque artist in the Kingdom of Murcia. He made carvings with religious imagery.