Zaragoza
Zaragoza, traditionally known in English as Saragossa, is the capital city of the province of Zaragoza and of the autonomous community of Aragon, Spain. It lies by the Ebro river and its tributaries, the Huerva and the Gállego, roughly in the centre of both Aragon and the Ebro basin.
In the 1st century BCE, Romans founded the colony of Caesaraugusta over the Sedetani settlement of Salduie. The city was the capital of the Upper March of Al-Andalus under Umayyad rule, later thriving as a capital of a rump state ruled by the Banu Hud, the taifa of Zaragoza. It swiftly became the political and spiritual centre of the Kingdom of Aragon after the 1118 Christian conquest, and its inhabitants managed to preserve and consolidate initially granted privileges over the course of the Late Middle Ages.
As of 2025, Zaragoza had a population of 699,007 inhabitants, making it the fourth most populous in Spain, on a land area of and is the centre of a metropolitan area of around 0.76 million. The municipality is home to more than 50 percent of the Aragonese population. The city lies at an elevation of about above sea level.
Zaragoza hosted Expo 2008 in mid-2008, a world's fair on water and sustainable development. It was also a candidate for the European Capital of Culture in 2012.
The city is famous for its folklore, local cuisine, and landmarks such as the Basílica del Pilar, La Seo Cathedral and the Aljafería Palace. Together with La Seo and the Aljafería, several other buildings form part of the Mudéjar Architecture of Aragon which is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The Fiestas del Pilar are among the most celebrated festivals in Spain.
Etymology
The Iberian town that preceded Roman colonisation was called Salduie or Salduba. The Romans and Greeks called the ancient city Caesaraugusta, from which derive the Arabic name سرقسطة Saraqusṭa, the medieval Çaragoça, and the modern Zaragoza.History
The Sedetani, a tribe of ancient Iberians, populated a village called .Roman Caesaraugusta
founded the city as Caesaraugusta between 25 BC and 11 BC as a colony to settle army veterans from the Cantabrian wars. As a Roman city, it had all the typical public buildings: forum, baths, theatre, and was an important economic centre. Many Roman ruins can still be seen in Zaragoza today.It is thought it might have been the Apostle James who had built a chapel on the site of the Cathedral-Basilica of Our Lady of the Pillar.
On the spot where Saint Engratia and her companions were said to have been martyred on Valerian's orders was the Church of Santa Engracia de Zaragoza. Only the crypt and the doorway survived the Peninsular War. Around the early 20th century it was rebuilt, and is now a functioning parish church.
Middle Ages
Despite the general decline of the last centuries of the Roman empire, Zaragoza suffered little. Capture by the Goths in the fifth century AD was without significant bloodshed or destruction.In the eighth century, following the Umayyad conquest of the Iberian Peninsula, Zaragoza became the capital of the Upper March of al-Andalus.
In 1018, amid the collapse of the Caliphate of Córdoba, Zaragoza became an independent Taifa of Zaragoza, initially controlled by the Tujibid family, then ruled by the Banu Hud from 1039. The taifa greatly prospered in a cultural and political sense in the late 11th century, and being later governed by Ahmad al-Muqtadir, Yusuf al-Mu'taman ibn Hud and Al-Musta'in II. It fell to the Almoravids in 1110.
On 18 December 1118, Alfonso I of Aragon conquered the city from the Almoravids, and made it the capital of the Kingdom of Aragon. The aforementioned monarch created a jurisdictional dominion in the city, which was gifted to Gaston of Béarn. The city remained a lordship up until the early 13th century.
Jewish community
There was a Jewish community in medieval Zaragoza, a notable center where yeshivas also incorporated the study of philosophy alongside Talmud studies. In the 11th century, the city was home to several notable Jewish physicians, including Menahem ibn al-Fawwal and Jonah ibn Janah, the latter of whom also gained renown as a Hebrew grammarian. Ibn Janah authored Kitāb al-Talkhīṣ, which included detailed descriptions of drugs, weights and measures used in medicine. Another prominent figure was Jonah ibn Biklārish, who served as court physician to Sultan Al-Musta'in II and authored Kitāb al-Musta'īnī, a drug manual written in table form that included names and properties of drugs.The Jewish community of Zaragoza had seven synagogues, two of which are known by location today: Le Mayor and the synagogue "de los Callizos" or "de Cehán." The community was spared from the 1391 pogroms, in large part due to the presence of the king and the intervention of the prominent Jewish leader Ḥasdai Crescas. In 1481, the Crown appointed the monk Miguel Ferrer to enforce the segregation of Jewish households in Zaragoza, but his extreme cruelty led King Ferdinand II to remove him from the post. On 29 April 1492, the Crown's decision to expel the Jews was announced in Zaragoza to the kingdom's procurators, two days before the Edict of Expulsion was formally proclaimed in Castile. The city's rabbi, Açach Chaqon, was ordered on 13 May to leave the Jewish quarter within a day and the kingdom within three. Most of the Jewish community eventually departed Zaragoza between 27 and 29 July, traveling to the port of Sagunto to go into exile.
In the months following the expulsion, the Crown and the Inquisition supervised the confiscation and transfer of communal property, including Torah scrolls, silver crowns, decorative cloths, and other ritual objects, many of which were dismantled, redistributed, or given to city authorities and religious institutions. In late 1493, Zaragoza formally received the Jewish quarter and its associated buildings.
Early modern history
An outbreak of bubonic plague decimated the city in 1564. It reportedly killed about 10,000 people out of an estimated population of 25–30,000.In the context of the 1701–1714 War of the Spanish Succession, the city rose in arms in favour of the Archduke Charles, who was proclaimed "King of Aragon" in the city on 29 June 1706, following the uprising of other parts of the Kingdom of Aragon in December 1705. Charles entered the city in July 1706, directing the attack on those places of Aragon that had sided with the Bourbon faction such as Borja or the Cinco Villas. Following the April 1707 battle at Almansa, the tide turned with the Austracist forces fleeing in disarray, and the Bourbon forces commanded by the Duke of Orléans entering the city on 26 May 1707. As he seized control of the kingdom, he began to enact the series of institutional reforms known as the Nueva Planta, abolishing the Aragonese institutions in favour of the Castilian ones. The war turned around again in 1710 after the Battle of Almenar, and, following another Bourbon defeat near Zaragoza on 20 August 1710, Archduke Charles returned to the city on the next day. This was for only a brief period, though, as following the entry of Philip V in Madrid and the ensuing Battle of Villaviciosa in December 1710, the Habsburg armies fled from Zaragoza in haste in December 1710 and Philip V proceeded to consolidate his rule over the kingdom of Aragon, resuming administrative reforms after a period of institutional void.
An important food riot caused by the high price of bread and other necessity goods took place in the city in April 1766, the so-called motín de los broqueleros, named after the repressive agents, volunteer farmers and craftsmen who wielded swords and bucklers. The repression left about 300 wounded, 200 detainees and 8 deaths and it was followed by 17 public executions, and an indeterminate number of killings at the dungeons of the Aljafería.
Late Modern history
Zaragoza suffered two famous sieges during the Peninsular War against the Napoleonic army: a first from June to August 1808; and a second from December 1808 to February 1809, surrendering only after some 50,000 defenders had died.Railway transport came to Zaragoza on 16 September 1861 with the inauguration of the Barcelona–Zaragoza line with the arrival of a train from the former city to the Estación del Norte. The Madrid–Zaragoza line was opened a year and a half later, on 16 May 1863.
The July 1936 coup d'état triumphed in the city. After the military uprising in Africa on 17 July, the military command easily attained its objectives in Zaragoza in the early morning of 19 July, despite the city's status as stronghold of organised labour, as the civil governor critically refused to give weapons to the people in time. Many refugees, including members of the provincial committees of parties and unions, fled to Caspe, the capital of the territory of Aragon, which was still controlled by the Republic.
The rearguard violence committed by the putschists, with at least 12 murders on 19 July, would only go in crescendo along the beginning of the conflict. Thus one of the two big cities under Rebel control since the early stages of the Spanish Civil War along with Seville, Zaragoza profited from an increasing industrial production vis-à-vis the war economy, playing a key role for the Francoist faction as ammunition manufacturer.
The General Military Academy, a higher training center of the Spanish Army, was re-established on 27 September 1940 by José Enrique Varela, the Francoist Minister of the Army.
The 1953 Accords ensued with the installment of a joint US–Spain air base in Zaragoza.
Following the declaration of Zaragoza as Polo de Desarrollo Industrial by the regime in 1964, the city doubled in population in a short time. The increase in population ran parallel to the rural flight and depopulation in the rest of Aragon.
In 1979, a fire at the Hotel Corona de Aragón fire killed at least 80 people, including members of the family of Francisco Franco. The armed Basque nationalist and separatist organization ETA carried out the Zaragoza barracks bombing in 1987 which killed eleven people, including a number of children, leading to 250,000 people taking part in demonstrations in the city.
Since 1982, the city has been home to a large factory built by General Motors for the production of Opel cars, some of which are exported to the United Kingdom and sold under the Vauxhall brand. The city took advantage of the entry of Spain into the European Communities.