Second Spanish Republic & Civil War

Castile and the unified Spanish monarchy.

1 chapter

1833 - 1931

The Renaixença—a romantic-nationalist cultural revival—began reconstructing a mythologized medieval Catalan past, projecting modern national identity backward onto medieval symbols. The restoration of the Jocs Florals poetry competition in 1859 in Barcelona was the movement's founding gesture. The sardana, originally a localized Empordà dance, was standardized and promoted as a national Catalan symbol; a 'legendary origin' claiming ancient Greek roots was invented to link it to Empúries and Classical antiquity—an imagined tradition. La Mercè became an official civic holiday in 1871 when Barcelona's city council first organized special activities for the feast of Our Lady of Mercy. The Arc de Triomf, built as the gateway to the 1888 Universal Exposition, announced Barcelona's European ambitions. The Palau de la Música Catalana (1908) crowned the Modernisme movement in architecture. Santiago Rusiñol transformed Sitges into a Modernista salon at Cau Ferrat, linking artistic avant-garde with the town's pre-Lenten carnival (carnestoltes). The Sant Jordi book tradition was proposed in 1926 by Valencian Vicent Clavel—initially a Spanish-national initiative under Alfonso XIII—adding a literary layer to the rose fair at the Palau de la Generalitat (documented since 1427). In 1881, the Pope proclaimed the Virgin of Montserrat patron of Catalonia on the Catalan national day, fusing Catholic devotion and national identity. La Santa Espina, the most emblematic sardana (composed 1907), was banned in 1924 by Primo de Rivera for its Catalanist connotations—the first major suppression-revival episode of the 20th century.

1939 - 1975

The Franco dictatorship (1939-1975) suppressed Catalan language, institutions, and public symbols—renaming Sant Jordi as 'Fiesta de las Letras,' banning Els Segadors and La Santa Espina, prohibiting the Diada. But suppression and co-optation coexisted: the sardana was temporarily prohibited in the 1940s for fomenting 'false feelings of pride and superiority' but was later folklorized—permitted as depoliticized tourist spectacle, separating it from its Catalanist meaning. Casteller collas continued practicing through the dictatorship; Castellers de Vilafranca was founded in September 1948 by Oriol Rossell, building on the increased interest in human towers in Vilafranca del Penedès. La Patum Infantil was founded in 1956—during Franco—ensuring generational transmission. Montserrat Abbey became the critical sanctuary: the Benedictine monks published books and journals in Catalan, conducted prayers in Catalan, and sheltered intellectuals and clandestine political activists. In 1970, artists and academics held a sit-in at Montserrat protesting death sentences for Basque ETA prisoners. The Museu de l'Exili at La Jonquera, on the French border, documents the Republican exile route—how half a million refugees crossed these mountains in 1939, and how exile communities in France and Mexico kept Catalan language and cultural memory alive abroad. Òmnium Cultural, founded in 1961, operated in the gray zone between permitted cultural activity and political resistance. The post-1975 festival revival drew on living practice that had survived through discretion and folklorization—not just romantic reconstruction, but practice shaped by 36 years of suppression and accommodation.

1714 - 1833

The Nueva Planta decrees (1714-1716) abolished Catalan institutions, the Diputació del General, and the University of Barcelona, replacing them with a centralized Bourbon administration. Philip V established the University of Cervera in 1717—the only university permitted in Catalonia—as a reward for the town's loyalty, a Bourbon institutional imposition rather than a Catalan achievement. Yet popular culture evolved in the cracks: the Ball dels Valencians in Valls, first documented in 1712, gradually transformed into the castell (human tower) tradition, building on the older Valencian Muixeranga but developing a secularized, competitive, and much taller form. La Bulla (later La Patum) was referenced in 1715 and renamed 'La Patum' between 1795 and 1809—the moment when popular festival broke from its official Corpus Christi frame. Montjuïc Castle was converted into a military fortress watching over the subdued city. The early cotton industry began transforming the landscape, planting the seeds of an industrial working class that would later reshape festival culture from below.

From 1975

After Franco's death in 1975, Catalonia's democratic revival activated traditions with new political meaning—each revival a reinterpretation, not a return to pre-suppression form. The Diada was reinstated in 1980 as the first law of the restored Parliament of Catalonia, held annually on September 11 with a floral offering at the Rafael Casanova monument. La Patum received UNESCO inscription as a Masterpiece of Oral and Intangible Heritage in 2005; castells followed in 2010. La Mercè was reformatted as Barcelona's major civic festa major—now featuring correfocs (fire runs, a late-1970s elaboration of medieval ball de diables devil dances), castellers, gegants, and neighborhood celebrations. The correfoc's medieval roots in ball de diables are plausible but the direct chain is poorly documented; the term gained traction only in the late 1970s. Sitges' carnestoltes evolved from pre-Lenten Catholic carnival into an internationally renowned event. The Val d'Aran—Catalonia's northwestern Pyrenean valley with its own Aranese Occitan language (~2,600 speakers) and Gascon Pyrenean festival traditions distinct from Catalan ones—gained official recognition of its linguistic autonomy. In Girona, the medieval Jewish quarter (call) was recovered through archaeology and memory projects since the late 20th century; the Bonastruc ça Porta center now presents the Jewish heritage that was erased after 1391/1492. The 1992 Barcelona Olympics opening ceremony, featuring castells, was a paradigmatic moment of institutional projection—amplifying the tradition while instrumentalizing it. Today, you can experience casteller competitions in Valls and Vilafranca del Penedès, La Patum's fire and drum ecstasy in Berga each Corpus Christi, Sant Joan bonfires on Barcelona's beaches each June 23, Santa Tecla's ten-day festival amid Tarragona's Roman ruins, and the Diada's contested commemoration each September 11—all living practices whose current forms are products of the suppression-and-revival cycle that shaped them.