Capital City of Spain
Madrid is the Capital city of Spain and the Community of Madrid, which is uni provincial. Also known as La Villa y Corte, it is the largest and most populated city in the country, officially reaching 3,213,271 inhabitants within its municipality, while the unofficial figure of the registry as of January 1, 2009, is 3,273,006 according to An 6,043,031 in its metropolitan area, being, therefore, the third most populated city of the European Union – behind Berlin and London and the third metropolitan area, behind those of Paris and London.
Interesting facts about Madrid
History
Prehistory
Although no human fossil remains have been found, a great variety of tools have been found, especially in the surroundings of Arganda del Rey and Manzanares, which allow to prove the existence of human settlements in the terraces of the river in the place that today Occupy the city.
Roman age
The conquest and colonization by Rome of the Iberian peninsula , carried out initially like Roman military maneuver in its long series of wars with Carthage , lasts almost 200 years, from the Second Punic War until 27 a. N. and. In which they complete the pacification of the north of the territory and divide it into three provinces. The region that currently occupies Madrid would be located in Tarraconense.
Muslim time
In the second half of the 9th century , the emir of Cordova Muhammad I (852-886) built a fortress on a promontory by the river for the purpose of monitoring the footsteps of the Sierra de Guadarrama and being a starting point for razzias against the kingdoms Christians of the North. Next to the fortress, the town is developed towards the south. This population is called Magrit, which seems to be an Arabization of the Romance name Matrice, “matrix”, in reference to a stream of that name that crossed the primitive city.
Many of the various archaeological works developed in the city from the middle of the nineteenth century onwards, they have found remains such as the Arab wall of the Cuesta de la Vega,the watchtower of the Plaza de Oriente and the vestiges of a water trip of the Plaza Of the Cars. In the Arab Madrid, Maslama al-Mayriti , called “the Euclides Andalusi” , was born inthe 10th century , a notable astronomer and founder of a mathematical school in Cordoba .
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Christianity
With the fall of the taifa kingdom of Toledo in the hands of Alfonso VI of Leon and Castile, the city was taken by the Christian forces in 1085 without resistance, probably by capitulation. The city and its alfoz were integrated in the kingdom of Castile like realengo territories. Christians replace Muslims in the occupation of the central part of the city, leaving the suburbs or suburbs, which in the previous period were inhabited by a Mozarabic community, as it would die. During the next century, Madrid continues to receive attacks from the new Muslim powers of the peninsula, the Almoravids, which burned the cityin 1109 and the Almohads, which put it siege in 1197.
From this time came two outstanding religious facts that mark the development of the personality of popular Christianity in Madrid: the “discovery” of the image of the Virgen de la Almudena and the “miraculous” life of Isidro Labrador , who would later be canonized. The city is prospering and receives the title of town in 1123. Following the habitual repopulation scheme in Castile, Madrid is constituted in council, head of a community of town and land, the community of town and land of Madrid.
The government of the city falls to all the locals with the rank of neighbors, meeting in open council until in 1346 , King Alfonso XI implants the regiment, in which already only representatives of the local oligarchy, the regidores, govern the city . In 1152, King Alfonso VII established the boundaries of the village and land community, between the rivers Guadarrama and Jarama. In 1188, a representation of Madrid participates for the first time in the Courts of Castile. In 1202, Alfonso VIII granted his first municipal jurisdiction, which regulated the functioning of the council, and whose powers were extended in 1222 by Fernando III el Santo.
Geography
Location
The city of Madrid is located in the central part of the Iberian Peninsula, a few kilometers north of the Cerro de los Ángeles, the geographical center of the city. The coordinates of the city are 40 ° 26’N 3 ° 41’O / 40.433, -3.683 and its average height above sea level is 667 m, thus being one of the highest capitals in Europe.
The geographical and climatic context of Madrid is that of the South Sub-Plateau, within the Central Plateau. The city is located a few kilometers from the Sierra de Guadarrama and is located hydrographically in the basin of the Tagus.
Weather
The climate of Madrid is a continental Mediterranean climate and is strongly influenced by urban conditions. The average temperature is 12 ° C. Winters are cold, with temperatures below 4-5 ° C, frequent frost and occasional snow.
Summers are hot with averages around 24 ° C in July and August and with maximums sometimes exceeding 35 ° C.
Economy
The city of Madrid had in 2003 a Gross Domestic Product of 79.785.000.000 €, supposing 10% of the national income. Of the economic sectors of the city, the most important is the tertiary or services sector, which already represents 85.09% of the city’s economy. Within this sector, financial services (31.91% of total GDP) and commercial activities (31.84% of total GDP) stand out. The rest of the GDP is contributed by industry (8.96% of total GDP), the construction sector (5.93% of total GDP). Agriculture has a residual character, so that it contributes only 0.03% of the total.
Tourism
Madrid was in 2006 the sixth most visited city in Europe and the second in Spain to hostmore than 3.9 million tourists that year. It is also home to the World Tourism Organization and the International Tourism Fair.
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