Picos de EuropaThe Picos de Europa ("Peaks of Europe", also the Picos) are a mountain range extending for about , forming part of the Cantabrian Mountains in northern Spain. The range is situated in the Autonomous Communities of Asturias, Cantabria and Castile and León. The highest peak is Torre de Cerredo, at an elevation of 2650m (8,690 ft). A widely accepted origin for the name is that they were the first sight of Europe for ships arriving from the Americas. The name can be traced to Lucio Marineo Sículo, who mentioned the Rupes Europae in 1530.
Spanish pesetaThe peseta (pəˈseɪtə, peˈseta) was the currency of Spain between 1868 and 2002. Along with the French franc, it was also a de facto currency used in Andorra (which had no national currency with legal tender). The name of the currency originally comes from peceta, a Catalan diminutive form of the (Catalan) word peça (lit. piece, i.e. a coin), not from the Spanish peso (lit. weight). The word peseta has been known as early as 1737 to colloquially refer to the coin worth 2 reales provincial or of a peso.
Leonese languageLeonese (Llionés, Lleonés) is a set of vernacular Romance language varieties currently spoken in northern and western portions of the historical region of León in Spain (the modern provinces of León, Zamora, and Salamanca) and a few adjoining areas in Portugal. In this narrow sense, Leonese is distinct from the dialects grouped under the Asturian language. There is no real linguistic division, though; it is only a purely political and identitary division, as dialectal areas (western, central, eastern...
AvilésAvilés (aβiˈles; aβɪˈleθ) is a town in Asturias, Spain. Avilés is, along with Oviedo and Gijón, one of the main cities in the Principality of Asturias. The town occupies the flattest land in the municipality, partially in a land that belonged to the sea, surrounded by small promontories, all of them having an altitude of less than 140 metres. Situated in the Avilés estuary, in the Northern Central area of the Asturian coast, west of Peñas Cape, is its national seaport. Avilés is mainly an industrial city.
Spanish LegionFor centuries, Spain recruited foreign soldiers to its army, forming the foreign regiments (Infantería de línea extranjera) such as the Regiment of Hibernia (formed in 1709 from Irishmen who fled their own country in the wake of the Flight of the Earls and the penal laws). However, the specific unit of the Spanish Army and Spain's Rapid Reaction Force, now known as the Spanish Legion (Legión Española, La Legión), and informally known as the Tercio or the Tercios, is a 20th-century creation.
Gaspar Melchor de JovellanosGaspar Melchor de Jovellanos (born Gaspar Melchor de Jove y Llanos, 5 January 1744 – 27 November 1811) was a Spanish neoclassical statesman, author, philosopher and a major figure of the Age of Enlightenment in Spain. Gaspar Melchor de Jovellanos (pseudonym Jovino) was born at Gijón in Asturias, Spain. Selecting law as his profession, he studied at Oviedo, Ávila, and the University of Alcalá, before becoming a criminal judge at Seville in 1767.
LusitaniaLusitania (ˌluːsɪˈteɪniə; luːsiːˈtaːnia) was an ancient Iberian Roman province comprising part of modern Portugal (south of the Douro River) and a large portion of western Spain (the present Extremadura and Province of Salamanca). It was named after the Lusitanians, an Indo-European tribe that lived in the region prior to the arrival of the Romans. Its capital was Emerita Augusta (currently Mérida, Spain), and it was initially part of the Roman Republic province of Hispania Ulterior before it became a province of its own in the Roman Empire.
MontevideoMontevideo (ˌmɒntɪvɪˈdeɪoʊ, USalso-'vɪdioʊ; monteβiˈðeo) is the capital and largest city of Uruguay. According to the 2011 census, the city proper has a population of 1,319,108 (about one-third of the country's total population) in an area of . Montevideo is situated on the southern coast of the country, on the northeastern bank of the Río de la Plata. The city was established in 1724 by a Spanish soldier, Bruno Mauricio de Zabala, as a strategic move amidst the Spanish-Portuguese dispute over the platine region.
AsturiansAsturians (asturianos) are a Celto-Romance ethnic group native to the autonomous community of Asturias, in the North-West of the Iberian Peninsula. Asturians are directly descended from the Astures, who were Celtic inhabitants of the northwest Iberian Peninsula before the conquest of the peninsula by the Romans which resulted in their Latinization. By the early Middle Ages, their Celtic language had fallen into disuse and was replaced by a Latin-derived language still spoken today called Asturian.
Asturian miners' strike of 1934The Asturian miners' strike of 1934 was a major strike action undertaken by miners in Asturias against the new CEDA-led government, from October 4-19. The strike and subsequent demonstrations eventually developed into a violent revolutionary uprising in an attempt to overthrow the conservative regime. The revolutionaries took over Asturias by force, killing many of the province's police and religious leaders. Armed with dynamite, rifles, and machine guns, they destroyed religious buildings, such as churches and convents.
