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About Spain
Location: Situated on the Iberian Peninsula to the South of France and the West of Portugal, Spain has miles of coastline with both the Atlantic Ocean and the Mediterranean Sea. Spain is one of the largest southern European countries and a part of the European Union. To the south the country is connected to Gibraltar by the mainland and taking this route would then lead you across to Morocco in North Africa. To the north Spain has borders with Andorra and is flanked by the Bay of Biscay. Off the east coast another Spanish territory is encompassed in the Balearic Islands such as Mallorca and Ibiza.
Known as the Kingdom of Spain, the country has had a monarchy for centuries. Today that constitutional monarchy still rules along with a parliamentary democracy. Spain was once the world's most powerful empire after conquering most of South America, plundering its wealth and leaving them the Spanish language as a legacy. The name Spain probably comes from the ancient Roman word for the Iberian Peninsula – Hispania, but there are many possibilities and it could also be a Basque derivative. The Romans were just one of many conquering races to take over Iberia, and after Germanic peoples invaded during the Middle Ages the Muslims made an indelible mark on Spain. Their legacy can be seen in beautiful and ornate structures such as the Alhambra palace in Granada. It was not until 1492 that the Christians finally repelled them, which was also the year when the explorer Christopher Columbus found the Americas. Over the next 200 hundred years Spain's empire grew from strength to strength, but then began to decline as wars sapped its strength, not least the French invasion in the 19th century. The Spanish Civil War of the 1930's left gaping wounds which were only exacerbated by the dictatorship of General Francisco Franco who ruled for almost 40 years until his death in 1975.