Province of Villafranca

The Province of Villafranca (also known as Province of Villafranca del Bierzo, Province of El Bierzo, or Province of El Vierzo) was a province of Spain created in the 1822 territorial division of Spain (27 January 1822), during the '' Trienio Liberal'' of 1820–1823. Its population of 86,365 represented 0.7% of the total Spanish population of the time. Its capital was Villafranca del Bierzo. With the restoration of absolutism, this territorial division was revoked 1 October 1823. Although Javier de Burgos's 1833 territorial division of Spain was very close to that of 1822, the province of Villafranca was not recreated; the other two major changes were the omission of the provinces of Calatayud and Játiva.

Territories

The territories of the province of Villafranca included the present-day ''comarca'' of El Bierzo in the Province of León, plus several other Leonese municipalities and some other territories that now belong to the provinces of Lugo and Ourense.

Following the general pattern of the 1822 territorial division of Spain, the province was named after its capital city, Villafranca del Bierzo. However, the regionalists in this area have always favored the name ''El Bierzo'' or ''El Vierzo'' (''El Bierzu'' in the local Bercian dialect).

Background

There have been many Bercian administrative entities in the history of Spain. El Bierzo was one of the 40 provinces of the Crown of Castile under the ''Repartimiento'' of 1591. Miguel J. García González, "La Provincia de El Bierzo" in ''Historia de El Bierzo'', published by the Instituto de Estudios Bercianos and the ''Diario de León''. Later, until the territorial division in the 1780s by Floridablanca, it was habitually united with León and Asturias, and referred to as either the ''Partido de Ponferrada'' or the ''Provincia del Vierzo''.

From 1789 to 1833 there were numerous efforts to reorganize the territory of Spain. El Bierzo was variously integrated into Province of León or the Prefecture of Astorga, or (in 1822) made a province in its own right. In this period, when conservatives and absolutists favored a system of ''partidos'' and liberals favored a division reflecting the newly rationalized departments of France, there were Bercian regionalists on both sides of that divide, each wanting the recognition of the region within whichever system they advocated.

The liberal territorial division of 1822 seemed briefly to satisfy these ambitions; however, with the return to absolutism the following year, that decree was revoked, and the 1833 territorial division, which remains largely in effect down to the present day,Eduardo Barrenechea
Los 'gibraltares' de unas regiones en otras: Treviño, Llivia, Rincón de Ademuz...
'' El País'', 1983-02-08. Accessed online 2000-12-30.Daniele Conversi
The Spanish Federalist Tradition and the 1978 Constitution
, p. 12, footnote 63. Accessed online 2000-12-31. although hewing closely to the 1822 plan, Jesús Larios Martín. ''Dinastías reales de España: Geografía política y eclesiástica'' (1986), Ediciones Hidalguia. p. 48. did not include a Bercian province.''Real Decreto de 30 de noviembre de 1833''
on Wikisource;
''Real Decreto de 30 de noviembre de 1833''
on the official web site of the government of the Canary Islands, accessed 2009-12-31.

Notes

{{DEFAULTSORT:Villafranca
19th century in Spain
Former provinces of Spain
Province of León
El Bierzo
States and territories established in 1822
States and territories disestablished in 1823
1822 establishments in Spain
1823 disestablishments in Spain
History of Castile and León