Urrea de Gaén is a municipality located in the province of Teruel, community of

Aragon Aragon ( , ; Spanish and an, Aragón ; ca, Aragó ) is an autonomous community in Spain, coextensive with the medieval Kingdom of Aragon. In northeastern Spain, the Aragonese autonomous community comprises three provinces (from north to sou ...

Spain , image_flag = Bandera de España.svg , image_coat = Escudo de España (mazonado).svg , national_motto = ''Plus ultra'' (Latin)(English: "Further Beyond") , national_anthem = (English: "Royal March") , i ...

. According to the 2004

census A census is the procedure of systematically acquiring, recording and calculating information about the members of a given population. This term is used mostly in connection with national population and housing censuses; other common censuses incl ...

(

INE INE, Ine or ine may refer to: Institutions * Institut für Nukleare Entsorgung, a German nuclear research center * Instituto Nacional de Estadística (disambiguation) * Instituto Nacional de Estatística (disambiguation) * Instituto Nacional Elec ...

), the municipality has a population of 568 inhabitants. Located in the Lower Martin river area, in the Ebro basin, at the left bank of the Martin river, at 308 meters of elevation. It lies 160 km away from

Teruel Teruel () is a city in Aragon, located in eastern Spain, and is also the capital of Teruel Province. It has a population of 35,675 in 2014 making it the least populated provincial capital in the country. It is noted for its harsh climate, with a ...

, the province capital, and 75 km away from

Zaragoza Zaragoza, also known in English as Saragossa,''Encyclopædia Britannica'"Zaragoza (conventional Saragossa)" is the capital city of the Zaragoza Province and of the autonomous community of Aragon, Spain. It lies by the Ebro river and its tributari ...

, capital of the community.

History

Urrea de Gaén has known human settlement at least since the

Chalcolithic The Copper Age, also called the Chalcolithic (; from grc-gre, χαλκός ''khalkós'', "copper" and ''líthos'', "stone") or (A)eneolithic (from Latin '' aeneus'' "of copper"), is an archaeological period characterized by regular ...

period (2100 BC), as evidenced by ruins and remains discovered in numerous excavations. It was inhabited by tribes of Iberian . Later there was the Roman occupation with a wide network of agricultural settlements (fundus) in the form of villas. A long Muslim occupation and residence (from the eighth century to 1610) left its mark in the local architecture in the Moorish styling of the village. The area was occupied by the Aragonese from the twelfth century, at the time of Ramon Berenguer IV and Petronila, becoming part of the Aragon defensive system. After multiple marriages, lawsuits and swaps, in 1268 King James I created the Lordship of

Híjar Híjar is a municipality located in the province of Teruel, Aragon, Spain. In 2009 the municipality had a population of 1,900 inhabitants. The town is noted for the well-preserved, 15th century Synagogue, and for the Gothic-Mudejar church of ' ...

for his natural son Pedro Fernandez de Hijar. Thereafter the town was always under the ''dominicatura'' of Híjar's house, until the abolition of the old regime, well into the nineteenth century.

Monuments

The village is rich in architecture, history and art. Some of the more notable structures are: * Iglesia de San Pedro Martir from the eighteenth century. Built in the baroque-style neoclassic of stone and brick. By the architect Agustín Sanz in 1782. It had a Bayeu Ramon altarpiece, a painting of St. Augustine of Jose Castillo, and another painting by Francisco de Goya, "Apparitions of the Virgin to Santiago", all missing today. The main altarpiece is the work of painter Alejandro Cañada, and there is a reproduction of Goya's painting on the altar of the Virgen del Pilar. * The Town Hall Facade of the same period, in civil baroque style, built with brick. The bottom four arches, two of them below street level give way to the old Moorish and Jewish quarter (La Muela) and the New District.

References

Municipalities in the Province of Teruel {{Teruel-geo-stub