Tarragona is a city and municipality in Catalonia, Spain. It is the capital and largest town of Tarragonès county, the Camp de Tarragona region and the province of Tarragona. Geographically, it is located on the Costa Daurada area on the Mediterranean shore, around the mouth of the Francolí.
Developed in a favorable location on a coastal hill by ancient Romans in the context of the Second Punic War near a previous Iberian settlement, Tarraco eventually became the gateway for Roman control of the Iberian Peninsula. It served as the capital, successively, of the provinces of Hispania Citerior and Hispania Tarraconensis and also became a bishopric seat. Urban continuity is presumed to have been the norm in the 8th century following its integration into Al-Andalus. The Camp de Tarragona later turned into a borderland, and the city was abandoned by Muslims by the mid 10th century. Early Christian repopulation of the city and its hinterland in the 12th century took the form of an autonomous principality, before its 1173 full integration into the Principality of Catalonia and the Crown of Aragon.
The Archaeological Complex of Tàrraco is a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
History
Mythical origins One Catalan legend holds that Tarragona was named for Tarraho, eldest son of Tubal in c. 2407 BC; another (derived from Strabo and Megasthenes) attributes the name to 'Tearcon the Ethiopian', a seventh-century BC pharaoh who campaigned in Spain. The real founding date of Tarragona is unknown.
Theories of origin The city's origins trace back to a possible Iberian settlement known as Kesse or Kosse, named after the local Iberian tribe, the Cossetans. However, the exact connection of Tarragona to Kesse remains uncertain. Scholars such as William Smith suggest that the city may have been established by the Phoenicians, who referred to it as . According to Samuel Bochart, signifies a citadel. The moniker likely stemmed from its location atop a high rock, approximately above sea level; earning it the epithet .Ausonius Class. Urb. 9; cf. Mart. x. 104. It was seated on the river Sulcis or Tulcis (modern Francolí), on a bay of the Mare Internum (Mediterranean), between the Pyrenees and the River Iberus (modern Ebro).Pomponius Mela, ii. 6; Pliny the Elder iii. 3. s. 4. Livy mentions a ;xxii. 22 and according to Eratosthenes it had a naval station or roads ();ap. Strabo iii. p. 159 but Artemidorus Ephesius says with more probability that it had none, and scarcely even an anchoring place; and Strabo himself refers to it as "harbourless" ().ap. Strab. l. c.; Polybius iii. 76Ford's Handbook of Spain, p. 222.
Rome Tarraco lies on the main road along the northeastern coast of the Iberian Peninsula.Antonine Itinerary pp. 391, 396, 399, 448, 452. During the Roman Republic, the city was fortified and much enlarged as a Roman colony by the brothers Publius Cornelius Scipio and Gnaeus Cornelius Scipio Calvus, who converted it into a fortress and arsenal against the Carthaginians. The city was first named Colonia Iulia Urbs Triumphalis Tarraco and was capital of the province of Hispania Citerior. Subsequently, it became the capital (conventus iuridicusPliny l. c.; Tacitus Ann. i. 78; Gaius Julius Solinus 23, 26; Polybius x. 34; Livy xxi. 61; Stephanus of Byzantium p. 637.) of the province named after it, Hispania Tarraconensis.Ptolemy, ii. 6. § 17
Augustus wintered at Tarraco after his Cantabrian campaign, and bestowed many marks of honour on the city, among which were its honorary titles of Colonia Victrix Togata and Colonia Julia Victrix Tarraconensis.
According to Mela, it was the richest town on the coast,l. c. and Strabo represents its population as equal to that of Carthago Nova (now Cartagena). Its fertile plain and sunny shores are celebrated by Martial and other poets; and its neighbourhood is described as producing good wine and flax.Mart. x. 104, xiii. 118; Sil. Ital. iii. 369, xv. 177; Plin. xiv. 6. s. 8, xix. 1. s. 2. The city also minted coins.Grut. Inscr. p. 382; Orelli, no. 3127; coins in Eckhel, i. p. 27; Enrique Flórez, Med. ii. p. 579; Théodore Edme Mionnet, i. p. 51, Suppl. i. p. 104; Sestini, p. 202.
An inscribed stone base for a now lost statue of Tiberius Claudius Candidus was found in Tarragona during the nineteenth century. The 24-line Latin inscription describes the governor and senator's career as an ally of the future Roman emperor Septimius Severus, who fought in the civil war following the assassination of Commodus in 192 AD. This important marble block was purchased by the British Museum in 1994.; British Museum Collection
From the demise of the Roman Empire to the union of Spain
After the demise of the Western Roman Empire, the city was captured by the Vandals and the Visigoths. The Visigothic Kingdom's rule of Tarracona was ended by the Umayyad conquest of Hispania in 714. The Muslims named it (). It was an important border city of the Caliphate of Córdoba between 750 and 1013. After the demise of the Caliphate, it was part of the Taifa of Zaragoza between 1013 and 1110 and under the control of the Almoravid dynasty between 1110 and 1117. It was taken by the County of Barcelona in 1117. From 1129 to 1173 Tarragona was the capital of the short lived Principality of Tarragona, under the Norman-influence. After the dynastic union of Aragon and Barcelona, it was part of the Principality of Catalonia within the Crown of Aragon from 1164 to 1714. After dynastic union of Aragon and the Crown of Castile, it remained a part of the Crown of Aragon until the foundation of the Spanish Empire in 1516.
During the Reapers' War, Tarragona was captured by Catalan insurgents with French support in 1641, but it was retaken by Spanish troops in 1644. It was captured by allied Portuguese, Dutch, and British troops in 1705 during the War of the Spanish Succession and remained in their hands until the Treaty of Utrecht in 1713. During the war, the Catalans supported the unsuccessful claim of Archduke Charles, Duke of Teschen against the victorious Bourbon Duke of Anjou, who became Philip V of Spain. He signed the Nueva Planta decrees, which abolished the Crown of Aragon, as well as the Catalan institutions and prohibited the administrative use of Catalan language on 16 January 1716.
Jewish history The Jewish community in Tarragona was established during the Roman era, making it one of the most ancient Jewish communities in Spain. A laver, possibly used by the Jews for ritual purification found in Tarragona bears the inscription "peace over Israel, over ourselves, and our children." Coins with Hebrew inscriptions have also been found, dating to the Visigoth period. During Muslim rule, Jews in Tarragona prospered; Muhammad al-Idrisi nicknamed Tarragona "the city of the Jews."
After the Christian reconquest, the Jews of Tarragona faced institutional persecution and anti-semitic restrictions until the community's destruction in 1492, during the expulsion of the Jews.
Peninsular War
During the Peninsular War, in the first siege of Tarragona from 5 May to 29 June 1811, Louis-Gabriel Suchet's Army of Aragon of the First French Empire laid siege to a Spanish garrison led by Lieutenant General Juan de Contreras. A British naval squadron commanded by Admiral Edward Codrington harassed the French besiegers with cannon fire and transported large numbers of reinforcements into the city by sea. Nevertheless, Suchet's troops stormed into the defences and killed or captured almost all the defenders. It became a subprefecture centre in Bouches-de-l'Èbre department of French empire.
In the second siege of Tarragona (3–11 June 1813), an overwhelming Anglo-Spanish force under the command of Lieutenant general John Murray, 8th Baronet failed to wrest Tarragona from a small Franco-Italian garrison led by Brigadier general Antoine Marc Augustin Bertoletti. Murray was subsequently removed from command for his indecisive and contradictory leadership. The Anglo-Spanish forces finally captured Tarragona on 19 August.
Spanish Civil War
During the Spanish Civil War, Tarragona was in the hands of the Second Spanish Republic until captured by Franco's Nationalist troops on 15 January 1939 during the Catalonia Offensive.
Main sights
Ancient remains
The Roman ruins of Tarraco have been designated a World Heritage Site by UNESCO.
Part of the bases of large Cyclopean walls near the Cuartel de Pilatos are thought to pre-date the Romans. The building just mentioned, a prison in the 19th century, is said to have been the palace of Augustus. The second century Tarragona Amphitheatre near the seashore was extensively used as a quarry after the fall of the Western Roman Empire, and but few vestiges of it now remain. A circus c. long, was built over in the area now called Plaça de la Font, though portions of it are still to be traced. Throughout the town Latin, and even apparently Phoenician, inscriptions on the stones of the houses mark the material used for buildings in the town.
Two ancient monuments, at some little distance from the town, have, however, fared rather better. The first of these is Les Ferreres Aqueduct, which spans a valley about north of the city. It is in length, and the loftiest arches, of which there are two tiers, are high. There is a monument about along the coast road east of the city, commonly called the "Tower of the Scipios"; but there is no authority for assuming that they were buried here.(Cf. Ford, Handbook, p. 219, seq.; Florez, Esp. Sagr. xxix. p. 68, seq.; Miñano, Diccion. viii. p. 398.)
Other Roman buildings include: The Roman walls The capitol, or citadel The Amphitheatre The Roman circus The Pretorium – Tower The Provincial and Colonial fora The Necropolis The palace of Augustus, called the house of Pilate The so-called tower, or sepulchre, of the Scipios Arch of Sura, or of Bara The Aurelian Way.
The city is also home to the National Archaeological Museum of Tarragona.
Religious buildings
The Tarragona Cathedral, dating to the 12th–13th centuries, combining Romanesque and Gothic architectural elements. The convent of the Poor Clares, near the walls The convent of Santa Teresa The church of the Order of Friars Minor Capuchin, the parish church of the port The former convent of Sant Francesc The Jesuit college was turned into barracks; their church, however, has been restored to them The convent of the Dominican Order, now the town hall The archiepiscopal palace, situated on the site of the ancient capitol, one tower of which still remains. It was rebuilt in the 19th century. Near the sea, in the Roman amphitheatre, are the remains of a church called Santa Maria del Miracle (Holy Mary of the Miracle), which belonged to the Knights Templar. It was afterwards used by the Trinitarian Order and was later converted into a penitentiary. It was demolished around 1915.Comisión de Antigüedades de la Real Academia de la Historia: catálogo e índices, Cataluña. Page 256. Published in Spanish, 2000.
The seminary of Sant Pau and Santa Tecla was founded in 1570 by the cardinal archbishop, Gaspar Cervantes de Gaeta, and was the first to comply with the decrees of the Council of Trent. In 1858 Archbishop José Domingo Costa y Borrás built a fourth wing. Benito Villamitjana built a new seminary behind the cathedral in 1886, in the courtyard of which stands the old chapel of Sant Pau. Pope Leo XIII raised this to the rank of a pontifical university.
north of the city is Poblet Monastery, founded in 1151 by Ramon Berenguer IV, Count of Barcelona, which was used for sepultures of the kings.
Economy
Tarragona is home to one of the largest ports in Spain, which is an export hub for the Spanish car industry.
Much of its economic activity comes from a number of chemical industries located west of the city. One quarter of all the chemical production in Spain is found in Tarragona. In 2025 this industry employed some 5,800 people. The industrial park is home to, amongst others, Ercros.