Girona's history
Girona's fascinating history derives from its strategic military importance, standing on a fortress-like hill, high above the confluence of the Onyar and Ter rivers. It was founded by Iberians, the remains of whose walls can still be seen. The Romans named it Gerunda and established it as an important stopping point on the Via Augusta, linking Iberia with Rome. Owing to its strategic importance, it has been fought over in almost every century since its foundation, and, perhaps more than any other place in Catalunya, it retains the distinct flavor of its erstwhile inhabitants. Following the Moorish conquest of Spain, Girona was an Arab town for over three generations, a fact apparent in the maze of narrow streets in the centre, and there was a continuous Jewish presence here for over six hundred years. The intricate former Jewish quarter of houses, shops, and community buildings is now visible again after centuries of neglect.
By the eighteenth century, Girona had been besieged on twenty-one occasions, and in the nineteenth it earned the nickname "Immortal" by surviving five attacks, of which the longest was a seven-month assault by the 35,000-strong Napoleonic forces in 1809. Not surprisingly, all this attention has bequeathed the city a hodge-podge of architectural styles, from Roman classicism to art-nouveau, yet the overall impression is of an overwhelmingly beautiful medieval city, whose attraction is heightened by its river setting, and lovely views of the distant Pyrenees. Considering that Girona's nearby airport serves most of the Costa Brava's resorts, the city is oddly devoid of tourists, which makes browsing around the streets and cool churches doubly enticing. It's easy to orient oneself in Girona. The skyline is dominated by the Romanesque bell-tower of the cathedral. As you walk across one of the bridges, stop to admire the tall multi-hued row of houses that rise sheer from the river, with the cathedral in its elevated position soaring above in what looks like a faded Italian scene of medieval life. Once in the old quarter you are engulfed in a labyrinth of steep, narrow streets, especially in the atmospheric and sensitively restored Jewish quarter, the Call, one of the best preserved juderías in Europe.
The Call was home to over a thousand Jews until 1492, when, on March 31st, the Catholic Kings Fernando and Isabel pronounced an edict expelling the Jews from Spain, bringing to an end the renowned Girona School of Kabalists, who for centuries managed to preserve and spread the mystical teachings of Judaism in the West. The Isaac el Cec Center on San Llorenç, and the Kabalist School on carrer la Força, are the newly-restored spiritual centres, once attended by Jews, Muslims, and Christians alike. The city of Girona is eager to recoup some of the prestige it once enjoyed as one of the capitals of Jewish thought, and in December of 1998, a multitudinous Januka ceremony presided by a Rabbi from Israel was celebrated here for the first time in 506 years.
The main street in the old town is the arcaded Rambla de la Libertat, with pavement cafés, a couple of modernist buildings, and a steady flow of strollers. In the sloping side-streets leading up to the cathedral you'll chance upon all sorts of curious shops, from antique dealers to arts and crafts shops.
The cathedral has the world's widest Gothic nave, 23m, only surpassed by the 25m-wide Baroque nave of Sant Peter's in Rome. Don't miss the Cloisters, and the Chapter museum, one a number of museums in the town well worth a visit.