title: Man in the Iron Mask

text: After Fouquet's death in 1680, Saint-Mars discovered a secret hole between Fouquet and Lauzun's cells. He was sure that they had communicated through this hole without detection by him or his guards and thus that Lauzun must have been made aware of Dauger's existence. Louvois instructed Saint-Mars to move Lauzun to Fouquet's cell and to tell him that Dauger and La Rivière had been released.


title: Man in the Iron Mask

text: Lauzun was freed in 1681. Later that same year, Saint-Mars was appointed governor of the prison of the Exiles Fort (now Exilles in Italy). He went there, taking Dauger and La Rivière with him. La Rivière's death was reported in January 1687; in May, Saint-Mars and Dauger moved to Sainte-Marguerite, one of the Lérins Islands, half a mile offshore from Cannes. It was during the journey to Sainte-Marguerite that rumours spread that the prisoner was wearing an iron mask. Again, he was placed in a cell with multiple doors.


title: Man in the Iron Mask

text: On 18 September 1698, Saint-Mars took up his new post as governor of the Bastille prison in Paris, bringing Dauger with him. He was placed in a solitary cell in the prefurnished third chamber of the Bertaudière tower. The prison's second-in-command, de Rosarges, was to feed him. Lieutenant du Junca, another officer of the Bastille, noted that the prisoner wore "a mask of black velvet". The masked prisoner died there on 19 November 1703 and was buried the next day under the name of "Marchioly".


title: Man in the Iron Mask

text: In 1711, King Louis's sister-in-law, Elizabeth Charlotte, Princess Palatine, sent a letter to her aunt, Sophia, Electress of Hanover, stating that the prisoner had "two musketeers at his side to kill him if he removed his mask". She described him as very devout, and stated that he was well treated and received everything he desired. However, the prisoner had already been dead for eight years by that point and the Princess had not necessarily seen him for herself; rather, she was quite likely reporting rumours she had heard at court.


title: Man in the Iron Mask

text: The fate of the mysterious prisoner—and the extent of the apparent precautions his jailers took—created significant interest in his story and gave birth to many rumours and legends. Many theories exist about his identity and the cause of his incarceration, and a very large number of books and articles have been written about the case during the last 350 years. Some of these theories were presented after the existence of reliable, contemporary documents was widely known. Still later commentators have presented their own theories, some of them based on embellished versions of the original tale.


title: Man in the Iron Mask

text: Theories about his identity that were popular during his time included that he was a Marshal of France; the English Henry Cromwell, son of Oliver Cromwell; or François, Duke of Beaufort. Later, many authors such as Voltaire and Alexandre Dumas suggested other theories about the man in the mask.


title: Man in the Iron Mask

text: Voltaire claimed that the prisoner was a son of Anne of Austria and Cardinal Mazarin, and therefore an illegitimate half-brother of Louis XIV. However, the sincerity of this claim is uncertain.


title: Man in the Iron Mask

text: In a 1965 essay "Le Masque de fer", French novelist Marcel Pagnol, supporting his hypothesis in particular on the circumstances of Louis XIV's birth, claims that the Man in the Iron Mask was indeed a twin but born second, and hence the younger, and would have been hidden in order to avoid any dispute over the throne holder. At the time there was a controversy over which one of twins was the elder: The one born first, or the one born second, who was then thought to have been conceived first.


title: Man in the Iron Mask

text: The historians who reject this hypothesis (including ), highlight the conditions of childbirth for the queen: It usually took place in the presence of multiple witnesses – the main court's figures. But according to Marcel Pagnol, immediately after the birth of the future Louis XIV, Louis XIII took his whole court to the "Château de Saint-Germain"'s chapel to celebrate a "Te Deum" in great pomp, contrary to the common practice of celebrating it several days before childbirth.


title: Man in the Iron Mask

text: Aligned with the hypothesis of Louis XIV having had a twin, a thorough examination of the French Kings' genealogy shows many twin births, in the Capetian dynasty, as well as in the House of Valois, the House of Bourbon, and the House of Orléans.


title: Man in the Iron Mask

text: Alexandre Dumas explored a similar hypothesis in his book "The Vicomte de Bragelonne", where the prisoner was instead an identical twin of Louis XIV. This book has served as the basis – even if loosely adapted – for many film versions of the story.


title: Man in the Iron Mask

text: According to Marcel Pagnol's hypothesis, this twin was then born in 1638 and grew up on the Island of Jersey under the name James de la Cloche. He would supposedly later conspire with Roux de Marcilly against Louis XIV, and be arrested in Calais in 1669.


title: Man in the Iron Mask

text: In 1955, Hugh Ross Williamson argued that the man in the iron mask was the natural father of Louis XIV. According to this theory, the "miraculous" birth of Louis XIV in 1638 would have come after Louis XIII had been estranged from his wife Anne of Austria for 14 years.


title: Man in the Iron Mask

text: The theory then suggests that Cardinal Richelieu, the king's minister, had arranged for a substitute, probably an illegitimate grandson of Henry IV, to become intimate with the queen and father an heir in the king's stead. At the time, the heir presumptive was Louis XIII's brother Gaston, Duke of Orléans, who was Richelieu's enemy. If Gaston became king, Richelieu would quite likely have lost both his job as minister and his life, and so it was in his best interests to thwart Gaston's ambitions.


title: Man in the Iron Mask

text: Supposedly, the substitute father then left for the Americas but in the 1660s returned to France with the aim of extorting money for keeping his secret, and was promptly imprisoned. This theory would explain the secrecy surrounding the prisoner, whose true identity would have destroyed the legitimacy of Louis XIV's claim to the throne had it been revealed.


title: Man in the Iron Mask

text: This theory had been suggested by British politician Hugh Cecil, 1st Baron Quickswood, who nonetheless added that the idea has no historical basis and is entirely hypothetical. Williamson held that to say it is a guess with no solid historical basis is merely to say that it is like every other theory on the matter, although it makes more sense than any of the other theories. There is no known evidence that is incompatible with it, even the age of the prisoner, which Cecil had considered a weak point; and it explains every aspect of the mystery.


title: Man in the Iron Mask

text: In 1890, Louis Gendron, a French military historian, came across some coded letters and passed them on to Étienne Bazeries in the French Army's cryptographic department. After three years, Bazeries managed to read some messages in the Great Cipher of Louis XIV. One of them referred to a prisoner and identified him as General . One of the letters written by Louvois made specific reference to de Bulonde's crime.


title: Man in the Iron Mask

text: At the Siege of Cuneo in 1691, Bulonde was concerned about enemy troops arriving from Austria and ordered a hasty withdrawal, leaving behind his munitions and wounded men. Louis XIV was furious and in another of the letters specifically ordered him "to be conducted to the fortress at Pignerol where he will be locked in a cell and under guard at night, and permitted to walk the battlements during the day with a 330 309." It has been suggested that the 330 stood for "masque" and the 309 for full stop. However, in 17th-century French "avec un masque" would mean "in a mask".


title: Man in the Iron Mask

text: Some believe that the evidence of the letters means that there is now little need of an alternative explanation for the man in the mask. Other sources, however, claim that Bulonde's arrest was no secret and was actually published in a newspaper at the time and that he was released after just a few months. His death is also recorded as happening in 1709, six years after that of the man in the mask.


title: Man in the Iron Mask

text: In 1801, revolutionary legislator Pierre Roux-Fazillac stated that the tale of the masked prisoner was an amalgamation of the fates of two separate prisoners, Ercole Antonio Mattioli (see below) and an imprisoned valet named "Eustache d'Auger".


title: Man in the Iron Mask

text: Lang (1903) presented a theory that "Eustache d'Auger" was a prison pseudonym of a man called "Martin", valet of the Huguenot Roux de Marcilly. After his master's execution in 1669, the valet was taken to France, possibly by abduction. A letter from the French Foreign minister has been found rejecting an offer to arrest Martin: He was simply not important.


title: Man in the Iron Mask

text: Noone (1988) pointed out that the minister was concerned Dauger should not communicate, rather than that his face should be concealed. Later, Saint-Mars elaborated upon instructions that the prisoner should not be seen during transportation. The idea of keeping Dauger in a velvet mask was Saint-Mars's own, to increase his self-importance. What Dauger had seen or done is still a mystery.


title: Man in the Iron Mask

text: In 2016, the American historian Paul Sonnino suggested that Eustache Dauger could have been a valet of Cardinal Mazarin's treasurer, Antoine-Hercule Picon. A native from Languedoc, Picon, upon entering the service of Colbert after Mazarin's death, might have picked up a valet from Senlis, where the name "Dauger" abounds. In his book, Sonnino asserts that Mazarin led a double life, "one as a statesman, the other as a loan shark", and that one of the clients he embezzled was Henrietta Maria, the widow of Charles I of England. According to Sonnino's theory, Louis XIV was complicit and instructed his ambassador in England to stonewall Charles II over the return of his parents' possessions. In 1669, however, Louis wanted to enlist Charles in a war against the Dutch and therefore worried about the subject of Mazarin's estate entering into the negotiations. Sonnino concludes by stating that Eustache Dauger, who might have been Picon's valet, was arrested and incarcerated for revealing something about the disposition of Mazarin's fortune, and that this is why he was threatened with death if he disclosed anything about his past.


title: Man in the Iron Mask

text: In 2021, the British historian Josephine Wilkinson supported the theory proposed earlier by Jean-Christian Petitfils, whereby the prisoner was a valet—perhaps to Henrietta of England—who had committed some indiscretion which risked compromising the relations between Louis XIV and Charles II at a sensitive time during the negotiations of the Secret Treaty of Dover against the Dutch Republic. In July 1669, Louis had suddenly and inexplicably fallen out with Henrietta and, since the two had previously been very close, it didn't go unnoticed. Wilkinson therefore suggested a link between this event and this valet's arrest in Calais, later that month, under the pseudonym of "Eustache Dauger".


title: Man in the Iron Mask

text: Barnes (1908) presents James de la Cloche, the alleged illegitimate son of the reluctant Protestant Charles II of England, who would have been his father's secret intermediary with the Catholic court of France.


title: Man in the Iron Mask

text: One of Charles's confirmed illegitimate sons, the Duke of Monmouth, has also been proposed as the man in the mask. A Protestant, he led a rebellion against his uncle, the Catholic King James II. The rebellion failed and Monmouth was executed in 1685. But in 1768, a writer named Saint-Foix claimed that another man was executed in his place and that Monmouth became the masked prisoner, it being in Louis XIV's interests to assist a fellow Catholic like James who would not necessarily want to kill his own nephew. Saint-Foix's case was based on unsubstantiated rumors and allegations that Monmouth's execution was faked.


title: Man in the Iron Mask

text: Another candidate, much favored in the 1800s, was Fouquet's fellow prisoner Count Ercole Antonio Mattioli (or Matthioli). He was an Italian diplomat who acted on behalf of the debt-ridden Charles IV, Duke of Mantua in 1678, in selling Casale, a strategic fortified town near the border with France. A French occupation would be unpopular, so discretion was essential, but Mattioli leaked the details to France's Spanish enemies, after pocketing his commission once the sale had been concluded, and they made a bid of their own before the French forces could occupy the town. Mattioli was kidnapped by the French and thrown into nearby Pignerol in April 1679. The French took possession of Casale two years later.


title: Man in the Iron Mask

text: George Agar-Ellis reached the conclusion that Mattioli was the state prisoner commonly called The Iron Mask when he reviewed documents extracted from French archives in the 1820s. His book, published in English in 1826, was translated into French and published in 1830. German historian Wilhelm Broecking came to the same conclusion independently seventy years later. Robert Chambers' "Book of Days" supports the claim and places Matthioli in the Bastille for the last 13 years of his life.


title: Man in the Iron Mask

text: Since that time, letters sent by Saint-Mars, which earlier historians missed, indicate that Mattioli was held only at Pignerol and Sainte-Marguerite and was not at Exilles or the Bastille and, therefore, it is argued that he can be discounted.


title: Man in the Iron Mask

text: In his letter to Saint-Mars announcing the imminent arrival of the prisoner who would become the "man in the iron mask", Louvois gave his name as "Eustache Dauger". Historically, this was deemed to be a pseudonym, and a succession of historians therefore attempted to find out the prisoner's real identity. Among them, Maurice Duvivier wondered if, instead, "Eustache Dauger" might not be the real name of a person whose life and history could be traced; he therefore combed the archives for surnames such as Dauger, Daugers, d'Auger, d'Oger, d'Ogiers and similar forms. He discovered the family of François d'Oger de Cavoye, a captain of Cardinal Richelieu's guard of musketeers, who was married to Marie de Sérignan, a lady-in-waiting at the court of Louis XIV's mother, Queen Anne of Austria. François and Marie had 11 children, of whom six boys and three girls survived into adulthood.


title: Man in the Iron Mask

text: Their third son was named Eustache, who signed his name as "Eustache Dauger de Cavoye". He was born on 30 August 1637 and baptised on 18 February 1639. When his father and two eldest brothers were killed in battle, Eustache became the nominal head of the family. In his 1932 book, Duvivier published evidence that this man had been involved in scandalous and embarrassing events, first in 1659, then again in 1665, and that he had also been linked with "l'Affaire des Poisons".


title: Man in the Iron Mask

text: In April 1659, Eustache Dauger de Cavoye and others were invited by the duke of Vivonne to an Easter weekend party at the castle of Roissy-en-Brie. By all accounts, it was a debauched affair of merry-making, with the men involved in all sorts of sordid activities, including attacking an elderly man who claimed to be Cardinal Mazarin's attorney. It was also rumoured, among other things, that a black mass was enacted and that a pig was baptised as "Carp" in order to allow them to eat pork on Good Friday.


title: Man in the Iron Mask

text: When news of these events became public, an inquiry was held and the various perpetrators jailed or exiled. There is no record as to what happened to Dauger de Cavoye but, in 1665, near the Château de Saint-Germain-en-Laye, he allegedly killed a young page boy in a drunken brawl involving the Duc de Foix. The two men claimed that they had been provoked by the boy, who was drunk, but the fact that the killing took place close to where Louis XIV was staying at the time meant that this crime was deemed a personal affront to the king and, as a result, Dauger de Cavoye was forced to resign his commission. His mother died shortly afterwards. In her will, written a year earlier, she passed over her eldest surviving sons Eustache and Armand, leaving the bulk of the estate to their younger brother Louis. Eustache was restricted in the amount of money to which he had access, having built up considerable debts, and left with barely enough for "food and upkeep".


title: Man in the Iron Mask

text: In his 1932 book, Duvivier also linked Eustache Dauger de Cavoye to the Affair of the Poisons, a notorious scandal of 1677–1682 in which people in high places were accused of being involved in black mass and poisonings. An investigation had been launched, but Louis XIV instigated a cover-up when it appeared that his mistress Madame de Montespan was involved. The records show that, during the inquiry, the investigators were told about a surgeon named Auger, who had supplied poisons for a black mass that took place before March 1668. Duvivier became convinced that Dauger de Cavoye, disinherited and short of money, had become Auger, the supplier of poisons, and subsequently "Eustache Dauger", the man in the mask.


title: Man in the Iron Mask

text: In a letter sent by Louvois to Saint-Mars on 10 July 1680, a few months after Fouquet's death in prison while "Eustache Dauger" was acting as his valet, the minister adds a note in his own handwriting, asking how it was possible that Dauger had made certain objects found in Fouquet's pockets—which Saint-Mars had mentioned in a previous correspondence, now lost—and "how he got the drugs necessary to do so". Duvivier suggested that Dauger had poisoned Fouquet as part of a complex power struggle between Louvois and his rival Colbert.


title: Man in the Iron Mask

text: In 1953, however, French historian Georges Mongrédien published historical documents confirming that, in 1668, Eustache Dauger de Cavoye was already held at the Prison Saint-Lazare in Paris—an asylum, run by monks, which many families used in order to imprison their "black sheep"—and that he was still there in 1680, at the same time that "Eustache Dauger", the man in the mask, was in custody in Pignerol, hundreds of miles away in the south.


title: Man in the Iron Mask

text: These documents include a letter dated 20 June 1678, full of self-pity, sent by Dauger de Cavoye to his sister, the Marquise de Fabrègues, in which he complains about his treatment in prison, where he had already been held "for more than 10 years", and how he was deceived by their brother Louis and by Clérac, their brother-in-law and the manager of Louis's estate. Dauger de Cavoye also wrote a second letter, this time to the king but undated, outlining the same complaints and requesting his freedom. The best the king would do, however, was to send a letter to the head of Saint-Lazare on 17 August 1678, telling him that "M. de Cavoye should have communication with no one at all, not even with his sister, unless in your presence or in the presence of one of the priests of the mission". The letter was signed by the king and Colbert.


title: Man in the Iron Mask

text: A poem written by Louis-Henri de Loménie de Brienne, an inmate in Saint-Lazare at the time, indicates that Eustache Dauger de Cavoye died as a result of heavy drinking in the late 1680s. Historians consider all this proof enough that he was not involved in any way with the man in the mask.


title: Man in the Iron Mask

text: Many films have been made around the mystery of the Man in the Iron Mask, most notably the 1998 film of the same name starring Leonardo DiCaprio, though others include "The Iron Mask" (1929), "The Man in the Iron Mask" (1939) and the 1977 British television production starring Richard Chamberlain as the titular prisoner.


title: Man in the Iron Mask

text: The Man in the Iron Mask is portrayed as the Duc de Sullun (inversion of "nullus", Latin for 'no one') in the first two episodes of the third season of the TV drama series "Versailles". In the programme, he is visited in the Bastille by Philippe I, Duke of Orléans on his search to find men to send to the Americas.


title: Man in the Iron Mask

text: When the Bastille was stormed on 14 July 1789, the mob were surprised to find only seven prisoners, as well as a room full of neatly kept boxes containing documents that had been carefully filed since 1659. These archives held records, not only of all the prisoners who had been incarcerated there, but also of all the individuals who had been locked up, banished into exile, or simply tried within the limits of Paris as a result of a "lettre de cachet". Throughout the 18th century, archivists had been working zealously at keeping these records in good order and which, on the eve of the French revolution, had amounted to hundreds of thousands of documents.


title: Man in the Iron Mask

text: As the fortress was being sacked and dismantled, the pillaging lasted for two days during which documents were burned, torn, thrown from the top of towers into the moats and trailed through the mud. Many documents were stolen, or taken away by collectors, writers, lawyers, and even by Pierre Lubrowski, an attaché in the Russian embassy—who sold them to emperor Alexander I in 1805, when they were deposited at the Hermitage Palace—and many ended up dispersed throughout France and the rest of Europe. Fortunately, a company of soldiers was posted on 15 July to guard the fortress and, in particular, to prevent any more looting of the archives. On 16 July, the Electoral Assembly created a commission assigned to rescue the archives; on arrival at the fortress, they found that many boxes had been emptied or destroyed, leaving an enormous pile of papers in a complete state of disorder. During the session of 24 July, the Electoral Assembly passed a resolution enjoining citizens to return documents to the Hôtel de Ville; restitutions were numerous and the surviving documents eventually stored at the city's library, then located at the convent of Saint-Louis-de-la-Culture.


title: Man in the Iron Mask

text: On 22 April 1797, Hubert-Pascal Ameilhon was appointed chief librarian of the Bibliothèque de l'Arsenal and obtained a decree that secured the Bastille archive under his care. However, the librarians were so daunted by this volume of 600,000 documents that they stored them in a backroom, where they languished for over forty years. In 1840, François Ravaisson found a mass of old papers under the floor in his kitchen at the Arsenal library and realised he had rediscovered the archives of the Bastille, which required a further fifty years of laborious restoration; the documents were numbered, and a catalogue was compiled and published as the 20th century was about to dawn. Eventually, the archives of the Bastille were made available for consultation by any visitor to the Arsenal library, in rooms specially fitted up for them.


title: Man in the Iron Mask

text: In addition to the Bibliothèque de l'Arsenal, several other archives host historical documents that were consulted by historians researching the enigma of the Man in the Iron Mask: the (Archives des Affaires étrangères),


title: Man in the Iron Mask

text: In his historical essay on the subject (published in two editions, in 1965 and 1977), French novelist and playwright Marcel Pagnol singled out for particular praise a number of historians who consulted the archives with the goal of elucidating the enigma of the Man in the Iron Mask: Joseph Delort (1789–1847), Marius Topin (1838–1895), Théodore Iung (1833–1896), Maurice Duvivier (18??–1936), and Georges Mongrédien (1901–1980). Along with Pierre Roux-Fazillac (1746-1833), François Ravaisson (1811-1884), Jules Loiseleur (1816-1900), Jules Lair (1836–1907), and Frantz Funck-Brentano (1862–1947), these historians uncovered and published the bulk of historical documents that enabled some progress to be made towards that goal.


title: Man in the Iron Mask

text: In particular, Mongrédien was the first to publish (1952) a complete reference of historical documents on which previous authors had relied only selectively. He was also one of the few historians who did not champion any particular candidate, preferring instead to review and analyse objectively the facts revealed by the documents. Giving full credit to Jules Lair for being the first to propose the candidacy of "Eustache Dauger" in 1890, Mongrédien demonstrated that, among all the state prisoners who were ever in the care of Saint-Mars, only the one arrested under that pseudonym in 1669 could be the one who died in the Bastille in 1703, and was therefore the only possible candidate for the man in the mask. Although he also pointed out that no documents had yet been found that revealed either the real identity of this prisoner or the cause of his long incarceration, Mongrédien's work was significant in that it made it possible to eliminate all the candidates whose vital dates, and/or life circumstances for the period of 1669-1703, were already known to modern historians.


title: Man in the Iron Mask

text: In October 1965, Mongrédien published a review, in the journal "La Revue des Deux Mondes", of the first edition of Pagnol's essay. At the end of this review, Mongrédien mentioned being told that the Archives of the Ministry of Defense located at the Château de Vincennes still held unsorted and uncatalogued bundles of Louvois's correspondence. He speculated that, if this were the case, then these bundles might contain a letter from July 1669 revealing the reasons for "Eustache Daugers arrest near Dunkirk.


title: Man in the Iron Mask

text: The National Archives of France has made the original data available online relating to the inventories of the goods and papers of (one inventory, of 64 pages, was drawn up at the Bastille in 1708; the other, of 68 pages, at the citadel of Sainte-Marguerite in 1691). These documents had been sought in vain for more than a century and were thought to have been lost. They were discovered in 2015, among the 100 million documents of the . They show that some of the 800 documents in the possession of the jailer were analysed after his death. These documents confirm the reputed avarice of , who appears to have diverted the funds paid by the king for the prisoner. They also give a description of a cell occupied by the masked prisoner, which contained only a sleeping mat, but no luxuries, as was previously thought.


title: Cricbuzz

text: Cricbuzz is an Indian cricket news website owned by Times Internet. It features, news, articles and live coverage of cricket matches including videos, text commentary, player stats and team rankings. Their website also offers a mobile app.


title: Cricbuzz

text: Cricbuzz is one of the most popular mobile apps for cricket news and scores in India. The site was the seventh most searched for site in India in 2014. The mobile app has over 100 million downloads as of February 2022 and the website is used by more than 50 million users worldwide, generating 2.6 billion page views in Jan 2015.


title: Cricbuzz

text: Cricbuzz was created by Pankaj Chhaparwal, Piyush Agrawal, and Pravin Hegde in 2004. In 2010, Cricbuzz started developing a mobile app for live cricket news and scores.


title: Cricbuzz

text: In November 2014, Times Internet, a subsidiary of Times of India acquired a majority stake in Cricbuzz for an undisclosed sum. The website continues to be managed by the original founders.


title: Cricbuzz

text: In January 2015, Times Internet-owned GoCricket was merged into Cricbuzz. GoCricket's website was redirected to Cricbuzz and the GoCricket mobile app was also merged with that of Cricbuzz. Cricbuzz hired Harsha Bhogle as ‘Voice of Cricket’ in September 2016 and has produced over 150 videos with the esteemed commentator and cricket expert ever since.


title: Luhansk Oblast

text: Luhansk Oblast (; ; also referred to as Luhanshchyna, ) is the easternmost oblast (province) of Ukraine. The oblast's administrative center is Luhansk. The oblast was established in 1938 and bore the name "Voroshilovgrad Oblast" (, until 1958 and again from 1970 to 1991) in honor of Kliment Voroshilov. Its population is estimated as


title: Luhansk Oblast

text: Important cities within the oblast include Alchevsk, Antratsyt, Brianka, Kirovsk, Krasnyi Luch, Krasnodon, Lysychansk, Luhansk, Pervomaisk, Rovenky, Rubizhne, Sverdlovsk, Sievierodonetsk, and Stakhanov.


title: Luhansk Oblast

text: , nearly all of the oblast is under the occupation of Russia, which claims the oblast as the Luhansk People's Republic (LPR), a self-declared state turned Russian federal subject. The war in Donbas and the subsequent 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine saw heavy fighting in the oblast, with Sievierodonetsk captured in June by Russian and LPR forces after an assault lasting several weeks, and the oblast's last major settlement under Ukrainian control, Lysychansk, captured by Russian and Russia-backed forces on 2 July. The next day, Russia's Minister of Defence announced that the entire territory of the oblast had been "liberated", but three weeks later the governor of the oblast reported heavy fighting was still ongoing. On 4 September, Ukrainian forces launched a counteroffensive in eastern Ukraine and recaptured small parts of Donetsk Oblast and, on 1 October, Lyman. Ukrainian forces also pushed through the stalemate at the Luhansk Oblast border and most notably recaptured Bilohirivka while engaging LPR Forces in Lysychansk.


title: Luhansk Oblast

text: On 30 September 2022 Russia annexed the Luhansk (LPR), Donetsk (Donetsk People's Republic), Zaporizhzhia, and Kherson Oblasts. However, the referendums and subsequent annexations are internationally unrecognized.


title: Luhansk Oblast

text: Luhansk Oblast is located in eastern Ukraine. The area of the oblast (26,700 km), comprises about 4.42% of the total area of Ukraine.


title: Luhansk Oblast

text: Its length from north to south is 250 km. Its width from east to west is 190 km. The oblast has the longest segment of the Ukrainian international border with Russia among other regions (see State Border of Ukraine) consisting of .


title: Luhansk Oblast

text: The abutting Russian oblasts are Belgorod Oblast to the north, Voronezh Oblast to the northeast, Rostov Oblast to the east. Abutting Ukrainian oblasts are Kharkiv Oblast to the west, and Donetsk Oblast to the south.


title: Luhansk Oblast

text: The region is located in the valley of the Siversky Donets river, which splits the region approximately in half. The southern portion of the region is elevated by the Donetsk Ridge which is located closer to the southern border. The highest point is Mohyla Mechetna () which is the highest point of Donetsk Ridge.


title: Luhansk Oblast

text: The left bank of the Siversky Donets river is part of the Starobilsk Plain. To the north this transforms into the Central Russian Upland.


title: Luhansk Oblast

text: The oblast originated in 1938 as Voroshylovhrad (Russian: Voroshilovgrad) Oblast after the Donetsk Oblast was split between Voroshylovhrad and Stalino (today Donetsk Oblast) oblasts. After the invasion by Nazi Germany in 1941, the region came under a German military administration, due to its proximity to frontlines. It was occupied at the end of 1942 as part of Case Blue German offensive directed towards Stalingrad.


title: Luhansk Oblast

text: Soon after the battle of Stalingrad, the Luhansk region (at that time Voroshilovgrad) again became the center of military operations during the Soviet counter-offensive operation Little Saturn in the spring of 1943. In the summer of 1943, the region was liberated from the Nazi Germany Armed Forces. During the Soviet era, the Oblast bore its current name between 1958 and 1970.


title: Luhansk Oblast

text: During the fateful March Referendum of 1991, 70.16% of all Ukrainians voted to remain a part of the Soviet Union as a sovereign republic, while only 27.99% voted 'no'. In the December 1991 referendum (after the August coup ended all hope of a restored Union), 83.86% of votes in the oblast were in favor of the Declaration of Independence of Ukraine.


title: Luhansk Oblast

text: On 8 April 2014, following the annexation of Crimea by Russia, pro-Russian separatists occupying the Luhansk Oblast administrative building planned to declare the independence of the region as the Luhansk Parliamentary Republic, after other pro-Russian separatists declared Donetsk People's Republic in the Donetsk Oblast (7 April 2014). When the Luhansk Parliamentary Republic ceased to exist, the separatists declared the Luhansk People's Republic on 27 April 2014. They held a disputed referendum on separating from Ukraine on 11 May 2014. The legitimacy of the referendums was not recognized by any government. Ukraine does not recognize the referendum, while the EU and US said the polls were illegal. Subsequently, the war in Donbas began.


title: Luhansk Oblast

text: As a result of the war in Donbas, Luhansk insurgents control the southern third of the oblast, which includes the city of Luhansk, the region's most populous city and the capital of the oblast. Due to this, most oblast government functions have moved to Sievierodonetsk, which forces of the Government of Ukraine recaptured in July 2014. Many universities located in the occupied areas have moved to government-controlled cities such as Sievierodonetsk, Starobilsk or Rubizhne. A survey conducted in December 2014 by the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology found that 5.7% of the oblast's population supported their region joining Russia, 84.1% did not support the idea, and the rest were undecided or did not respond. Insurgent-controlled areas were not polled.


title: Luhansk Oblast

text: During the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russian ground forces entered the occupied territory of Luhansk Oblast by crossing the Russian border on February 22, 2022. They invaded government-controlled territory across the line of contact and the Russian border on February 24. As of 26 May 2022 had occupied all but 5% of the region.


title: Luhansk Oblast

text: During the Battle of Donbas, Russian troops attacked and eventually captured the cities of Sieverodonetsk and Lysychansk during May and June 2022 in two of the most significant and most intense battles of the Eastern Ukraine offensive. By 3 July 2022, Russian and allied troops controlled all cities in the oblast.


title: Luhansk Oblast

text: On 4–5 July 2022, during the international Ukraine Recovery Conference (URC 2022) in Lugano, Finland, Sweden, and the Czech Republic pledged to support the postwar rebuilding of the Luhansk region.


title: Luhansk Oblast

text: On 11 September 2022, there were unconfirmed reports that Bilohorivka near Lysychansk, was recaptured. On 19 September 2022, Ukrainian forces confirmed this.


title: Luhansk Oblast

text: A referendum was held in Luhansk on joining the Russian Federation, although Ukraine along with the United Nations and most observers declared the referendum to be illegitimate and fraudulent. Following the staged victory in the voting, the region and the so-called Luhansk People's Republic were absorbed into Russia. The United Nations General Assembly subsequently passed a resolution calling on countries not to recognise what it described as an "attempted illegal annexation" and demanded that Russia "immediately, completely and unconditionally withdraw".


title: Luhansk Oblast

text: Like the rest of the provinces in Ukraine, Luhansk Oblast has a double jurisdiction. The oblast is predominantly administrated by the Luhansk Oblast State Administration, headed by the governor of the oblast, who is appointed by the President of Ukraine. The province has a representative body, the provincial council, which is headed by its chairman and elected by popular vote.


title: Luhansk Oblast

text: The province is primarily divided into 18 "raions" (districts), and 37 cities, including 14 cities of regional significance. The administrative center is Luhansk. These raions are listed below with their areas and populations.


title: Luhansk Oblast

text: The province's secondary division consists of various municipalities. Those municipalities may consist of one or more populated places. The municipalities are administratively subordinate to the raion in which they are located, with the exception of 14 cities subordinated directly to the oblast. The city of Luhansk is subdivided into its own four city-districts (boroughs).


title: Luhansk Oblast

text: The population is largely Russian-speaking, although ethnic Ukrainians constitute a majority (58.0%). Among the minorities are native Russians (39.1%), Belarusians (0.8%), and others (1.4%). Ukrainians constitute the majority in all raions except for Stanytsia-Luhanska Raion and Krasnodon Raion, both of which are east of Luhansk. Ethnic Russians also constitute the majority in regionally significant cities, such as Krasnodon, Sverdlovsk, Krasnyi Luch and Stakhanov.


title: Luhansk Oblast

text: In the 2001 Ukrainian Census, more than 68.8% of the population considered themselves Russian speakers, while 30.0% considered themselves Ukrainian speakers. The Russophone population predominates in the southern portion of the region and around the city of Luhansk, while the northern region is less populated, mostly agricultural and Ukrainophone.


title: Luhansk Oblast

text: Its population (as of 2004) of 2,461,506 constitutes 5.13% of the overall Ukrainian population. The Luhansk Oblast rates fifth in Ukraine by the number of its inhabitants, having an average population density of 90.28/km. About 87% of the population lives in urban areas, while the remaining 13% reside in agricultural areas. According to the national census, 54% of the population are Ukrainians and 42% are Russians.


title: Luhansk Oblast

text: The oblast has post industrial sites which run off building material into surrounding land. Yakymchuk 2018 finds feral stands of "Triticum aestivum" have colonised several of these sites.


title: Luhansk Oblast

text: Through the region pass two major European routes and . There are 24 Russo-Ukrainian international border checkpoints of various entry.


title: Bilbao

text: Bilbao (, , ; ) is a city in northern Spain, the largest city in the province of Biscay and in the Basque Country as a whole. It is also the largest city proper in northern Spain. Bilbao is the tenth largest city in Spain, with a population of 345,141 as of 2015. The Bilbao metropolitan area has 1,037,847 inhabitants, making it one of the most populous metropolitan areas in northern Spain; with a population of 875,552 the comarca of Greater Bilbao is the fifth-largest urban area in Spain. Bilbao is also the main urban area in what is defined as the Greater Basque region.


title: Bilbao

text: Bilbao is located in the north-central part of Spain, some south of the Bay of Biscay, where the economic social development is located, where the estuary of Bilbao is formed. Its main urban core is surrounded by two small mountain ranges with an average elevation of . Its climate is shaped by the Bay of Biscay low-pressure systems and mild air, moderating summer temperatures by Iberian standards, with low sunshine and high rainfall. The annual temperature range is low for its latitude.


title: Bilbao

text: After its foundation in the early 14th century by Diego López V de Haro, head of the powerful Haro family, Bilbao was one of the commercial hubs of the Basque Country that enjoyed significant importance in the Crown of Castile. This was due to its thriving port activity based on the export of wool and iron commodities extracted from the Biscayan quarries to all over Europe. Throughout the nineteenth century and the beginning of the twentieth, Bilbao experienced heavy industrialisation, making it the center of the second-most industrialised region of Spain, behind Barcelona. At the same time an extraordinary population explosion prompted the annexation of several adjacent municipalities. Nowadays, Bilbao is a vigorous service city that is experiencing an ongoing social, economic, and aesthetic revitalisation process, started by the iconic Bilbao Guggenheim Museum, and continued by infrastructure investments, such as the airport terminal, the rapid transit system, the tram line, the Azkuna Zentroa, and the currently under development Abandoibarra and Zorrozaurre renewal projects.


title: Bilbao

text: Bilbao is also home to football team Athletic Club, a significant symbol for Basque nationalism due to its promotion of only Basque players and being one of the most successful clubs in Spanish football history.


title: Bilbao

text: On 19 May 2010, the city of Bilbao was recognised with the Lee Kuan Yew World City Prize, awarded by the city state of Singapore, in collaboration with the Swedish Nobel Academy. Considered the Nobel Prize for urbanism, it was handed out on 29 June 2010. On 7 January 2013, its mayor, Iñaki Azkuna, received the 2012 World Mayor Prize awarded every two years by the British foundation The City Mayors Foundation, in recognition of the urban transformation experienced by the Biscayan capital since the 1990s. On 8 November 2017, Bilbao was chosen the Best European City 2018 at The Urbanism Awards 2018, awarded by the international organisation The Academy of Urbanism.


title: Bilbao

text: The official name of the town is Bilbao, as known in most languages of the world. Euskaltzaindia, the official regulatory institution of the Basque language, has agreed that between the two possible names existing in Basque, "Bilbao" and "Bilbo", the historical name is "Bilbo", while "Bilbao" is the official name. Although the term "Bilbo" does not appear in old documents, in the play "The Merry Wives of Windsor" by William Shakespeare, there is a reference to swords presumably made of Biscayan iron which he calls "bilboes", suggesting that it is a word used since at least the sixteenth century.


title: Bilbao

text: There is no consensus among historians about the origin of the name. Generally accepted accounts state that prior to the 12th century the independent rulers of the territory, named Lords of Zubialdea, were also known as Lords of Bilbao la Vieja ("Old Bilbao"). The symbols of their patrimony are the tower and church used in the shield of Bilbao to this day. One possible origin was suggested by the engineer Evaristo de Churruca. He said that it was a Basque custom to name a place after its location. For Bilbao this would be the result of the union of the Basque words for river and cove: "Bil-Ibaia-Bao". The historian José Tussel Gómez argues that it is just a natural evolution of the Spanish words "bello vado", beautiful ford. On the other hand, according to the writer Esteban Calle Iturrino, the name derives from the two settlements that existed on both banks of the estuary, rather than from the estuary itself. The first, where the present Casco Viejo is located, would be called "billa", which means stacking in Basque, after the configuration of the buildings. The second, on the left bank, where now Bilbao La Vieja is located, would be called "vaho", Spanish for mist or steam. From the union of these two derives the name Bilbao, which was also written as "Bilvao" and "Biluao", as documented in its municipal charter.


title: Bilbao

text: An "-ao" ending is also present in nearby Sestao and Ugao, that could be explained from Basque "aho", "mouth".


title: Bilbao

text: The demonym is "bilbaíno, -a", although the popular pronunciation "bilbaino/a" (sic) is also frequent. In euskera it is "bilbotar", which is sometimes also used in Spanish, generally within the Basque Country.


title: Bilbao

text: The village is affectionately known by its inhabitants as the "" meaning "hole", since it is surrounded by mountains. The nickname "botxero" is derived from this nickname. Another nickname that Bilbao receives is that of "chimbos", which comes from birds that were hunted in large numbers in these places during the 19th century.


title: Bilbao

text: The titles, the flag and the coat of arms are Bilbao's traditional symbols and belong to its historic patrimony, being used in formal acts, for the identification and decoration of specific places or for the validation of documents.


title: Bilbao

text: Bilbao holds the historic category of township ("villa"), with the titles of "Very noble and very loyal and unbeaten" ("Muy Noble y Muy Leal e Invicta"). It was the Catholic Monarchs who awarded the title "Noble Town" ("Noble Villa") on 20 September 1475. Philip III of Spain, via a letter in 1603 awarded the town the titles of "Very noble and very loyal". After the siege of Bilbao, during the First Carlist War, on 25 December 1836, the title of "Unbeaten" was added.


title: Bilbao

text: The flag that represents it is white with a red block, in a ratio of three parts long by two wide. The colors red and white are the historical ones of the villa.


title: Bilbao

text: The Royal Order of 30 July 1845 determined the maritime password for the population. This was defined as a white flag with an upper red die next to the pod. The die should be square and the length of its side should equal half of the pod. Previously, at least since 1511, the banner that the " Bilbao Consulate " was wearing was white with a red Cross of Burgundy. The relationship of the town with the mercantile and marine activities was always very strong coming to share headquarters. In 1603 the new consistorial house is inaugurated and in it the headquarters of the city council and of the referred one " Bilbao Consulate " are located. The intimate relationship made the flag of the Consulate was related as a flag of the town by citizenship.


title: Bilbao

text: The definition of the maritime flag in 1845 was assumed by the population, who accepted it as their own, and so did the city council. At the inauguration of the Bilbao-Miranda de Ebro railway line, it was already used as a symbol of the town's representation, being permanently adopted in 1895 although no resolution has been adopted for this purpose.


title: Bilbao

text: Although it has always been assumed by the municipal institution and citizenship, at the beginning of the 20th century it was discussed in a municipal plenary session about the determination of a flag for the town. There was talk about "the use of the crimson color of the Lordship of Biscay, or of the cross of Saint Andrew" but without reaching any resolution to the effect.


title: Bilbao

text: Remains of an ancient settlement were found on the top of Mount Malmasín, dating from around the 3rd or 2nd century BC. Burial sites were also found on mounts Avril and Artxanda, dated 6,000 years old. Some authors identify the old settlement of Bilbao as "Amanun Portus", cited by Pliny the Elder, or with "Flaviobriga", by Ptolemy.


title: Bilbao

text: Ancient walls, which date from around the 11th century, have been discovered below the Church of San Antón. Bilbao was one of the first towns founded in the fourteenth century, during a period in which approximately three-quarters of the Biscayan cities were developed, among them Portugalete in 1323, Ondarroa in 1327, Lekeitio in 1335, and Mungia and Larrabetzu in 1376. Diego López V de Haro, then third Lord of Biscay, founded Bilbao through a municipal charter dated in Valladolid on 15 June 1300 and confirmed by King Ferdinand IV of Castile in Burgos, on 4 January 1301. Diego López established the new town on the right bank of the Nervión river, on the grounds of the "elizate" of Begoña and granted it the "fuero" of Logroño, a compilation of rights and privileges that would prove fundamental to its later development.


title: Bilbao

text: In 1310 María Díaz I de Haro, niece of Diego López V and Lady of Biscay, grants a new municipal charter to the city, which extends its commercial privileges even further, transforming the city in a mandatory stop for all the trade coming from Castile towards the sea. This second charter established that the road from Orduña to Bermeo, at the time the most important trade route in the lordship, had to traverse the San Antón Bridge in Bilbao instead of the pass in Etxebarri, as it did until then. This strengthened the position of Bilbao as a trading post, in detriment of Bermeo, city which until then had acted as the main port of the territory. In addition, Bilbao was granted exclusive rights to all trade between the city and Las Arenas. In 1372, John I of Castile strengthened even more the city's position by naming Bilbao a free port and granting it special privileges concerning the trade of iron. This caused Bilbao to become an important port, particularly due to its trade with Flanders and Great Britain.


title: Bilbao

text: In 1443 the Church of Saint Anthony the Great was enshrined, having been built in the place of an old "alcázar". Still today the church is one of the oldest extant buildings of the city. On 5 September 1483, the Queen Isabella I of Castile traveled to Bilbao to swear fealty to the fueros of Biscay. Her husband, Ferdinand II of Aragon had already done so in 1476 in Gernika.


title: Bilbao

text: On 21 June 1511, Queen Joanna of Castile ordered the creation of the Consulate of the Sea of Bilbao. This would become the most influential institution of the borough for centuries, and would claim jurisdiction over the estuary, improving its infrastructure. Under the Consulate's control, the port of Bilbao became one of the most important of the kingdom. The first printing-press was brought to the town in 1577. Here in 1596, the first book in the Basque language was edited, entitled "Doctrina Christiana en Romance y Bascuence" by Dr. Betolaza.


title: Bilbao

text: In 1602 Bilbao was made the capital of Biscay, a title previously held by Bermeo. Around 1631, the city was the scenario of a series of revolts against the increased taxation on salt, which had been ordered by the Crown, an event locally known as the ""Machinada" of the salt". The revolt ended with the execution of several of its leaders. The city had seen a continuous increase of its wealth, especially after the discovery of extensive iron deposits in the surrounding mountains, and by the end of the century it managed to overcome the economic crises that affected the rest of the kingdom, thanks in part to the increased trading of wool (which now used the port of Bilbao instead of the one in Santander), and to the iron ore and its commerce with England and the Netherlands.


title: Bilbao

text: In 1791, the city of "Nueva Bilbao" ("New Bilbao" - now known as "Constitución") was founded in Chile, at the time a remote colony of the Spanish Empire.


title: Bilbao

text: The French invasion of Spain saw the occupation of several Basque cities, but Bilbao was not among them. The first open uprising against Napoleonic rule took place on 6 August 1808, a month after the Battle of Bailén. French troops sieged and sacked the city, alongside the neighbouring towns of Deusto and Begoña on 16 August. Beginning in February 1810, the city was under the command of Pierre Thouvenot, general of the French army and Baron of the Empire, who had become the head of the Military Government of "Vizcaya", which included the three Basque provinces. Thouvenot intended to move forward with the plan of total annexation of the Basque provinces into France, but the Peninsular War and ultimately the Battle of Vitoria made those plans impossible.


title: Bilbao

text: The Basque Country was one of the main sites of battles during the First Carlist War, a civil war between supporters of the Spanish regent Maria Christina, known as liberals, and those of the late king's brother Carlos of Borbón, known as Carlists. The Carlists were particularly focused on capturing Bilbao, a liberal and economic bastion in northern Spain. The Carlist general Tomás de Zumalacárregui tried to take the city during the siege of Bilbao of 1835, but he was wounded during a battle near Begoña and died some time after in the town of Zegama. The next year, the city resisted a second siege during which the liberal general Baldomero Espartero defeated the Carlists in the Battle of Luchana. The city was untouched by the Second Carlist War, which took place mostly in Catalonia, but was again an important scenario during the Third Carlist War; in April 1874 the city suffered a third siege which lasted two months.


title: Bilbao

text: Despite the warfare, Bilbao prospered during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, when it rose as the economic centre of the Basque Country. It was during this time that the railway first arrived to the city and the Bank of Bilbao (which later would go on to become the BBVA) was founded, as well as the Bilbao Stock Exchange. Steelmaking industries flourished with the creation of many new factories, including the Santa Ana de Bolueta and the Altos Hornos de Vizcaya in 1902. The city was modernised with new avenues and walkways, as well as with new modern buildings such as the City Hall building, the Basurto Hospital and the Arriaga Theatre. The population increased dramatically, from 11,000 in 1880 to 80,000 in 1900. Social movements also arose, notably Basque nationalism under Sabino Arana, which in the subsequent decades would grow to become the Basque Nationalist Party.


title: Bilbao

text: The Spanish Civil War in Bilbao started with a number of small uprisings suppressed by the Republican forces. On 31 August 1936, the city suffered its first bombing, with a series of air bombs dropped by Nationalist airplanes. In September, the Nationalists distributed pamphlets threatening further bombing if the city did not give up, which finally took place on 25 September when German planes, in coordination with Francoist forces, dropped at least a hundred bombs on the city. In May 1937, the Nationalist army besieged the town. The battle lasted until 19 June of that year, when Lieutenant Colonel Putz was ordered to destroy all bridges over the estuary, and the troops of the 5th Brigade took the borough from the mountains Malmasin, Pagasarri, and Arnotegi.


title: Bilbao

text: With the war over, Bilbao returned to its industrial development, accompanied by steady population growth. In the 1940s, the city was rebuilt, starting with the bridges and by 1948, the first commercial flight took off from the local airport. Over the next decade, there was a revival of the iron industry, which became a strategic industrial sector in Spain, as a consequence of the economic model promoted by Francoism. The city received migrants from other Spanish regions looking to work in the iron industry. The demand for housing outstripped supply, and workers built slums on the hillsides. It was in this context that the first social movements arose and the strike of the "Euskalduna" shipyard in 1947 was the first one to take place during the Francoist dictatorship. In this environment of social repression, on 31 July 1959 the separatist organisation ETA was created from Basque nationalist movements. During the 1960s the city was the scenario of several urban projects, with the creation of new neighbourhoods like Otxarkoaga and the motorway to the French border. In June 1968 the University of Bilbao, the first public university, was established. It would later be integrated into the University of the Basque Country.


title: Bilbao

text: After the end of Francoist Spain and the establishment of a constitutional monarchy, in a process known in Spain as the transition, Bilbao was able to hold democratic elections again. This time Basque nationalists rose to power. With the approval of the Statute of Autonomy of the Basque Country in 1979, Vitoria-Gasteiz was elected the seat of the government and therefore the "de facto" capital of the Basque Autonomous Community, although Bilbao was larger and more powerful economically. In the 1980s, several factors such as labor demands and the arrival of cheap labor from abroad led to a devastating industrial crisis.


title: Bilbao

text: On 26 August 1983 during the celebration of the local festivities known as "Aste Nagusia", the estuary overflowed up to five metres in some areas due to the continuous raining, killing two people and causing important destructions in the city's infrastructure, with a total economic cost that reached 60,000 million pesetas (around 360 million Euro)


title: Bilbao

text: Since the mid-1990s, Bilbao has been in a process of deindustrialization and transition to a service economy, supported by investment in infrastructure and urban renewal, starting with the opening of the Bilbao Guggenheim Museum (the so-called "Guggenheim effect"), and continuing with the Euskalduna Conference Centre and Concert Hall, Santiago Calatrava's Zubizuri, the metro network by Norman Foster, the tram, the Iberdrola Tower and the Zorrozaurre development plan, among others. Many officially supported associations such as Bilbao Metrópoli-30 and Bilbao Ría 2000 were created to monitor these projects.


title: Bilbao

text: Bilbao is located near the northern edge of the Iberian Peninsula, about from the Bay of Biscay. It covers an area of , of which are urban and the remaining consist of the surrounding mountains. The official average altitude is , although there are measurements between and . It is also the core of the "comarca" of Greater Bilbao. It is surrounded by the municipalities of Derio, Etxebarri, Galdakao, Loiu, Sondika, and Zamudio to the north; Arrigorriaga and Basauri to the west; Alonsotegi to the south; and Barakaldo and Erandio to the east.


title: Bilbao

text: Bilbao is located on the Basque threshold, the range between the larger Cantabrian Mountains and the Pyrenees. The soil is predominantly composed of mesozoic materials (limestone, sandstone, and marl) sedimented over a primitive paleozoic base. The relief of the province is dominated by NW-SE and WNW-ESE oriented folds. The main fold is the anticline of Bilbao which runs from the municipality of Elorrio to Galdames. Inside Bilbao there are two secondary folds, one in the northeast, composed of Mounts Artxanda, Avril, Banderas, Pikota, San Bernabé, and Cabras; and other in the south, composed of Mounts Kobetas, Restaleku, Pagasarri and Arraiz. The highest point in the municipality is Mount Ganeta, of , followed by Mount Pagasarri, of , both on the border with Alonsotegi.


title: Bilbao

text: The main river system of Bilbao is also the hydrological artery of Biscay. The rivers Nervión and Ibaizabal converge in Basauri and form an estuary named variously "estuary of Bilbao", "of the Nervión", "of the Ibaizabal", or "of the Nervión-Ibaizabal". The estuary runs for and with a low flow (with an average of per second). Its main tributary is the river Cadagua, which rises in the Mena valley and has a basin of , mostly lying in the neighboring province of Burgos. This river is also the natural border between Bilbao and Barakaldo.


title: Bilbao

text: The river has frequently suffered from human intervention, as seen in the dredging of its bottom, the building of docks on both banks and especially in the Deusto canal, an artificial waterway dug between 1950 and 1968 in the district of Deusto as a lateral canal, with the aim of facilitating navigation, sparing ships from the natural curves of the estuary. The project was stopped with left to complete, and it was decided to leave it as a dock. However, in 2007, a plan was approved to continue the canal and form the island of Zorrozaurre. This human intervention has also brought negative results in the quality of the water, after decades of toxic waste dumping causing a situation of anoxia (lack of oxygen), which almost eliminated the entire fauna and flora. However, in recent years this situation is being reversed, thanks to a dumping ban and natural regeneration. now it is possible to observe algae, tonguefishes, crabs, and seabirds, as well as occasional bathers in the summer months.


title: Bilbao

text: The estuary is also a natural border for several neighbourhoods and districts within the borough. Entering the municipality from the west it separates the districts of Begoña and Ibaiondo, then Abando and Uribarri and lastly Deusto and Basurto-Zorroza.


title: Bilbao

text: Its proximity to the Bay of Biscay gives Bilbao an oceanic climate ("Cfb"), with precipitation occurring throughout the year and without a well-defined dry summer. Precipitation is abundant, and given the latitude and atmospheric dynamics, rainy days represent 45% and cloudy days 40% of the annual total. The rainiest season is between October and April, November being the wettest. Snow is not frequent in Bilbao, although it is possible to see snow on the top of the surrounding mountains. Sleet is more frequent, about 10 days per year, mainly in the winter months. Bilbao is nearest to the subtropical boundary of all the Atlantic coastal cities in the country with an August daily mean of . There is also a drying trend in summer with only around of rainfall in July – but not dry enough to be considered Mediterranean.


title: Bilbao

text: The proximity of the ocean also means that the two best defined seasons (summer and winter) remain mild, with low intensity thermal oscillations. Average maximum temperatures vary between in the summer months, while the average minimum in winter is between .


title: Bilbao

text: Extreme record observations in Bilbao are maximum (on 26 July 1947) and minimum (on 3 February 1963). The maximum precipitation in a day was on 26 August 1983 when severe flooding was caused by the Nervión river.


title: Bilbao

text: According to the Basque Statistics Office, the population of Bilbao is 342,397 people as of 2017, distributed on a land area of , making Bilbao the largest city by population of the Basque Autonomous Community and of the Basque Country as a whole. Bilbao makes the main component of the Bilbao metropolitan area, with a population of 1,037,847 people.


title: Bilbao

text: The first credible data on the population of Bilbao are post-1550. It is known that in 1530 Biscay had approximately 65,000 inhabitants, a number that could have been reduced by plagues that struck the city in 1517, 1530, 1564–68, and 1597–1601, the last being especially devastating. This trend for periodic reverses in population growth was maintained until the nineteenth century. Since then, Bilbao has experienced an exponential growth in population thanks to industrialisation. After a peak of 433,115 inhabitants in 1982, the municipalities of the Txorierri valley were removed from Bilbao, with the corresponding loss of their population.


title: Bilbao

text: Spanish is the most spoken language in the city, followed by the vernacular Basque language. According to the city government of Bilbao, at least 51% of the population can speak "some Basque", while 29% consider themselves to be fluent.


title: Bilbao

text: Out of the 355,731 people residing in Bilbao in 2009, only 114,220 (32.1%) were born inside the municipality. Of the remainder, 114,908 were born in other Biscayan towns, while 9,545 were born in the other two Basque provinces; 85,789 came from the rest of Spain (mainly Castile-León and Galicia), and 33,537 were foreigners. There are 127 different nationalities registered in Bilbao, although 60 of them represent fewer than 10 people each. The largest foreign communities are Bolivians and Colombians, with 4,879 and 3,730 respectively. Other nationalities with more than 1,000 inhabitants are Romanians (2,248), Moroccans (2,058), Ecuadorians (1,832), Chinese (1,390), Brazilians (1,273) and Paraguayans, with 1,204.


title: Bilbao

text: The city of Bilbao is the capital of the province of Biscay and as such it is home of the administrative entities that pertain to the provincial administration, both from the autonomous and central governments. Settled in the city are the provincial delegations of the different departments of the Basque autonomous government, each coordinated by a representative. In addition, the Government of Spain has the official Government Subdelegation in the city.


title: Bilbao

text: Bilbao is a municipality and has a mayor-council government system. The municipal government is elected for four-year terms by universal suffrage and it is divided into two branches, executive and legislative. The legislative side consists of a municipal plenum composed of 29 councillors. These councillors represent the different political parties elected in the local elections, for which can vote all residents registered in the city who are citizens of Spain or of any member state of the European Union. The executive branch is composed of the mayor and a board of governors. The number of members of the board cannot be more than a third the number of members of the legislative plenum and the mayor can appoint them at his or her own discretion.


title: Bilbao

text: Since 1892 the seat of the government has been the Bilbao City Hall, located on the centric Ernesto Erkoreka plaza and by the Estuary of Bilbao. It is the fourth city hall building to have been used since the year 1300. The first three city halls were located by the San Antón Church but were destroyed due to floodings. The current building was designed by the Spanish architect Joaquín Rucoba in Baroque style and was built in the former site of the San Agustín Monastery, which was destroyed during the First Carlist War. Since the Spanish transition to democracy, the city has been governed by the Basque Nationalist Party, often with support of the Socialist Party of the Basque Country. Iñaki Azkuna served as mayor from 1999 until his passing in 2014, when he was replaced by Ibon Areso. Azkuna was awarded the World Mayor prize in 2012. Since the 2019 municipal election, the councillors of the plenum have the following political distribution: 14 seats for the Basque Nationalist Party, 5 seats for the Socialist Party of the Basque Country, 4 seats for the EH Bildu coalition, 3 seats for Udalberri and 3 seats for the People's Party. The mayor is Juan Mari Aburto, chosen with 19 votes from the Basque Nationalist Party and the Socialist party.


title: Bilbao

text: In 2008 and 2010, Bilbao won the Municipal Transparency Prize, awarded by the Spanish division of Transparency International. In 2009 it came second, after Sant Cugat del Vallés.


title: Bilbao

text: The municipality is divided into eight districts (Basque: "barrutia") which are further subdivided into 34 neighbourhoods (Basque: "auzoa"). Most of the districts and neighbourhoods were former independent municipalities and elizates that were eventually annexed into the city. Originally, the city of Bilbao comprised the Old Town and some houses on the left side of the estuary, today known as Bilbao la Vieja. The first expansion included the annexation of the elizate of Begoña and the river side of Uribarri. In the 19th century the merge of Abando into the city brought along small neighbourhoods of farm houses and hamlets that were clustered close to the former municipality's town hall and the Mount Cobetas, such as Errekalde and Basurto. Starting in the 20th century it started annexing the elizates on the right bank of the river, including Begoña and Deusto. In the decade of 1960 as an effort to stop the increasing problem of slums, new neighbourhoods were created from the ground up, among them Otxarkoaga and Txurdinaga, which were joined together as a new district, Otxarkoaga-Txurdinaga in the decade of 1990.


title: Bilbao

text: The Bilbao metropolitan area comprises about 47% of the total population of the Basque autonomous community, out of which a 15% is registered in the municipality of Bilbao. The "comarca" of Greater Bilbao, in which the city occupies a central position, has a GDP per capita of €30,860, higher than the Spanish and European Union averages. The Bilbao metropolitan area has a nominal GDP amounting to $36,9 billion. Bilbao has been the economic centre of the Basque autonomous community since the original establishment of the Consulate of the Sea in the city in the 16th century, mostly thanks to the commerce in Castilian products on the town's port. It was in the 19th century when the city experimented its biggest economic development, mainly based on the exploitation of the nearby iron mines and siderurgy, both of which promoted maritime traffic and port activity and eventually the development of a very important shipbuilding industry.


title: Bilbao

text: Banking became an important sector with the establishment of the Bank of Bilbao (Spanish: "Banco de Bilbao") in 1857 and the Bank of Biscay (Spanish: "Banco de Vizcaya") in 1901. These two entities merged in 1988 creating the BBV, which finally merged with Argentaria bank in 1999, creating the current multinational corporation, the BBVA. The savings banks that were established locally, the Municipal Savings Bank of Bilbao (Spanish: "Caja de Ahorros Municipal de Bilbao") in 1907 and the Provincial Savings Bank of Biscay (Spanish: "Caja de Ahorros Provincial de Vizcaya") in 1921, would merge in 1990 to form the Bilbao Bizkaia Kutxa (BBK), which would marge again in 2012 with other Basque financial entities (Kutxa and Caja Vital Kutxa) to form Kutxabank. There is also the Chamber of Commerce, Industry and Navigation of Bilbao and the Stock Exchange Market of Bilbao, founded in 1890.


title: Bilbao

text: The historical port was located in what is today an area called the Arenal, a few steps from the old city, until the late 19th century. In 1902, an exterior port was built at the mouth of the estuary, in the coastal municipality of Santurtzi. Further extensions to the outer port, which became called "the super-port", led to the final move of the city portuary facilities in the 1970s, finally replacing the docks in the centre of the city, with the exception of those located in the neighbourhood of Zorrotza, still active.


title: Bilbao

text: The port of Bilbao is a first-class commercial port and is among the top five of Spain. Over 200 regular maritime services link Bilbao with 500 ports worldwide. At the close of 2009 cargo movements amounted to 31.6 million tonnes, Russia, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands and the Nordic countries being the main markets. In the first semester of 2008, it received over 67,000 passengers and 2,770 ships. This activity contributed 419 million euros to the Basque GDP and maintains almost 10,000 jobs.


title: Bilbao

text: Iron is the main and most abundant raw material found in Biscay, and its extraction has been legally regulated since 1526. Mining was the main primary activity in Bilbao and the minerals, of great quality, were exported to all over Europe. It was not until the second half of the nineteenth century that an ironworks industry was developed, benefiting from the resources and the city's good communication links. In the 20th century, both Spanish and European capitals imported around 90% of the iron from Biscay. Although World War I made Bilbao one of the main ironworks powers, a subsequent crisis prompted a decline in the activity.


title: Bilbao

text: The first notion of Bilbao as a tourist destination came with the inauguration of the railway between Bilbao and the coastal neighbourhood of Las Arenas, in the municipality of Getxo in 1872. The connection made Bilbao a minor beach destination.


title: Bilbao

text: The real tourist surge though would come much later with the inauguration of the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao in 1997. Thereafter tourist arrivals registered a continued upward trend, reaching over 932,000 visitors in 2018. The trend was exponential considering that in 1995, Bilbao only counted 25,000 tourists. Bilbao also hosts 31% of the total Basque Country visitors, being the top destination of this autonomous community, outranking San Sebastián. The majority of tourists are domestic visitors, coming from Madrid and Catalonia. International travellers are predominantly French, crossing the border just to the east. The others arrive from the United Kingdom, Germany, and Italy. Tourism generates about 300 million euros yearly for the Biscayan GDP. Bilbao also draws business tourism, having been equipped with facilities like the Euskalduna Conference Centre and Concert Hall, and the Bilbao Exhibition Centre, in nearby Barakaldo.


title: Bilbao

text: Plans to create a stock exchange market in Bilbao began in the early 19th century, even though it would not be realized until 21 July 1890. Bilbao's institution is one of the country's four regional stock exchanges, joining Barcelona, Madrid, and Valencia as Spain's commercial centres. It is owned by Bolsas y Mercados Españoles. The Bilbao Stock Exchange is considered a secondary market.


title: Bilbao

text: In its beginnings, Bilbao only had three streets ("Somera", "Artecalle", and "Tendería") surrounded by walls located where Ronda street now stands. Inside this enclosure, there was a small hermitage dedicated to the Apostle Saint James (the current St. James' Cathedral), which pilgrims visited on their way to Santiago de Compostela. In the fifteenth century, four more streets were built, forming the original "Zazpikaleak" or "Seven Streets". In 1571, after several floods and a major fire in 1569, the walls were demolished in order to allow the expansion of the town.


title: Bilbao

text: In 1861, engineer Amado Lázaro projected an "ensanche" inside the then-municipality of Abando with wide avenues and regular buildings, that included the hygienists ideas of the time. The project was mostly based on Barcelona's "Eixample", designed by Ildefons Cerdà. However, the project was dropped by the City Council after considering it "utopian and excessive" because of its high cost, though of great quality. Furthermore, Lázaro had calculated the demographic growth of the town was based on the previous three centuries, a provision that eventually would not conform to reality.


title: Bilbao

text: The next large urban change in Bilbao would come in 1876, when the capital annexed (in several stages) the neighbouring municipality of Abando. The new "ensanche" project was planned by a team made of architect Severino de Achúcarro and engineers Pablo de Alzola (elected Mayor that same year), and Ernesto de Hoffmeyer. Unlike Lázaro's, this project was significantly smaller, compassing against the original . It also featured a not so strict grid pattern, a park to separate the industrial and residential areas and the Gran Vía de Don Diego López de Haro, the main thoroughfare, where many relevant buildings were located, such as the Biscay provincial government hall or the BBVA Tower. By the end of the 1890s, this widening was half completed and already filled, so a new extension was planned by Federico Ugalde.


title: Bilbao

text: By 1925, the municipalities of Deusto and Begoña, as well as part of Erandio were annexed, and in 1940, the remaining part of Erandio became part of Bilbao. The last annexation took place in 1966, with the municipalities of Loiu, Sondika, Derio, and Zamudio. This made Bilbao larger than ever, with . However, all these municipalities, with the exception of Deusto and Begoña regained their independence on 1 January 1983.


title: Bilbao

text: On 18 May 2010, the government of Singapore awarded Bilbao the Lee Kuan Yew World City Prize, at the World Cities Summit 2010. It is considered the Pritzker of urbanism.


title: Bilbao

text: Bilbao's buildings display a variety of architectural styles, ranging from gothic, Art Deco, Art Nouveau, Neo-Gothic and contemporary architecture. The Old Town features many of the oldest buildings in the city, as the St. James' Cathedral or the Church of San Antón, included in the borough's coat of arms. Most of the Old Town is a pedestrian zone during the day. Nearby is one of the most important religious temples of Biscay, the Basilica of Begoña, dedicated to the patron saint of the province, Our Lady of Begoña.


title: Bilbao

text: Seventeen bridges span the banks of the estuary inside the town's boundaries. Among the most interesting ones are the Zubizuri (Basque for "white bridge"), a pedestrian footbridge designed by Santiago Calatrava opened in 1997, and the Princes of Spain Bridge, also known as "La Salve", a suspension bridge opened in 1972 and redesigned by French conceptual artist Daniel Buren in 2007. The Deusto Bridge is a bascule bridge opened in 1936 and modelled after the Michigan Avenue Bridge, in Chicago. Between 1890 and 1893 the first transporter bridge (""Puente Colgante"") in the world on the Nervion river, between Portugalete and Getxo, was built by Alberto Palacio (architect and engineer) together with his brother Silvestre.


title: Bilbao

text: Since the deindustrialization process started in the 1990s, many of the former industrial areas are being transformed into modern public and private spaces designed by several of the world's most renowned architects and artists. The main example is the Guggenheim Museum, located in what was an old dock and wood warehouse. The building, designed by Frank Gehry and inaugurated in October 1997, is considered among architecture experts as one of the most important structures of the last 30 years, and a masterpiece by itself. The museum houses part of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation modern art collection. Another example is the Azkuna Zentroa, a wine warehouse built in 1909 and completely redesigned in 2010 by French designer Philippe Starck into a multi-purpose venue that consists of a cinema multiplex, a fitness centre, a library, and a restaurant, among other spaces. The Abandoibarra area is also being renovated, and it features not only the Guggenheim Museum, but also Arata Isozaki's tower complex, the Euskalduna Conference Centre and Concert Hall and the Iberdrola Tower, designed by Argentine architect César Pelli which is, since its completion in 2011, the Basque Country's tallest skyscraper, high. Zorrozaurre is the next area to be redeveloped, following a 2007 master plan designed by Iraqi architect Zaha Hadid. This peninsula was transformed into a island and will feature residential and commercial buildings, as well as the new BBK seat.


title: Bilbao

text: , Bilbao has 18 public parks inside its limits, totalling of green spaces. Furthermore its green belt has a total area of , of which are urbanized. The largest parks are Mount Cobetas, of , and Larreagaburu, of , both located on the outskirts.


title: Bilbao

text: The Doña Casilda Iturrizar park is located in the district of Abando, near the town centre and covers an area of . It is named after a local benefactress who donated the grounds to the borough. It is an English-style garden designed by Ricardo Bastida and opened to the public in 1907. It features a dancing water fountain surrounded by a pergola, and a pond with many species of ducks, geese and swans, which gives the park the alternate name of "Ducks' Park", as known locally. In recent years, it was expanded to be connected with the Abandoibarra area. In Ibaiondo, the Etxeberria Park was built in the 1980s in the place where a steel mill previously stood. The original chimney was maintained as a homage of its industrial past. It covers an area of , on a sloped terrain that overlooks the Old Town. Other relevant public spaces inside the city include the Europa Park, the Miribilla Park, or the Memorial Walkway, a long walkway, with high lamps, located in the left bank of the estuary and that connects the main sights.


title: Bilbao

text: Mount Artxanda is easily accessible from the town centre by a funicular. There is a recreational area at the summit, with restaurants, a sports complex and a balcony with panoramic views. In the south, Mount Pagasarri receives hundreds of hikers every weekend since the 1870s, who seek its natural wonders. Its environment is officially protected since 2007.


title: Bilbao

text: Bilbao was appointed a "City of Design" by UNESCO in 2014 and has been part of the Creative Cities Network since then.


title: Bilbao

text: The main hall of the city is the Arriaga Theater, reopened in 1985 as a municipal venue with a varied repertoire that includes dancing, opera, live music and theatre. Also very active are the Campos Elíseos Theater and the Euskalduna Concert Hall. Other important venues include La Fundición, dedicated to contemporary dances and theatre; the Pabellón 6, the Sala BBK and the Azkuna Zentroa.


title: Bilbao

text: Bilbao has more than a dozen museums covering a range of fields including art, science, and sport, which have played a central role in Bilbao being named one of the most creative cities in the world.


title: Bilbao

text: The Guggenheim Museum Bilbao, part of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation, was inaugurated on 19 October 1997 and is work of the Canadian architect Frank Gehry. The museum's permanent collection is centered in the visual arts of the second half of the 20th century and the present, with relevant artworks from Richard Serra and Jeff Koons, although including as well temporary exhibitions with a more varied nature, like Russian art or engravings from Albrecht Dürer.


title: Bilbao

text: Another important museum is the Bilbao Fine Arts Museum, first established in 1908 and housing a notable collection of Spanish and European work from the 12th century to present times. The collection from before the 20th century is centered mainly around Spanish and Flemish artists such as El Greco, Francisco de Zurbarán, Bartolomé Esteban Murillo, Francisco Goya and Anthony van Dyck. The museum also holds one of the best collections of Basque art, with works from the 19th century to present times. It has an eye-catching collection of Avant-garde art, from the Post-Impressionism of Paul Gauguin to Pop art and the expressionism of Francis Bacon.


title: Bilbao

text: The Basque Museum showcases Basque archaeology and ethnography, and holds frequent exhibitions in the area of Basque history. The museum building itself is part of the heritage listing "Conjunto histórico". The city also has several specialised museums, like the Maritime Museum Estuary of Bilbao ("Bilboko Itsasadarra Itsas Museoa"), located next to the Estuary of Bilbao, which holds ships and other collection related to the region's fishing and shipbuilding culture, being particularly relevant the "Carola" crane, last remaining element of the Euskalduna shipyard that existed where the museum now stands.


title: Bilbao

text: Other relevant museums are the Biscayan Archeological Museum ("Arkeologi Museoa") which holds important collections related to the region's prehistory, and the Diocesan Museum of Religious Art ("Eleiz Museoa"), both located in the Casco Viejo quarter.


title: Bilbao

text: The Euskalduna Concert Hall is home to frequent musical performances and it is home of the Bilbao Symphony Orchestra ("Bilbao Orkestra Sinfonikoa") and the opera season programmed by the ABAO (Bilbao Association of Friends of the Opera). The Arriaga Theater is frequently the host of numerous musical events, other notable stages include the Philharmonic Society of Bilbao (chamber music) and Bilborock (pop and rock music). The city hosts many different musical festivities, often funded by the city hall. Due to its scope, it is especially relevant the Bilbao BBK Live festival, which has been celebrated every year since 2006 and focuses on Basque, Spanish and international pop and rock music. Since the opening of the new San Mamés Stadium in 2013, it has been often used as an open-air concert venue, the first ever concert being one from the American band Guns N' Roses in 2017. Other relevant music festivals include the "Bilbao Distrito Jazz" and the "Bilbao Ars Sacrum", the latter dedicated to religious music.


title: Bilbao

text: Bilbao is the birthplace of famous composer Juan Crisóstomo Arriaga, who lived his formative years in the city before moving to Paris at age 15. Also native from Bilbao were the soprano singer Josefa Cruz de Gassier and Natividad Álvarez, nicknamed "Nati, la bilbainita" (Spanish for "Nati, the little one from Bilbao") a dancer and castanets player who achieved national fame in the early 20th century. Also relevant is the Bilbao Choir Society ("Bilboko Koral Elkartea"), established in 1866. Important musical bands coming from the city include rock band "Fito & Fitipaldis", Basque folk band "Oskorri" and folk-pop band "Mocedades".


title: Bilbao

text: Bilbao hosts several regular festivals and events. The most relevant is the Big Week of the city ("Aste Nagusia"), celebrated annually since 1978 and lasting nine days. It is the city's main festival, attracting over 1,500,000 people every year. The festivities begin on the first Saturday before 22 August, and during those nine days the city hall organises a series of cultural events of diverse kind, including concerts, stage plays, Basque rural sports and bullfighting, as well as nightly firework displays. The festivities begin with the "chupinazo" or "txupinazo", which is the launch of a small rocket, and the reading of a proclamation by the festivities' herald. The central point of the festivities is the place around the "txosnas", where the different "konpartsak" are reunited, organised by neighbourhood associations as well as cultural, social and political groups. The symbol of the festivities is "Marijaia", a large doll which is burned during the last day of celebrations.


title: Bilbao

text: Beyond the main festivities of the "Aste Nagusia", the city also celebrates some minor festivities, many of them religious in nature, such as Saint Agatha on 5 February, the celebrations of Our Lady of Begoña on 11 October, the Day of Thomas the Apostle on 21 December and the Christmas festivities, centered around the figure of Olentzero. There are also festivities in the different neighbourhoods and districts which are celebrated locally, such as the "Fiestas del Carmen" in Santutxu and Indautxu, "Fiestas Santiago" in Bilbao la Vieja, "Fiestas San Ignacio" in San Inazio and "Fiestas San Roque" in Arxtanda and Larraskitu.


title: Bilbao

text: The city also hosts the International Festival of Documentary and Short Film under the commercial name of Zinebi. It was first held in 1959 under the name International Festival of Ibero-American and Filipino Documentary Film of Bilbao, with the goal of being complementary to the San Sebastián International Film Festival. Since 1981 it is organised by the city hall and takes place in the Arriaga Theatre. Bilbao is also the host of the SAIL in Festival, a yearly event centered exclusively around sailing, which brings together international representatives of this sport.


title: Bilbao

text: Traditional Bilbao dishes are centered around products from the sea and the estuary, such as eels and cod. For the most part Bilbao shares its original gastronomy with that of the province of Biscay, including dishes such as "bacalao al pil pil" (cod fish cooked with olive oil, garlic and guindilla peppers), "bacalao a la vizcaína" (salted cod with Biscayan sauce, mostly made of "choricero" peppers and onions), "merluza en salsa verde" (hake fish with green sauce), "chipirones en su tinta" (squid served with its own ink), "morros a la vizcaína" (beef snouts with Biscayan sauce), "revuelto de perretxikos" (scrambled eggs with mushrooms) and desserts such as "canutillos de Bilbao" (puff pastries filled with custard or chocolate), "Pantxineta" (puff pastries filled with custard and almonds), rice cakes and "bollos de mantequilla" (butter buns).


title: Bilbao

text: Bilbao, as other Basque cities, is known for a variety of appetizers and snacks, being prominent among them the "pintxos", which are typically eaten in bars and that consist of small slices of bread on top of which is placed an ingredient or mixture of ingredients, generally of many different types and usually including elements typical of Basque cuisine. Other snacks include "rabas" (fried or battered calamari rings, usually served with lemon slices), Spanish omelette (omelette made with eggs and potatoes, sometimes including onions and peppers), "" (stuffed mushrooms), "triángulos" (Bilbao-style sandwiches), "gildas" (one or more olives, a "guindilla" pepper and an anchovy joined together with a toothpick).


title: Bilbao

text: In what refers to beverages, typical from the region is the "txakoli", a white wine usually drunk as an apéritif. Biscayan "txakoli" ("Bizkaiko Txakolina") is a protected "Denominación de origen" for the white wine produced in the province of Biscay and it is usually served in Bilbao. Also typical are cider, "patxaran" (sloe-flavoured liqueur) and "Rioja" wine.


title: Bilbao

text: There are many restaurants and bars who serve these dishes and beverages, especially around the Casco Viejo quarter. "Txokos" are also a very popular institution in Bilbao, as in other Basque cities and towns. Bilbao, and the province of Biscay as a whole, is one of the spanish cities with a greater number of recognized restaurants by the gastronomic guides, among them several Michelin-starred restaurants.


title: Bilbao

text: The Spanish language is the most used language of the city, followed by the Basque language, which is vernacular to the region. The presence of Basque in the city is less prominent than in other municipalities of the region, such as Bermeo or Lekeitio. In 1986, the bilingual Basque-speaking population represented about 28% of the total. However, the number of Basque speakers has experienced a continuous increase since, reaching a number of 37% in 2001. More than half of the Basque speakers were younger than 30 and lived in the districts of Deusto, Begoña and Abando.


title: Bilbao

text: According to the data from the 2016 census, the population older than 2 years old registered in the municipality of Bilbao who speaks fluently represents 29% of the total population, while those who can speak it with difficulty represent around 19.95% of the total. Finally, those who cannot speak or understand the language represent the remaining 51.06% of the census.


title: Bilbao

text: Bilbao is a relevant transport hub for northern Spain. Bilbao is connected to three major motorways and a series of minor roads of national and provincial level. The city lies on two international roads, the European route E70 that follows the coast of the Bay of Biscay and the cities of Santander and Gijón to the west and with Eibar, San Sebastián and Bordeaux to the east. The European route E80 connects the city with inner Spain to the south, including Burgos and Salamanca and continuing to Lisbon, and Toulouse to the north. The AP-68 motorway (European road E-804) starts in the city, joining with Vitoria-Gasteiz, Logroño and ending in Zaragoza.


title: Bilbao

text: The city is connected with the regions of Cantabria, Asturias and Galicia via the A-8 motorway and with Durango, Eibar, San Sebastián and the French border via the AP-8 motorway, which is a toll road. The AP-68 toll motorway to the south is the main road connecting Bilbao with southern Spain and the Mediterranean coast, connecting in Miranda de Ebro with the A-1 to Madrid and in Zaragoza with the AP-2 to Barcelona.


title: Bilbao

text: Minor roads passing through Bilbao or starting in the city itself include the national road N-634 which connects San Sebastián with Santiago de Compostela and runs parallel to the A-8 and AP-8 motorways. The regional road BI-631 connects Bilbao with Bermeo, while the BI-626 joins the city with Balmaseda. The city is circled by the BI-625 and N-637 roads, which form a half-ring to the east, and the N-634 and A-8 to the west.


title: Bilbao

text: The city's main arteries the Gran Vía de Don Diego López de Haro, which crosses the financial and business district of Abando and connecting it with the Casco Viejo to the east and the San Mamés area to the west. The Sabino Arana Avenue and Juan Antonio Zunzunegui Avenue provide a direct route between the central districts and the motorways while Autonomía Street joins the southern districts on an east-west direction. The city has 14 bridges connecting opposite sides of the Estuary of Bilbao and the Kadagua river, including the La Salve and Euskalduna bridges, as well a series of tunnels under the Mount Artxanda.


title: Bilbao

text: Bilbao is served by the Bilbao Airport (BIO), the busiest terminal in the Basque Country and in the entire Northern coast, with more than 5.4 million passengers in 2018. It is located north of the borough, between the municipalities of Loiu and Sondika. 20 airlines operate in the terminal, including Iberia, Lufthansa, and TAP Portugal. Top destinations include London, Frankfurt, Munich, Madrid, Barcelona, Málaga, Paris, Brussels, and Amsterdam. It opened to the public in September 1948, with a regular flight to Madrid. On 19 November 2000, a new terminal building was opened, designed by Valencian architect Santiago Calatrava. In February 2009, a project was approved to expand the current building to double its capacity. Although originally expected to be completed by 2014, the financial crisis and the decrease of passenger traffic delayed it to at least 2019. No work has begun as of 2018.


title: Bilbao

text: Some low-cost airlines, such as Ryanair, also use the Vitoria Airport (VIT) located in Foronda located 59 km (37 mi) south of the city.


title: Bilbao

text: Long-distance rail lines connect Bilbao with Madrid, Barcelona and other destinations in northern Spain. The city has four railway stations: the Bilbao-Abando and Bilbao-Concordia railway stations are owned by Adif and operated by the Spanish railways Renfe, whereas the Bilbao-Atxuri and Zazpikaleak/Casco Viejo stations are owned by the Basque railway network ETS and operated by Euskotren, serving short-distance local destinations.


title: Bilbao

text: The Bilbao-Abando station is the main railway station of the city, with Renfe running Iberian-gauge long-distance Alvia trains to Madrid and Barcelona, as well as Intercity services to Vigo with connections possible to A Coruña and Hendaye. During the summer there are special trains to Málaga. The city will be connected to the Basque Y high-speed train network around 2023, allowing for high speed AVE trains to operate between the Basque capitals and also to Madrid and other Spanish cities in the future. The arrival of the new high speed services will involve the creation of a completely new underground station that will replace the current infrastructure. The construction is expected to begin in 2020.


title: Bilbao

text: Bilbao-Concordia station is located in close vicinity to Bilbao-Abando, and hosts the narrow-gauge railway services ran by Renfe under the Renfe Feve brand. Renfe runs frequent regional trains to the cities of Santander and León. Euskotren Trena runs regular services to Bermeo from the Bilbao-Atxuri station, while in the Zazpikaleak/Casco Viejo station there are regional services to Durango, Eibar and San Sebastián.


title: Bilbao

text: Public transport by rail and bus is organised by the "Bizkaiko Garraio Partzuergoa" (Consortium of the Biscayan Transport). The consortium manages the Barik card, a form of electronic ticket valid across almost all public transport systems of the Bilbao metropolitan area and Biscay province, as well as some other selected services in other provinces of the Basque autonomous community.


title: Bilbao

text: The mass transit rail system is divided into different networks managed by separate operators. Metro Bilbao, established in 1995, operates two underground lines with some overground sections (Line 1 and Line 2). These two lines connect the metropolitan area following the estuary on both sides, starting in Etxebarri in the south all the way to Plentzia and Santurtzi by the coast. Line 1 was built following largely the same route as the Bilbao-Las Arenas railway, which was still active by the time the Metro system opened in 1995 and since has been replaced by it. The metro system stations were designed by Norman Foster. Line 3 of metro is operated by Euskotren Trena, which also operates the regional services to Durango and Eibar as well as a commuter rail line that connects the centre of Bilbao with Lezama and the Txorierri valley. This third line of metro was inaugurated on 8 April 2017 and is expected to be extended to the airport in the near future. Projects for a fourth and fifth line exist and are currently being studied.


title: Bilbao

text: Euskotren also operates a tramway line under the brand Euskotren Tranbia. The line follows the estuary of Bilbao across the central districts of the city, starting in the Bilbao-Atxuri Station and connecting important areas like the Guggenheim museum and the San Mamés football stadium. The original tram network started operations in 1876 and gradually expanded across the city to finally shut down in the 1960s due to being largely replaced by urban buses. The new tram system was opened on 18 December 2002, almost forty years after the closing of the original system.


title: Bilbao

text: Renfe operates four commuter-rail lines in a system separate from the metro. Three of them operate under the Cercanías brand and are collectively known as "Cercanías Bilbao", while a fourth line is operated by Renfe Feve. The three lines operated under the Cercanías name operate largely overground and travel larger distances than the metro system, reaching municipalities outside of the metropolitan area such as Muskiz or even outside of the Biscay province, like Amurrio. The three lines all start in the Bilbao-Abando railway station, whereas the line operated by Renfe Feve starts in the Bilbao-Concordia station.


title: Bilbao

text: The gaps in the railway service are covered by an extensive bus network. The urban bus system is operated under the brand Bilbobus and has 28 regular bus lines, 8 microbus lines and 8 night buses collectively known as "Gautxori" (night owl). The Bilbaobus network is limited to the city limits, and only a few lines extend beyond it. The BizkaiBus network fills this gap, with more than 100 lines, connecting the city with all other municipalities in the metropolitan area, as well as with most towns in Biscay and some in Álava.


title: Bilbao

text: A Brittany Ferries ferry service links Santurtzi, near Bilbao, to Portsmouth (UK). MV Cap Finistère ferry departs from the port of Bilbao, north west of the town centre. A service operated by Acciona Trasmediterranea served the same route from 16 May 2006 until April 2007. P&O Ferries operated this route until its withdrawal on 28 September 2010 with a ship called the Pride of Bilbao.