Demolition of the Mercadal wall, in the city of Girona.

Date: 1901 - 1908

Archive: Municipal Archive of Girona

Document type: Imatge fixa

Reference code: CAT-CRDI-69-101063

Link to the online document

Description: The sieges of the French War, which took place in the years 1808 and 1809, represent the last war event with the wall as an essential element of defense. From that moment on, the wall, largely demolished as a result of the attacks, became completely obsolete. Not too many years passed, with the memory of the sieges still strongly present, that the first voices began to emerge that called for the demolition of the walls, with the intention of oxygenating the urban core, for the expansion towards the plan to take place and, in short, to change the banners of history to those of progress. Among the numerous testimonies that have been preserved, we have that of Elie Reclus (brother of the geographer Elisée Reclus), a French citizen who in the course of a trip passed through the city of Girona in November 1868, and commented with these words on his perception: “Girona is currently one of the most backward towns in Catalonia. The walls that surround it limit its intellectual horizon”. The wall was therefore conceived as an obstacle to urban growth and in 1895 a law was passed authorizing the demolition of its western side, the Mercadal wall. The process, in the section shown in the photograph, began in 1901 and ended in 1908.
This document is significant at the European level because it is witness to a process of urban transformation that mainly affected large cities, also medium-sized ones, from the middle of the 19th century. Faced with the obsolescence of the defensive walls, they saw the possibility of expanding and creating boulevards and large urban roads with an urbanistic conception more in line with the idea of progress of the time.

You might also be interested in