Xàtiva

Municipal charter of Xàtiva (1252).

Xàtiva (Saetabis in Latin) was famous in Roman times for its linen fabrics, mentioned by the Latin poets Ovid and Catullus. Xàtiva is also known as an early European centre of paper manufacture. In the 12th century, Arabs brought the technology to manufacture paper to Xàtiva (Arabic: شاطبة Shāṭiba).

It is the birthplace of two popes, Callixtus III and Alexander VI, and also the painter José Ribera (Lo Spagnoletto). It suffered a dark moment in its history at the hands of Philip V of Spain, who, after his victory at the Battle of Almansa during the War of the Spanish Succession, had the city besieged then ordered it to be burned and renamed San Felipe. In memory of the insult, the portrait of the monarch hangs upside down in the local museum of l'Almodí.[1]

Xàtiva was briefly a provincial capital under the short-lived 1822 territorial division of Spain,[2] during the Trienio Liberal. The Province of Xàtiva was revoked with the return to absolutism in 1823.

^ XÀTIVA – Museo de l'Almodí Archived May 27, 2007, at the Wayback Machine ^ (in Spanish) División provisional del territorio español de 27 de Enero de 1822 Archived December 14, 2009, at the Wayback Machine, the text of the proposed 1822 territorial division of Spain, Instituto de Historia, Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Cientificas (CSIC, Spanish National Research Council). Accessed online 2010-01-03.