Names of the Valencian Community

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The names of the Valencian Community are diverse, even though Comunitat Valenciana (in English, "Valencian Community") is the only denomination with official status in its Statute of Autonomy. Nonetheless, this legal document includes in its Preamble other legal denominations that portray the history and nature of the territory: Regne de València (in English: Kingdom of Valencia) and País Valencià (in English literally: Valencian Country). The first designation refers to the oldest historic denomination, while the second one relates to the origin of the modern concept of autonomy, which the territory has been granted in its Statute of Autonomy first written in 1982 and reformed in 2006.

Contents 1 Denominations 1.1 Kingdom of Valencia 1.2 Valencian Region and "Levante" 1.3 "Valencian Country" 1.4 "Land of Valencia" 1.5 Valencian Community 2 Notes 3 References and external links

[edit] Denominations

Over the years, there have been several denominations both in Spanish and Valencian covering what today is the Valencian Community. The topic stems from the potentially confusing usage of Valencia, a homonym term which may designate the city of Valencia, the Valencia province or the whole territory of the Valencian Community.

The different translations forged by Spaniards into English have solved little, since, in their literality, they have an uneasy sonority for the average English native speaker.

In any case, today, in English, the most used denominations are Valencia and Valencian Community.

[edit] Kingdom of Valencia

The term "Kingdom of Valencia" refers to the conquered territory by the Christian Catalan and Aragonese troops commanded by king James I in 1238. The conquered territory was granted wide administrative, legal and political self government within the structure of the Crown of Aragon as stipulated in the set of laws known first as Costums de Valencia. When these were transformed into the Furs of Valencia (Charters of Valencia) , the autonomy was extended to all the Valencian territory. The furs (code of law), its administrative and legal structure, as well as its status as an autonomous political entity were dissolved in 1707, at the end of the War of the Spanish Succession by Phillip V of Spain, with the promulgation of the Nueva Planta decrees, whereby the legislation and structure of the Kingdom of Castile were instituted in the territory.

Nevertheless, the Kingdom of Valencia denomination continued to be used locally during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, an example of which were the government divisions or Javier de Burgos's provincial division proposal. However, it was sometimes rendered as Antic Regne de Valencia (Old Kingdom of Valencia") to clarify the non-existence of the kingdom as a legal or political entity. At the beginning of the twentieth century, the term was confined to the academic, cultural or literary domains, especially after the Valencian Renaixença and the nascent Valencian nationalism, which began to use the term along with País Valencià. During Franco's dictatorship the term was in disuse, only to be revived during the political transition toward democracy in Spain, concurrent with the transition towards Valencian autonomy, at the beginning of the 1980s, as well as by blaverism, which used it in opposition to the denomination País Valencià, adopted by the left wing organizations.

Nowadays, the term "Kingdom of Valencia" is only used in the cultural or academic realms, even though it is included in the Preamble of the current Valencian Statute of Autonomy, as well as in its first article, in order to evocate the historical origin of what todays constitutes the Valencian Community.

[edit] Valencian Region and "Levante"

The term "Valencian Region" (in Valencian: Regió Valenciana) was a denomination that became majoritary during Franco's dictatorship with the intention of emphasizing the intended nature of the territory under the political structure of the time: a simple region within Spain. In fact, before the twentieth century, several territories dominated by Spain were called "kingdoms", as a synonym of "country" in spite of the fact that they were not monarchies. From the nineteenth century onwards, the term "kingdom" began to be substituted by the term "region", especially in books which imitated the French regional geographical nomenclature. In that sense region designated any state, country or nation (all previously used terms that designated the diverse territories of the Spanish Empire or under the King of Spain), regardless of their political and administrative nature of the territory, whereas "kingdom" was reserved to the particular State, country or nation governed by a monarch. Today, the concept of "region" does not refer to a particular political entity, but alludes to regional geography. Within the dictatorship, the term had a centralizing connotation and not simply a geographical meaning.

One more term which gained wide acceptance during the Francoist times was Levante, which roughly translates as "East", in a similar fashion to the francophone Levant. In Spanish, "levante" (llevant in Valencian) are easterly winds and, geographically speaking, anything coming from or originating in the east, such as the eastern slopes of a range (the western ones are called "Poniente").

In its attempt to homogenize the Spanish territory, the Francoist governments and media often used this "Levante" term to refer to the eastern Mediterranean coast of Spain. Since Catalonia had a well defined identity already, "Levante" came to designate, roughly, the territories which used to make the Kingdom of Valencia and, often, additionally the Región de Murcia. Since by population and extension, the Valencian Community is quite larger than the Región de Murcia, for some this term was narrowed to vaguely designate what today is the Valencian Community. The term may still be heard today, mainly informally, even though it was not until recently that the highway linking Madrid and the Valencian Community changed its name from Autovía de Levante to Autovía del Mediterráneo (Levante and Mediterranean highway, respectively).

Also, the oldest newspaper in the Valencian Community, edited in the city of Valencia is called Levante-El Mercantil Valenciano. The football team Levante UD, from the city of Valencia and currently in the Spanish Primera División is also named in this fashion.

[edit] "Valencian Country"

The term País Valencià (rendered in English by Spanish as "Valencian Country") is, for some (namely Valencian nationalists and some leftist movements), the contemporary rendering of the term "Kingdom of Valencia", even though it had been occasionally used since the sixteenth century as well. Agustín Bella, in his work Vida de fra Agustín Antonio Pascual,^[1] stated in 1699, while the Furs of Valencia were still in place, that:

"...no le tenía el Señor destinado para el apóstol de las Indias, sino de nuestro País Valenciano"

("The Lord had not destined the apostle [to go to the] the [West] Indies, but [to remain in] our Valencian Country").

Manuel Sanchis i Guarner, in his work La llengua dels valencians, confirms the existence of a satiric document of 1767 which was titled, in Valencian:

"Carta no vista, lletra uberta, combit cheneral i particular, que fa Quelo el Roig d'Albal, nét de la tia Rafela, a tota la Cort de Madrit, per que vinga a veurer o mirar la gran Festa Centenar de la Verche Proectora, ulatant el lluit que estarà en el País Valencià"

("Letter, not seen, open words, a general and particular invitation made by Quelo the Red of Albal, grandson of aunt Rarela, to all the Court of Madrid, to come and see or watch the Great Centennial Feast to the Protector Virgin, proving how splendid the Valencian Country will be")

Although at the beginning it was used as a mere geographic term, by the early twentieth century the Labor and Valencian nationalist movements picked up the term and gave it a cultural and political connotation. For example, the Joventuts Valencianistes (Valencianist Youth), in 1906 published a map of the comarques using this particular denomination. The term became popular during the 1930s, and was widely used in academic, cultural and political papers and publications, most notably the Quaderns d'Orientació Valencianista journal, published by Editorial Estel, nowadays edited by the Unviersity of Valencia).^[2]. This denomination was also used officially during the Second Spanish Republic.

During the 1960s, after the publication of El País Valenciano, by Joan Fuster,^[3] the term became widely used again (during the dictatorship), to the point of being the most widely used term to refer to the territory in the media, most notably in the regional newspapers of various political ideologies, without any overt censorship from Franco's government, despite it being most likely a term mimicking País Vasco or Basque Country and, thus, trying to emphasize the perceived (for this term users) "othernesss" of the Valencian territory within Spain. When democracy was restored, the term was proposed in the Statute of Autonomy of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Valencian Country, on October 25, 1979. Before the ratification of the 1979 Statue of Autonomy, which coined the term "Valencian Community", the "Pre-autonomy Council of the Valencian Country" also used the term.

Even though the term was widely used, especially by the Democratic Center Union party (UCD), in the 1980s, the right-wing parties, along with those who supported the blaverism movement, rejected the term, since they considered that its use would imply a political link to the Catalan Countries (in Valencian: Països Catalans). The last major of the city of Valencia before democracy, Miguel Ramón Izquierdo, justified the rejection of the term, since "país és singular de països, llavors es parla d'un País Valencià dins dels Països Catalans" ("country is the singular of countries, thence we are talking about a Valencian Country within the Catalan Countries").

Nowadays, the term is still used, mostly in the Academia, in the names of streets, plazas and avenues, by some political parties (e.g. the Socialist Party of the Valencian Country and the United Left of the Valencian Country), labor unions (UGT-PV, CCOO-PV, etc.), and some media. The term is even preferred to "Valencian Community" in some comarques, even though it is not official.

[edit] "Land of Valencia"

A new rendition in English, also locally created, has added recently: Land of Valencia. This has appeared in the Valencian tourist department merchandising^[4] and then has been mimicked by some other travel publications in English.^[5] Its usage by English native speakers seems to be marginal.

It is unclear as to which original term this is referring to, wether "Comunitat Valenciana" or "País Valencià".

[edit] Valencian Community

The term which has become official, "Valencian Community" (Comunitat Valenciana) was first used within the articles of the proposal of the Statute of Autonomy drafted by the Parliamentary Assembly in charge of forging the Statute, interchangeably with the term "País Valencià". In this proposal, known as the Agreement of Benicàssim (Acord de Benicàssim) both the left-wing and right-wing parties reached a consensus regarding the symbols of the territory and soon-to-be autonomous community of Spain. The left-wing parties accepted as the Flag of Valencia a senyera including a blue strip and the coat of arms of the Generalitat, and the right-wing parties accepted the term "País Valencià" in the Statute's preamble.

Nonetheless, when this proposal was presented before the Chamber of Deputies of Spain, consensus was broken; UCD did not comply with the Agreement of Benicàssim, and proposed to change the flag to include the crown in the blue strip, i.e., to use the flag of the city of Valencia as the flag of the whole territory, they also moved back to retain the term "Regne de Valencia" (Kingdom of Valencia).

Given that center and right-wing political parties formed an absolute majority in the Congress, the Socialist Workers' Party (PSOE), reached a consensual version with UCD (by the proposal of deputy Emilio Attard), through which the term "Regne de Valencia" was replaced by "Valencian Community" within the articles of the legal text, and the terms "Regne de Valencia" and "País Valencià" were included only as incidental mentions in the Preamble, so that whichever party was in power in a particular time would use whichever denomination it preferred.

Later on, by the mid and late 1980s, when the PSOE won absolute majorities both in the Spanish Parliament and the Valencian one, it decided to keep the existing solution unchanged as a means for not to reopen the topic, which had been harsly fought over at the time of its forging.

[edit] Notes

[edit] References and external links

• del roig al blau: La transició valenciana. Documental del Taller d'Audiovisuals de la Universitat de València. Any 2004.
• El llarg camí cap a l'Autonomia Valenciana, de Vicente Ruiz Monrabal. Revista Valenciana d'Estudis autonòmics, núm. 41/42, 3^er trimestre de 2003 - 4o trimestre de 2003, p. 372-421. URL: [2].
• El valencianisme polític, 1874-1936, Alfons Cucó i Giner. 1999, Catarroja, Ed. Afers SL. ISBN 84-86574-73-0.
• Història del País Valencià, Vicente Boix. 1981. Editorial Planeta, ISBN 84-3900-148-7.
• Història del País Valencià, Antoni Furió i Diego. 2001. Edicions 3i4. ISBN 84-7502-631-1.