Castile La Mancha
Guadalajara, Cuenca,
Tolede, Ciudad Real, Albacete
Superficy 80.000 km2
Population 1.670.091 hab.
Capital Tolède
Climate Temperatures
Winter : 11° Spring : 21°
Summer : 31° Autumn : 16°
 Castile-La Mancha (Spanish Castilla-La Mancha) is an
autonomous community of Spain.
Castile-La Mancha is bordered by Castile and León, Madrid,
Aragon, Valencia, Murcia, Andalusia, and Extremadura. It is the most
sparsely populated of Spain's autonomous communities.
The capital of Castile-La Mancha is Toledo.
Castile-La Mancha was formerly grouped with the province of Madrid into
New Castile ("Castilla la Nueva"), but with the advent of the modern
Spanish system of semi-autonomous regions (las autonomías), it
was separated due to great economic disparity between the capital and
the remaining New-Castilian provinces.
It is in this province where the famous Spanish novel Don Quixote by
Cervantes takes place. Although La Mancha is a windswept, battered
plateau (manxa means parched earth in Arabic; hence mancha is Spanish
for stain) it remains a symbol of the Spanish culture with its
sunflowers, windmills, Manchego cheese and, of course, El Quijote.
La Mancha's history has been tumultuous. Going as far back as the
Muslim domination of the Iberian peninsula, La Mancha was the center of
many battles between Christian and Muslim forces. Moreover, this region
saw many a struggle in the 14th and 15th century with the unification
of Castile and Aragon in 1492 under Queen Isabel and King Ferdinand.
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