Extremadura

Extremadura's name is usually explained as the land at the "extremes" of the Duero, the frontier of the medieval Christian kingdoms. In antiquity it was home to the Lusitanians and Vettones, whose granite boar sculptures, the verracos, still stand in villages. Augustus founded Emerita Augusta, now Mérida, in 25 BC as a colony for retired legionaries, and it became the capital of the province of Lusitania, one of the grandest cities of Roman Hispania and later a Visigothic centre.

Under Muslim rule Badajoz became the seat of a taifa kingdom in the 11th century. The Christian conquest was completed in the 13th century: Alfonso IX of León took Cáceres in 1229 and Badajoz fell soon after. Much of the land was granted to the military orders of Alcántara and Santiago and to noble families, creating great estates that long shaped rural poverty.

The region's poverty and its warrior tradition sent many of its sons to the Americas. Francisco Pizarro and Francisco de Orellana came from Trujillo, Hernán Cortés from Medellín and Vasco Núñez de Balboa from Jerez de los Caballeros, and some returned rich enough to build palaces. The emperor Charles V retired to the monastery of Yuste in 1557 and died there. The border with Portugal saw repeated wars, and Olivenza passed from Portugal to Spain in 1801. In the Civil War, Nationalist troops took Badajoz in August 1936 and carried out mass killings. Emigration emptied the countryside in the 20th century, and Extremadura became an autonomous community in 1983.

Extremadura has a quieter regional identity than the Basque Country or Galicia, rooted in rural life, the dehesa and a long history of emigration. The local Castilian has a distinctive accent close to Andalusian speech, and in three villages of the Sierra de Gata people speak A Fala, a language related to Galician and Portuguese. Links with Portugal run deep, and in Olivenza the street names and Manueline architecture recall its Portuguese past.

White storks nest on bell towers and rooftops across the region. Transhumance and pig slaughter, the matanza, remain part of the rural calendar, and cork is stripped from the oaks in summer.

The most famous event is Mérida's International Festival of Classical Theatre, staged in the Roman theatre each summer since 1933. The Jerte valley celebrates its cherry blossom each spring, Badajoz is known for its carnival, and in January the village of Piornal pelts the costumed figure of Jarramplas with turnips. Holy Week processions fill Cáceres's old town.

Just over a million people live in Extremadura, an area larger than Switzerland, and the density is among the lowest in Spain. Badajoz is the largest city with about 150,000 people, Cáceres has about 95,000, and Mérida, the regional capital, about 60,000; Plasencia and Don Benito are the other sizeable towns.

The economy leans heavily on farming. The dehesa, open woodland of holm and cork oaks, supports Iberian pigs, sheep and cattle, while the irrigated Vegas del Guadiana grow tomatoes, rice and fruit, the Jerte valley cherries and La Vera paprika and tobacco. Solar farms have spread across the plains, and the future of the Almaraz nuclear power station, due for closure, is a local issue.

Extremadura is one of Spain's poorest regions, with high unemployment, an ageing population and a long history of young people leaving. Slow and unreliable rail links to Madrid have been a long-standing grievance. Daily life is unhurried: late lunches, evening walks in the plaza and summer nights spent outdoors.

The dehesa gives Extremadura its most famous product: jamón ibérico de bellota, from Iberian pigs fattened on acorns in the autumn, protected under the Dehesa de Extremadura designation. Pork appears in countless forms, from chorizo and lomo to fresh cuts grilled over oak.

Cheese is the other great product. Torta del Casar, a sheep's-milk cheese from Casar de Cáceres, is so soft inside that the top is cut off and the centre scooped out with bread; Queso de La Serena is similar, and Ibores is a goat's cheese rubbed with paprika. Pimentón de la Vera, paprika dried over oak smoke, gives many Spanish dishes their smoky flavour.

Shepherds' dishes dominate: migas, fried breadcrumbs with garlic, pork and peppers; caldereta, a lamb stew; and frite, fried lamb with paprika. Tench is a prized river fish, and the Jerte valley's Picota cherries are eaten fresh and made into cherry liqueur. The main wine area is Ribera del Guadiana, especially Tierra de Barros around Almendralejo, and homemade vino de pitarra is served in villages. Sweets include perrunillas, crumbly lard biscuits.

Cáceres's old town, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, is a walled maze of granite palaces, towers and churches, entered through the Arco de la Estrella from the Plaza Mayor; the Casa de las Veletas museum holds a Moorish cistern. Roman Mérida, also a UNESCO World Heritage Site, has its theatre and amphitheatre, the Temple of Diana, the Los Milagros aqueduct, a Roman bridge of some 60 arches over the Guadiana, the Alcazaba and the National Museum of Roman Art.

Trujillo's Plaza Mayor has an equestrian statue of Pizarro and palaces built with American gold, with a castle above. To the south-east, the Monastery of Guadalupe is a UNESCO World Heritage Site in the Villuercas hills.

Monfragüe National Park, between Trujillo and Plasencia, protects the gorges of the Tagus and Tiétar, where griffon and black vultures nest on the Salto del Gitano crag, with Monfragüe castle on the ridge to the east. To the north, the cherry blossom of the Jerte valley turns the slopes white in spring, and the Garganta de los Infiernos reserve has natural pools. Plasencia has two cathedrals, Hervás a Jewish quarter, La Vera the monastery of Yuste, and the Roman bridge at Alcántara still crosses the Tagus. Badajoz has its Moorish Alcazaba and Zafra its arcaded squares.