Cadaqués is a town in the Alt Empordà comarca, in Girona province, Catalonia, Spain. It is on a bay near the Cap de Creus peninsula, on the Costa Brava of the Mediterranean Sea. It is only a 2 1/2 hour drive from Barcelona, therefore it is very accessible and not only attracts tourists, but people who want a second house to have on the weekends and summers. In 2002 it had a population of 2,612 people.
Artist Salvador Dalà often visited here in his childhood, and later kept a home in Port Lligat, a small bay next to the village. Other notable artists, including Mei Fren (see his commanding charcoals of the nineteenth century Cadaques beleaguered by a winter tramontan in the Cadaques museum. He was the first artist to live in Cadaques and gave the town many of his works and a marble top table on which he sketched many of its turn of the century fishermen), Pablo Picasso, Joan Miró, Marcel Duchamp, Antoni Pitxot, Henri-François Rey, Melina Mercouri and Maurice Boitel also spent time here.
Cadaqués is mentioned in the story Tramontana by Gabriel GarcÃa Márquez.
In a time it remained undisturbed, its interesting submarine flora was studied during several years by psychologist Françoise Ardré.
Long a sleepy fishing village, Cadaqués is now a tourism destination. Although it has about 2,000 permanent residents, sometimes up to 10 times that number of visitors stay there.
The famous Salvador Dali visited this city during the summer holiday of 1916, and discovered 'modern painting'. This holiday (that he spent with family of Ramon Pichot) was the start to his wonderful career creating mind-boggling creations.
On Mondays there is a travelling market in cadaques, located near the parking lot. This
market has a wide variety of products
relationship with cuba
In the early 20th century a large number of inhabitants of cadaques travelled
or emigrated to Cuba (the figure has been estimated as one third of a village of
approximately 1200 people). Many of these immigrants were financially successful in
Cuba and returned to cadaques where they had constructed large and ornate houses. These
houses can still be seen in cadaques (for example; the "casa blava"). A person returned
from Cuba was referred to as an "Americano" among other names.
Notable Visitors and Residents
language
The village of cadaques has its own "variant" or "speech" of the Catalan
language. One of the most notable features is that the definite articles
are different from standard Catalan, namely, they are "sa" (feminine) and
"es" masculine instead of the normal Catalan definite articles "la" and "el".
This feature is interestingly shared with the variant of Catalan spoken
in the Balearic Islands. The explanation for this (see "El Vocabulari de Cadaques"
Ernesta Sala i Bruses) is that when the Catalan ruler Jaume I conquered the Balearic
Islands in the Middle Ages he re-colonized the islands with people from
the Emporda region of catalonia. Because Cadaques has remained relatively
isolated from the surrounding region (owing to its geography), the mediaeval
speech patterns have been preserved.
Another aspect of the speech variant of cadaques is the alteration of
the first person singular of certain verbs: conjugations that normally
end in "o" end in "i" in the cadaques variant. For example "a vegades agafi molt
per cala nans" (informant was an approximately 90 year old fisherman). In
standard Catalan this would be "a vegades agafo molt per cala nans". The speech
variant of Catalan has most similarities with the Catalan spoken in eivissa (Balearic
Islands)
The Catalan variant of cadaques is referred to as "cadaquesenc" by the local people
and also has many lexical items.
Examples:
# rastell: a street (normally with a steep slope) which is formed with pieces of slate stone placed in a vertical position. These types of streets are very characteristic of the streets of cadaques.
# grop: a black rain cloud
# llagut: a small boat
# talaia: an elevated castle or look-out which could warn the village of danger or transmit other signals (example: approaching ships) - compare with the "talaiots" of menorca.
# xarxi: a (fishing) net, as opposed to "xarxa" in standard Catalan
# Norai: Is a stone cylindrical building with a large stone on the top that fishermans used to attach their boats.
You can see it and the main photo at bottom.
hermitage of sant sebastia
The hermitage of San Sebastia is a large house located high on the mountain PenÃ
behind cadaques. It's owned by Sebastian Guinness. The hermitage is surrounded
by cork trees, and is built on a steep slope. There is a walking path which leads from
the town of cadaques up to the hermitage and this path follows the old "road" (although
it is not, and never was suitable for any wheeled vehicle) from the town to the hermitage.
There is also a more modern road (not asphalted) which leads to the hermitage.
The hermitage can also be regarded as a "talaia" or a look-out to warn the village of
potential pirate raids.
traditions
Women of the village traditionally fetched water using a glazed earthen ware
jug called a "doll". The colour of the glazing was green. Similar earthen ware
can be seen still used as decorations. A number of photos exist showing women
carrying these "dolls" on their heads (with a cloth to protext their heads).
Owing to cadaqueses proximity to the French border and its isolation by land,
the village had a tradition of running contraband. See writings by josep pla.
books about cadaques
External links
