Last modified: 2015-09-09 by ivan sache
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![[Flag]](../images/e/es-ca-cf.gif)
Flag of Chiclana de la Frontera, as seen on 15 November 2009 at th Town Hall - Image from the Símbolos de Cadíz website, 28 November 2009
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The municipality of Chiclana de la Frontera (82,212 inhabitants in 2013; 20,545 ha; municipal website) is located 25 km south of Cádiz.
Successively colonized by the Phoenicians, the Greeks and the Romans, Chiclana de la Frontera was located in the upper Middle Ages on the border (frontera), between the Muslim and Christian states. On 15 May 1303, King Fernando IV transfered the domain of Chiclana to Alonso Pérez de Guzm‡n "El Bueno", as a reward for the seizure of Tarifa from the Moors in 1294.
On 5 March 1811, in the Battle of Chiclana (aka Battle of Barrosa), the Anglo-Spanish troops defeated three divisions of Napol&eaucte;on's army in an attempt to lift the siege of Cádiz. The French occupation of Chiclana ceased in August 1812. In August 1876, King Alfonso XII granted the title of ciudad (town) to Chiclana. In 1884, the Marquis of Bertemati founded near the town the Campano Wine-Growing Colony; a modern viticultural and social experiment, the colony was awarded in 1895 a gold medal in the 13th World Wine Exhibition held at Bordeaux for the red wine called "Rouge Royal".
Chiclana de la Frontera is the birth town of the politician and economist Juan de Dios Álvarez Mendizábal (1790-1853). Mendizábal supported the Liberals in their struggle against King Ferdinand VII. On 14 September 1835, he was appointed Prime Minister by Queen Regent Maria Christina. Mendizábal could not stop the Carlist Wars and had to resign in 1836; a few months later, a revolt forced the Queen to restore the 1812 Constitution. The new government led by Mendizábal suppressed the feudal system, confiscated the goods of the church and set up a free press.
The Romantic poet and playwright Antonio García Gutiérrez (1813-1884), also born in Chiclana de la Frontera, is mostly known through the adaptations of two of his works by Guiseppe Verdi, as the operas Il Trovatore (1853) and Simon Boccanegra (1857). However, the most famous local hero of Chiclana must be the torero Francisco Montes Reina "Paquiro" (1804-1851), a great modernizer of the corrida. Paquero wrote the treatise Tauromachia completa, improved the torero's costume (the famous Traje de Luz, Dress of Light) and created a new headdress called montera.
Ivan Sache, 1 July 2009
The flag of Chiclana de la Frontera, adopted on 15 November 2007 by the Municipal Council and submitted on 4 December 2007 to the Directorate General of the Local Administration, is prescribed by a Decree adopted on 8 January 2008 by the Directorate General of the Local Administration and published on 24 January 2000 in the official gazette of Andalusia, No. 17, p. 43 (text).
The flag is described as follows:
Flag: Rectangular, in proportions 2:3, crimson. In the middle of the panel is placed the municipal coat of arms, representing history.
The coat of arms of Chiclana de la Frontera, adopted on 29 December 2006 by the Municipal Council and submitted on 22 January 2007 to the Directorate General of the Local Administration, is prescribed by a Decree adopted on 2 February 2007 by the Directorate General of the Local Administration and published on 19 February 2007 in the official gazette of Andalusia, No. 36, p. 45 (text).
The coat of arms is described as follows:
Coat of arms: Azure a tower or [brownish on the flag] port and windows gules surmonting two rocks proper [brownish on the flag] issuant from waves azure and argent, flanked by two lions or. The shield surmounted by a Royal crown open.
The tower represents the old castle of Liro, named after Tiro, an ancient Phenician settlement. The waves represent river Liro watering the town. The open crown recalls that the town is an ancient Royal town.
[Símbolos de las Entidades Locales de Andalucía. Cádiz (PDF file)]
Klaus-Michael Schneider & Ivan Sache, 1 December 2009