Montjuic Castle

Montjuic has been used to watch, control, and kill the people of Barcelona for nearly four centuries. The first fortification was thrown up in 1640 during the Catalan Revolt against the Spanish crown, and within a year it saw battle — Catalan forces led by Francesc de Tamarit defeated the Spanish at the Battle of Montjuic in January 1641. The basic fort became a proper castle in 1694 when new bastions and battlements were erected, and military engineer Juan Martin Cermeno rebuilt it entirely in 1751 into the star-shaped fortress that still stands today.

For Catalans, Montjuic is synonymous with repression. In the late nineteenth century, the castle became a prison and torture facility for anarchists and political dissidents. During the Spanish Civil War, it served as a detention center and execution site. The darkest chapter came on October 15, 1940, when Lluis Companys — the president of the Generalitat of Catalonia — was executed by firing squad on Franco's orders. He remains the only sitting president of a European democratic government to have been executed. His last words, reportedly, were "Visca Catalunya" — long live Catalonia.

The castle sat for decades as a military museum under Franco's regime, a bitter irony for the city. It wasn't until 2007 that the Spanish government finally transferred it to Barcelona City Council, and the long process of transforming it from a symbol of oppression into a civic space began.

Despite its dark history, the views from the ramparts are among the finest in Barcelona. The entire city unfolds below — the port, the Eixample grid, the Sagrada Familia in the distance, and the Mediterranean stretching to the horizon. You can reach the castle by cable car from Paral·lel, adding a dramatic ride above the city to the experience.