Catalan nationalism blossoms

The last decade of the nineteenth century was to emerge as a key stage in political Catalanism. The impact of the loss of Spain's last overseas colony in 1898 sparked off a far-reaching crisis in Spain as a whole.

The press played a leading role in airing the theoretical tenets of political Catalanism, and the newspaper La Veu de Catalunya, which was the organ of the nationalist party called the Regionalist League, is an excellent example of this. It pushed for a renovated political discourse, to put an end to the rule of local political strongmen. In the early years of the twentieth century, the newspaper brought together a highly distinguished staff of journalists and contributors, and they were to win prestige for it and fuel its enduring success. It was against that backdrop of literary and journalistic talent that Ferran Agulló appeared on the scene.

On 12 September 1908, Ferran Agulló published the article “Per la costa brava” in La Veu de Catalunya, a piece that is regarded as the birth certificate of the Girona coast, since it is the first published mention of the use of the term “Costa Brava” in connection with the strip of coast running from the mouth of the river Tordera to the French part of Catalonia.