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Galicia is an autonomous community and historical nationality in modern-day northwestern Spain on the Iberian Peninsula, which was a major part of the Roman province known as Gallaecia prior to 409. It consists of the provinces of A Coruña, Lugo, Ourense and Pontevedra. It is bounded on the north by the Cantabrian Sea, to the south by Portugal, to the west by the Atlantic Ocean and to the east by principality of Asturias and the community of Castile and León. The archipelago of the Cíes Islands, the Ons archipelago, the Sálvora archipelago and other island such as Cortegada, Arousa, the Sisargas Islands and the Malveiras Islands are also part of Galicia.
Galicia has about 2,795,422 inhabitants which mainly combines the coastal strip between Ferrol and A Coruña in the northwest and between Vilagarcía de Arousa and Vigo in the southwest.
The medieval and modern Kingdom of Galicia derived of the kingdom of the Suebi, founded by king Hermeric in 409. By the 6th century the kingdom of the Suebi was already known as the Kingdom of Galicia, Gregory of Tours being the first chronicler to use this denomination.[1]
- ^ "Quo defuncto, filius eius Eurichus Leuvichildi regis amicitias expetiit, dataque, ut pater fecerat, sacramenta, regnum Galliciensim suscepit. Hoc vero anno cognatus eius Audica, qui sororem illius disponsatam habebat, cum exercitu venit; adpraehensumque clericum facit ac diaconatus sibi praesbiterii ei inponi honorem iobet. Ipse quoque acceptam soceri sui uxorem, Galliciensim regnum obtenuit." Gregory of Tours, Historiarum, VI.43.