Logbook · 7 places

What to see and do in Barberà de la Conca

What to see and do in Barberà de la Conca (Conca de Barberà, Tarragona): 7 places across monuments, nature, activities and curiosities, with a photo and a Google Maps location.

1 Villages · 3 Monuments · 1 Activities · 1 Historical milestones · 1 Food and drink

How far each place is from the centre of Barberà de la Conca

Castle of Barberà 300 m
Tower of Ambigats 2.1 km

Towns near Barberà de la Conca

What to see in Pira 2.4 km · 2 places
What to see in Sarral 4.2 km · 4 places
What to see in Cabra del Camp 4.5 km · 3 places
What to see in Figuerola del Camp 5.4 km · 5 places
What to see in Blancafort 6.4 km · 3 places
What to see in Solivella 6.5 km · 3 places
What to see in Montblanc 6.5 km · 16 places
What to see in el Pla de Santa Maria 7.4 km · 5 places

Spain › Catalonia › Tarragona › Conca de Barberà › Barberà de la Conca

What to see and do in Barberà de la Conca

Barberà de la Conca
Village
Barberà de la Conca is a vila in the comarca of Conca de Barberà, to which it gives its name, in the province of Tarragona, with 476 inhabitants. The castrum of Barbará is mentioned in 1012; abandoned in the early 11th century, it was recovered when Ramon Berenguer I ordered its resettlement and a castle, which in the 12th century fell into the hands of the Templars and then the Hospitallers, lords of the place until the end of the Ancien Régime. The border castle came to be used as a public school before being abandoned; today it is municipally owned. The church of Santa María, baroque, preserves the Romanesque tympanum of the earlier temple, with the enthroned Virgin. The vila lives off the vineyards protected by the D.O. Conca de Barberà, and preserves a modernist cooperative winery from 1894, the work of César Martinell.
Castle of Barberà
Monument
A defined castle that gives its name to the municipality of Barberà de la Conca, situated atop the hill overlooking the village, from where it controlled one of the roads that led from the coast into the interior of Catalonia. It was the seat of a Templar commandery and, later, a Hospitaller one, which expanded the buildings until they were almost complete by the end of the 19th century, when it was ceded to the town council as a public school. Of the 11th-century castle found by the Templars, the base of a cylindrical tower and remains of a wall are preserved; from the Templar period there also remains a large hall measuring 25 by 5 metres, with walls almost three metres thick, a round-arched doorway with large voussoirs, and the so-called palau veyll, a square tower known in Hospitaller documents as the prior's tower.
Tower of Ambigats
Monument
The Torre d'Ambigats is the remains of an old watchtower or defensive tower, circular in plan, situated south of the municipal area of Barberà de la Conca, near the motorway. Built in the 11th century with the typical masonry of early Romanesque style, made of small roughly hewn ashlars bound with lime mortar, it has an internal diameter of 2.70 m and walls 1.90 m thick, of which only the northern part is preserved, a little over 2 m high. A few steps away stood the church of Sant Pere d'Ambigats, documented in 945 when the counts of Barcelona Sunyer I and Riquilda donated it, together with its lands and tithes, to the monastery of Santa Cecília de Montserrat, and demolished at the end of the 19th century. In the surrounding area remains of an Ibero-Roman settlement and medieval pottery have been found.
Cooperative Winery of Barberà de la Conca
Monument
Modernist cooperative winery situated south of the village of Barberà de la Conca (Conca de Barberà), built between 1920 and 1921 by the architect Cèsar Martinell i Brunet, commissioned by the local Agricultural Union, with financial help from the Bank of Valls; the water tank tower was completed in 1929. It is organised in two parallel rectangular naves, with parabolic brick arches, and is laid out in an unloading dock, a processing nave and storage and fermentation naves with vats and tanks of reinforced concrete, then a novel technique. The main facade, facing west, is composed of three levels -a stone plinth, a plain wall with windows and an upper cornice- and stands out for the water tank tower, with forms similar to the village's Baroque bell tower.
Barberà de la Conca Main Festival
Activity
The fiesta mayor of Barberà de la Conca is celebrated in a town whose castle was granted in 1131-1133 by the counts of Urgel and Barcelona to the Templars, who established one of their first houses in Catalonia there and organized from it the agricultural resettlement of much of the region.
Templar commandery of Barberà
Historical milestone
Between 1131 and 1133 the counts of Urgell and of Barcelona ceded the castle to the Templars, who installed here one of their first houses in Catalonia. From it they organised the agricultural repopulation of a good part of the basin.
Cavas and sparkling wines of the Conca
Food and drink
A good part of the macabeo, the parellada and the xarel·lo of the comarca is destined for making sparkling wines by the traditional method. Several cooperative and family wineries age their cavas in the underground galleries of the village.