Spain explained to kids

Spain is a country in southwestern Europe with a long coastline on the Atlantic Ocean and the Mediterranean Sea. Its mainland is bounded to the south and east by the Mediterranean Sea except for a small land boundary with Gibraltar; to the north and northeast by France, Andorra, and the Bay of Biscay; and to the west and northwest by Portugal and the Atlantic Ocean. With an area of 505,990 km2 (195,360 sq mi), Spain is the largest country in Southern Europe, the second largest country in Western Europe and the European Union, and the fourth largest country in the European continent. By population, Spain is the fifth largest country in Europe and the third largest in the European Union after Germany and Poland. Spain's capital and largest city is Madrid, other urban areas include Barcelona, Valencia, Seville, Bilbao, and Málaga. Modern humans first arrived in the Iberian Peninsula around 35,000 years ago. Iberia was subsequently colonized by a number of civilizations: Celts in the north, Phoenicians and Carthaginians along the coast, and the Greek city-states of the south. The Roman Republic conquered Iberia during the 2nd and 1st centuries BC. As a result of Roman colonization, the majority of local languages, with the exception of Basque, stem from the Vulgar Latin. The Germanic Vandals and Suebi, with part of the Iranian Alans under King Respendial, invaded in 409 AD. The Suebi established a kingdom in what is today Galicia and the northern part of Portugal, while the Vandals settled in the south. The Iberian Peninsula was conquered and brought under the rule of the Muslim Umayyad Caliphate in 711. Following the invasion of Hispania by the Moors, the Christian king of Asturias, Pelagius, led the resistance against them. The Moorish invasion was eventually repulsed, and in 1212 the Moorish Kingdom of Granada was conquered by the Christian Kingdom of Castile. Spain emerged as a unified country in the 15th century, following the marriage of the Catholic Monarchs and the completion of the reconquest of the peninsula in 1492 with the fall of Granada, the last Muslim state on the Iberian Peninsula. In the early modern period, Spain became one of history's first global empires, leaving a vast cultural and linguistic legacy that includes over 500 million Spanish speakers, making Spanish the world's second-most spoken native language, after Mandarin Chinese. Spain's extensive empire reached its height during the 17th century, when the Spanish Empire included possessions in Europe, the Americas, Asia, Africa and Oceania. The Spanish Golden Age of the 16th and 17th centuries was marked by unprecedented political and social stability and prosperity, in what has been referred to as the first globalized era, marked by the expansion of European power to the Americas, Asia and Oceania. Because of this, historians often refer to the period as the "Age of Exploration". Spain's colonial empire reached its greatest extent in the 19th century, when the country lost the last of its overseas possessions in the Spanish–American War. That same year, Spain itself was invaded and occupied by a coalition of European powers during the First World War. In the aftermath of the war, Spain was internationally recognized as a republic. During the Second Spanish Republic, which lasted from 1931 to 1939, Spain fought in the Spanish Civil War, which ended in victory for the nationalist forces led by Francisco Franco. After the war, Spain was internationally isolated and banned from taking part in international affairs. In the postwar years, Spain was one of the founding members of the United Nations, and later of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. In 1957, Spain joined the European Economic Community, which later became the European Union. In 1975, Spain became a democracy after the death of dictator Francisco Franco. In 1986, Spain joined the European Union and became a member of the Eurozone. In 1990, Spain hosted the Goodwill Games. In 1992, Spain made the Summer Olympics. In 2004, Spain joined NATO. In 2007, Spain became the first country to ratify the European Charter of Fundamental Rights.