León is a city in northwestern Spain and the capital of the Province of León. The city was founded by the Romans as Castra Legionis, the home base of Legio VI Victrix during the Cantabrian Wars of the late 1st century BC. In 74 AD, Legio VII Gemina settled in a permanent military camp meant to protect the recently conquered territories of northwestern Hispania from the Astures and Cantabri. The station of the legion grew into an important city which resisted the attacks of the Visigoths until 586 AD, when it fell to Liuvigild. The Goths allowed Castra Legionis to retain its fortifications, and the fortress serves as one of the last refuges of the Astures during the Umayyad conquest of Hispania in the early 8th century. The city did not resist the Arabs, and the Muslims attempted to settle the city with soldiers before the Berbers in 740. In 846, a group of Mozarabs tried to repopulate the city, but they were prevented from doing so by a Muslim attack. In 856, King Ordonno I of Asturias repopulated the city, and Kings Alfonso III and Garcia I made León the capital of the Kingdom of León and the most important of the Christian cities in Iberia. León was sacked by Almanzor in 987, but it was rebuilt and repopulated by Alfonso V of Leon in 1017. León became a waystation for pilgrims en route to Santiago de Compostela. During the 13th century, traders and artisans began to influence the municipal government, and the livestock industry produced a period of prosperity for the city. Economic and demographic decline occurred from the 16th to 19th centuries as the city remained controlled by a reduced set of noble families. The city population increased from 9,000 to 15,000 during the 19th century and thereafter to 18,000 in 1910, 44,000 in 1940, 73,000 in 1960, and 100,000 in 1971. The far-right coup that marked the beginning of the Spanish Civil War took place in León on 20 July 1936, and the Falangists found strong support from the rest of the traditionally conservative province. During the 1960s, León experienced much growth due to in-migration from the rural zones of the province. In 2018, León had a population of 124,772 people, and it is a destination of both domestic and international tourism for its historical and architectural heritage.
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