Olivenza

The War of the Oranges

In 1801 France and Spain went to war with Portugal. Spanish troops under Manuel de Godoy joined the French on 20 May and took the town of Olivenza (in Portuguese, Olivença), near the frontier. Godoy picked oranges at nearby Elvas and sent them to the queen of Spain with a message that he would march on to Lisbon, which gave the brief war its name.^[3] The Irish Times put its length at less than three weeks.^[1]

In the Peace of Badajoz that June, Portugal ceded Olivenza to Spain.^[3] Article III of the treaty, signed on 6 June 1801, let the Spanish king keep the fortress and its territory as a conquest, and made the Guadiana the frontier between the two kingdoms on that side.^[4]

“Sa Majesté Catholique gardera comme Conquête, et joindra à ses Domaines, la Forteresse d’Olivença, avec son Territoire, et les Places situées sur la Guadiana, en sorte que cette Fleuve soit la Frontière des 2 Royaumes de ce côté.”^[4]

Promised back in 1815

The Final Act of the Congress of Vienna, signed on 9 June 1815, took up Portugal’s claim. In Article CV the Powers recognised the justice of the Portuguese Prince Regent’s claims to Olivenza and the other territories ceded in 1801, and engaged to use their utmost endeavours, by amicable means, to have them returned to Portugal as soon as possible.^[4]

The town was never handed back; according to the Portuguese, it should have been.^[1] According to The Irish Times, Lisbon has never quite given up its claim, and from time to time Portuguese nationalists push the government to take a harder line.^[1]

“formally engage to use their utmost endeavours, by amicable means, to procure the retrocession of the said territories, in favour of Portugal”^[4]

A gap in the border treaties

When Spain and Portugal finally surveyed their border, they worked around the question. The Treaty of Limits signed in Lisbon on 29 September 1864 fixed the line from the mouth of the Minho down to where the Caia meets the Guadiana. The Convention of 29 June 1926 fixed it from where the Cuncos meets the Guadiana, south of Olivenza, to the sea.^[5] The stretch of river in between, beside Olivenza, is covered by neither.^[5]

In practice the Guadiana is the frontier. In 2004 The Irish Times called it the de facto frontier which Lisbon does not accept. A new bridge had just been built across it between Olivenza and Elvas, after long delays, and on the approach road that Portugal considers Portuguese, Spain had put up a sign reading “España”.^[1]

A Portuguese town in Spain

Olivenza’s past shows in its buildings. Its main church is built in the Portuguese Manueline style, and old marble plaques still carry the Portuguese arms.^[1] Observador called the church of Santa María Magdalena the only Manueline church in Spain.^[2] Portuguese has been spoken there since the Middle Ages, though by 2014 mostly by older people at home.^[2]

Some residents have taken Portuguese nationality alongside their Spanish one. In December 2014 the local association Além Guadiana said 80 people from Olivenza had recently become Portuguese citizens, with 90 more applications submitted.^[2]

Views in the town differ. A local historian quoted in 2004 compared two centuries of Spanish rule to ethnic cleansing, while the town librarian called the Portuguese claim a fantasy. A senior Spanish diplomat, Máximo Cajal, argued that giving the town back was unthinkable but that Portuguese feelings could not simply be trampled on.^[1]