Names of the Valencian Community
Encyclopedia
The names of the Valencian Community are diverse, even though Comunitat Valenciana (in English
, "Valencian Community") is the only denomination with official status in its Statute of Autonomy
. Nonetheless, this legal document includes in its Preamble other legal denominations that portray the history and nature of the territory: Regne de València (in English: Kingdom of Valencia) and País Valencià (in English: "Valencian Country" or "Land of Valencia").
.
The term Kingdom of Valencia
refers to the conquered territory by the Christian
Catalan
and Aragon
ese troops commanded by king James I
in 1238. The conquered territory was granted wide administrative, legal and political self government within the structure of the Crown of Aragon
as stipulated in the set of laws known first as Costums de Valencia. When these were transformed into the Furs of Valencia (Charter
s of Valencia) , the autonomy was extended to all the Valencian territory. The furs
(code of law), its administrative and legal structure, as well as its status as an autonomous political entity were dissolved in 1707, at the end of the War of the Spanish Succession
by Phillip V of Spain, with the promulgation
of the Nueva Planta decrees
, whereby the legislation and structure of the Kingdom of Castile
were instituted in the territory.
Nevertheless, the Kingdom of Valencia denomination continued to be used locally during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, an example of which were the government divisions or Javier de Burgos's provincial division proposal. However, it was sometimes rendered as Antic Regne de Valencia (Old Kingdom of Valencia") to clarify the non-existence of the kingdom as a legal or political entity. At the beginning of the twentieth century, the term was confined to the academic, cultural or literary domains, especially after the Valencian Renaixença
and the nascent Valencian nationalism, which began to use the term along with País Valencià. During Franco's dictatorship the term was in disuse, only to be revived during the political transition toward democracy in Spain, concurrent with the transition towards Valencian autonomy, at the beginning of the 1980s, as well as by blaverism
, which used it in opposition to the denomination País Valencià, adopted by the left wing organizations.
Nowadays, the term "Kingdom of Valencia" is only used in the cultural or academic realms, even though it is included in the Preamble of the current Valencian Statute of Autonomy, as well as in its first article, in order to evocate the historical origin of what today constitutes the Valencian Community.
País meaning "country" or "region" and Valencià meaning "Valencian") was first recorded by 17th century hagiographer Agustín Bella, in his work Vida de fra Agustín Antonio Pascual (1699). Valencian linguist and historian Manuel Sanchis i Guarner
reports other instances of the term as used since the 18th century in his work La llengua dels valencians.
In these early usages, the term designated a merely geographic concept. Then, by the early twentieth century, Labor and Valencian nationalist movements picked up the term and gave it the modern cultural and political connotation. For example, the Joventuts Valencianistes (Valencianist Youth), in 1906 published a map of the comarques
using this particular denomination. The term became popular during the 1930s, and was widely used in academic, cultural and political papers and publications, most notably the Quaderns d'Orientació Valencianista journal, published by Editorial Estel, nowadays edited by the University of Valencia).
It had a noticeable official usage during the Second Spanish Republic
, as it reflects, by example, the use of the term from the Provincial Council of Valencia (present Provincial Delegation) in a poster made by Artur Ballester i Marco. Also a good sample of it can be seen its use in the different projects from statutes of autonomy of the CNT in 1936, of Valencian Left
and Izquierda Republicana in 1937.
During the 1960s, after the publication of El País Valenciano, by Joan Fuster
, the term became widely used again (during the dictatorship), to the point of being the most widely used term to refer to the territory in the media, most notably in the regional newspapers of various political ideologies, without any overt censorship from Franco's government, despite it being most likely a term mimicking País Vasco or Basque Country
and, thus, trying to emphasize the perceived (for this term users) "othernesss" of the Valencian territory within Spain. When democracy was restored, the term was proposed in the Statute of Autonomy of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Valencian Country, on October 25, 1979. Before the ratification of the 1979 Statute of Autonomy, which coined the term "Valencian Community", the "Pre-autonomy Council of the Valencian Country" also used the term.
Even though the term was widely used, especially by the Democratic Center Union party (UCD), in the 1980s, the local right wing politicians
rejected the term, since they considered that its use would imply a political link to the "Catalan Countries
" (in Valencian: Països Catalans). The last mayor of the city of Valencia before democracy, Miguel Ramón Izquierdo, justified the rejection of the term, since "país es singular de países, entonces se habla de un País Valenciano dentro de los Países Catalanes" ("country is the singular of countries, hence we are talking about a Valencian Country within the Catalan Countries").
Nowadays, the term is still used, mostly in Academia, encyclopedias in Catalan
(and occasionally in Spanish
) in the names of streets, plazas and avenues, by some political parties (e.g. the United Left of the Valencian Country), labor unions (UGT-PV, CCOO-PV, etc.), and some nationalist-leaning media. The term may be even preferred to "Valencian Community" in some comarques, even though it is not the official denomination. The Partit Socialista del País Valencià, which is the local branch of the Spanish Socialist Workers' Party
, currently the main opposition party at the regional parliament, keeps País Valencià in its name, but in its documents and public statements they no longer use País Valencià, but rather "Comunitat Valenciana".
Both the 1982 and the 2006 Statutes of Autonomy included the term in the Preamble. The current Statute of Autonomy states that the "Valencian tradition coming from the historic Kingdom of Valencia
met with the modern conception of the Valencian Country and produced the Valencian autonomy".
Valencian Country is one attempt at rendering the term "País Valencià" in English. Another rendition in English, also locally created: Land of Valencia. This appeared in Valencian tourist department advertising and since then has been used by some other travel publications in English.. It is unclear whether the original term translated is either "Region Valenciana" or "País Valencià".
: Regió Valenciana) was a denomination that became majoritary during Franco's dictatorship with the intention of emphasizing the intended nature of the territory under the political structure of the time: a region within Spain. In fact, before the twentieth century, several territories dominated by Spain were called "kingdoms", as a synonym of "country" in spite of the fact that they were not monarchies
. From the nineteenth century onwards, the term "kingdom" began to be substituted by the term "region", especially in books which imitated the French regional geographical nomenclature. In that sense region designated any state, country or nation (all previously used terms that designated the diverse territories of the Spanish Empire
or under the King of Spain), regardless of their political and administrative nature of the territory, whereas "kingdom" was reserved to the particular State, country or nation governed by a monarch. Today, the concept of "region" does not refer to a particular political entity, but alludes to regional geography. Within the dictatorship, the term had a centralizing
connotation and not simply a geographical meaning.
One more term which gained wide acceptance during the Francoist times was Levante
, which roughly translates as "East", in a similar fashion to the francophone Levant
. In Spanish, "levante" (llevant in Valencian) are easterly winds and, geographically speaking, anything coming from or originating in the east, such as the eastern slopes of a range (the western ones are called "Poniente").
In its attempt to homogenize the Spanish territory, the Francoist governments and media often used this "Levante" term to refer to the eastern Mediterranean coast of Spain. Since Catalonia had a well defined identity already, "Levante" came to designate, roughly, the territories which used to make the Kingdom of Valencia and, often, additionally the Región de Murcia. Since by population and extension, the Valencian Community is quite larger than the Región de Murcia, for some this term was narrowed to vaguely designate what today is the Valencian Community.
The term may still be heard today, mainly informally, designating for example motorways names such as in Autovía de Levante
. It remains in use also within private organizations such as companies, chiefly to designate a sales territory. Some public organizations such as the trade union CNT-FAI also use it for their territorial organization.
Also, the oldest newspaper in the Valencian Community, edited in the city of Valencia is called Levante-El Mercantil Valenciano. The football team Levante UD
, from the city of Valencia and currently in the Spanish Primera División
is also named in this fashion, even despite its name has origin in the Levante Beach in Valencia, nowadays called Malva-rosa.
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The term which has become official, Valencian Community (Comunitat Valenciana), was first used within the articles of the proposal of the Statute of Autonomy drafted by the Parliamentary Assembly in charge of forging the Statute, interchangeably with the term "País Valencià". In this proposal, known as the Agreement of Benicàssim (Acord de Benicàssim) both the left-wing and right-wing parties reached a consensus regarding the symbols of the territory and soon-to-be autonomous community of Spain. The left-wing parties accepted as the Flag of Valencia a senyera
including a blue strip and the coat of arms of the Generalitat, and the right-wing parties accepted the term "País Valencià" in the Statute's preamble.
Nonetheless, when this proposal was presented before the Chamber of Deputies of Spain, consensus was broken; UCD did not comply with the Agreement of Benicàssim, and proposed to change the flag to include the crown in the blue strip, i.e., to use the flag of the city of Valencia as the flag of the whole territory, they also moved back to retain the term "Regne de Valencia" (Kingdom of Valencia).
Given that center and right-wing political parties formed an absolute majority in the Congress, the Socialist Workers' Party
(PSOE), reached a compromise with the UCD (by the proposal of deputy Emilio Attard), through which the term "Regne de Valencia" was replaced by Comunidad Valenciana ("Valencian Community", "Community" such as in "Autonomous Community") within the articles of the legal text, and the terms "Regne de Valencia" and "País Valencià" were included only as incidental mentions in the Preamble, so that whichever party was in power in a particular time would use whichever denomination it preferred.
Later on, by the mid and late 1980s, when the PSOE won absolute majorities both in the Spanish Parliament and the Valencian one
, it decided to keep the existing solution unchanged rather than reopening the topic, which had been harshly fought over. The same stance has been followed by the PP. It has been under the latter's ruling that the name has been officially made "Comunitat Valenciana" (in Valencian) rather than the previous bilingual Spanish/Valencian (Comunidad/Comunitat Valenciana).
English language
English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...
, "Valencian Community") is the only denomination with official status in its Statute of Autonomy
Statute of Autonomy
Nominally, a Statute of Autonomy is a law hierarchically located under the constitution of a country, and over any other form of legislation...
. Nonetheless, this legal document includes in its Preamble other legal denominations that portray the history and nature of the territory: Regne de València (in English: Kingdom of Valencia) and País Valencià (in English: "Valencian Country" or "Land of Valencia").
Denominations
Over the years, there have been several denominations both in Spanish and Valencian covering what today is the Valencian Community. The topic stems from the potentially confusing usage of Valencia, a homonym term which may designate the city of Valencia, the Valencia province or the whole territory of the Valencian CommunityValencian Community
The Valencian Community is an autonomous community of Spain located in central and south-eastern Iberian Peninsula. Its capital and largest city is Valencia...
.
Kingdom of Valencia
Kingdom of Valencia
The Kingdom of Valencia , located in the eastern shore of the Iberian Peninsula, was one of the component realms of the Crown of Aragon. When the Crown of Aragon merged by dynastic union with the Crown of Castile to form the Kingdom of Spain, the Kingdom of Valencia became a component realm of the...
refers to the conquered territory by the Christian
Christianity
Christianity is a monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus as presented in canonical gospels and other New Testament writings...
Catalan
Catalonia
Catalonia is an autonomous community in northeastern Spain, with the official status of a "nationality" of Spain. Catalonia comprises four provinces: Barcelona, Girona, Lleida, and Tarragona. Its capital and largest city is Barcelona. Catalonia covers an area of 32,114 km² and has an...
and Aragon
Aragon
Aragon is a modern autonomous community in Spain, coextensive with the medieval Kingdom of Aragon. Located in northeastern Spain, the Aragonese autonomous community comprises three provinces : Huesca, Zaragoza, and Teruel. Its capital is Zaragoza...
ese troops commanded by king James I
James I of Aragon
James I the Conqueror was the King of Aragon, Count of Barcelona, and Lord of Montpellier from 1213 to 1276...
in 1238. The conquered territory was granted wide administrative, legal and political self government within the structure of the Crown of Aragon
Crown of Aragon
The Crown of Aragon Corona d'Aragón Corona d'Aragó Corona Aragonum controlling a large portion of the present-day eastern Spain and southeastern France, as well as some of the major islands and mainland possessions stretching across the Mediterranean as far as Greece...
as stipulated in the set of laws known first as Costums de Valencia. When these were transformed into the Furs of Valencia (Charter
Charter
A charter is the grant of authority or rights, stating that the granter formally recognizes the prerogative of the recipient to exercise the rights specified...
s of Valencia) , the autonomy was extended to all the Valencian territory. The furs
Fuero
Fuero , Furs , Foro and Foru is a Spanish legal term and concept.The word comes from Latin forum, an open space used as market, tribunal and meeting place...
(code of law), its administrative and legal structure, as well as its status as an autonomous political entity were dissolved in 1707, at the end of the War of the Spanish Succession
War of the Spanish Succession
The War of the Spanish Succession was fought among several European powers, including a divided Spain, over the possible unification of the Kingdoms of Spain and France under one Bourbon monarch. As France and Spain were among the most powerful states of Europe, such a unification would have...
by Phillip V of Spain, with the promulgation
Promulgation
Promulgation is the act of formally proclaiming or declaring a new statutory or administrative law after its enactment. In some jurisdictions this additional step is necessary before the law can take effect....
of the Nueva Planta decrees
Nueva Planta decrees
The Nueva Planta decrees were a number of decrees signed between 1707 and 1716 by Philip V—the first Bourbon king of Spain—during and shortly after the end of the War of the Spanish Succession which he won....
, whereby the legislation and structure of the Kingdom of Castile
Kingdom of Castile
Kingdom of Castile was one of the medieval kingdoms of the Iberian Peninsula. It emerged as a political autonomous entity in the 9th century. It was called County of Castile and was held in vassalage from the Kingdom of León. Its name comes from the host of castles constructed in the region...
were instituted in the territory.
Nevertheless, the Kingdom of Valencia denomination continued to be used locally during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, an example of which were the government divisions or Javier de Burgos's provincial division proposal. However, it was sometimes rendered as Antic Regne de Valencia (Old Kingdom of Valencia") to clarify the non-existence of the kingdom as a legal or political entity. At the beginning of the twentieth century, the term was confined to the academic, cultural or literary domains, especially after the Valencian Renaixença
Renaixença
The Renaixença was an early 19th century late romantic revivalist movement in Catalan language and culture, akin to the Galician Rexurdimento or the Occitan Félibrige movements. The first stimuli of the movement date of the 1830s and 1840s, but the Renaixença stretches up into the 1880s, until it...
and the nascent Valencian nationalism, which began to use the term along with País Valencià. During Franco's dictatorship the term was in disuse, only to be revived during the political transition toward democracy in Spain, concurrent with the transition towards Valencian autonomy, at the beginning of the 1980s, as well as by blaverism
Blaverism
Blaverism is a body of ideas in the Valencian Community, Spain that emerged with the Spanish transition to democracy after the death of Francisco Franco, and characterised by its opposition to Joan Fuster's book Nosaltres, els valencians , which revived the concept of Països Catalans which...
, which used it in opposition to the denomination País Valencià, adopted by the left wing organizations.
Nowadays, the term "Kingdom of Valencia" is only used in the cultural or academic realms, even though it is included in the Preamble of the current Valencian Statute of Autonomy, as well as in its first article, in order to evocate the historical origin of what today constitutes the Valencian Community.
Valencian Country or Land of Valencia
País Valencià (rendered in English either as "Valencian Country", "Valencian Region", or "Land of Valencia"; from ValencianValencian
Valencian is the traditional and official name of the Catalan language in the Valencian Community. There are dialectical differences from standard Catalan, and under the Valencian Statute of Autonomy, the Acadèmia Valenciana de la Llengua has been established as its regulator...
País meaning "country" or "region" and Valencià meaning "Valencian") was first recorded by 17th century hagiographer Agustín Bella, in his work Vida de fra Agustín Antonio Pascual (1699). Valencian linguist and historian Manuel Sanchis i Guarner
Manuel Sanchis i Guarner
Manuel Sanchis i Guarner was a Valencian Spanish philologist, historian and writer.He was an author of a vast work ranging from studies of linguistics, literature, history, ethnography to popular culture, basically centered on the Valencian Community, but also on the rest of the territories of...
reports other instances of the term as used since the 18th century in his work La llengua dels valencians.
In these early usages, the term designated a merely geographic concept. Then, by the early twentieth century, Labor and Valencian nationalist movements picked up the term and gave it the modern cultural and political connotation. For example, the Joventuts Valencianistes (Valencianist Youth), in 1906 published a map of the comarques
Comarca
A comarca is a traditional region or local administrative division found in parts of Spain, Portugal, Panama, Nicaragua, and Brazil. The term is derived from the term marca, meaning a "march, mark", plus the prefix co- meaning "together, jointly".The comarca is known in Aragonese as redolada and...
using this particular denomination. The term became popular during the 1930s, and was widely used in academic, cultural and political papers and publications, most notably the Quaderns d'Orientació Valencianista journal, published by Editorial Estel, nowadays edited by the University of Valencia).
It had a noticeable official usage during the Second Spanish Republic
Second Spanish Republic
The Second Spanish Republic was the government of Spain between April 14 1931, and its destruction by a military rebellion, led by General Francisco Franco....
, as it reflects, by example, the use of the term from the Provincial Council of Valencia (present Provincial Delegation) in a poster made by Artur Ballester i Marco. Also a good sample of it can be seen its use in the different projects from statutes of autonomy of the CNT in 1936, of Valencian Left
Valencian Left
Valencian Left is a nationalist Valencian leftist party founded in the Valencian Community, founded in April, 1998 a group of ex-members of Unitat del Poble Valencià formed left this party and went to form a new political group using the vacant name of the historical Esquerra Valenciana.EV's...
and Izquierda Republicana in 1937.
During the 1960s, after the publication of El País Valenciano, by Joan Fuster
Joan Fuster
Joan Fuster i Ortells was a Valencian writer, who published mostly in Catalan.- Life and works :He was born in the village of Sueca near Valencia, Spain, in a relatively prosperous middle class family. Both his parents were pious Roman Catholics and Carlists. His father was a renowned local...
, the term became widely used again (during the dictatorship), to the point of being the most widely used term to refer to the territory in the media, most notably in the regional newspapers of various political ideologies, without any overt censorship from Franco's government, despite it being most likely a term mimicking País Vasco or Basque Country
Basque Country (autonomous community)
The Basque Country is an autonomous community of northern Spain. It includes the Basque provinces of Álava, Biscay and Gipuzkoa, also called Historical Territories....
and, thus, trying to emphasize the perceived (for this term users) "othernesss" of the Valencian territory within Spain. When democracy was restored, the term was proposed in the Statute of Autonomy of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Valencian Country, on October 25, 1979. Before the ratification of the 1979 Statute of Autonomy, which coined the term "Valencian Community", the "Pre-autonomy Council of the Valencian Country" also used the term.
Even though the term was widely used, especially by the Democratic Center Union party (UCD), in the 1980s, the local right wing politicians
Blaverism
Blaverism is a body of ideas in the Valencian Community, Spain that emerged with the Spanish transition to democracy after the death of Francisco Franco, and characterised by its opposition to Joan Fuster's book Nosaltres, els valencians , which revived the concept of Països Catalans which...
rejected the term, since they considered that its use would imply a political link to the "Catalan Countries
Catalan Countries
The Catalan term Països Catalans refers to the territories where the Catalan language is spoken.The first mentions of the term date back to the late 19th century, but it never surpassed the limits of a small circle of Catalan authors until its strictly cultural dimension became increasingly...
" (in Valencian: Països Catalans). The last mayor of the city of Valencia before democracy, Miguel Ramón Izquierdo, justified the rejection of the term, since "país es singular de países, entonces se habla de un País Valenciano dentro de los Países Catalanes" ("country is the singular of countries, hence we are talking about a Valencian Country within the Catalan Countries").
Nowadays, the term is still used, mostly in Academia, encyclopedias in Catalan
Catalan language
Catalan is a Romance language, the national and only official language of Andorra and a co-official language in the Spanish autonomous communities of Catalonia, the Balearic Islands and Valencian Community, where it is known as Valencian , as well as in the city of Alghero, on the Italian island...
(and occasionally in Spanish
Spanish language
Spanish , also known as Castilian , is a Romance language in the Ibero-Romance group that evolved from several languages and dialects in central-northern Iberia around the 9th century and gradually spread with the expansion of the Kingdom of Castile into central and southern Iberia during the...
) in the names of streets, plazas and avenues, by some political parties (e.g. the United Left of the Valencian Country), labor unions (UGT-PV, CCOO-PV, etc.), and some nationalist-leaning media. The term may be even preferred to "Valencian Community" in some comarques, even though it is not the official denomination. The Partit Socialista del País Valencià, which is the local branch of the Spanish Socialist Workers' Party
Spanish Socialist Workers' Party
The Spanish Socialist Workers' Party is a social-democratic political party in Spain. Its political position is Centre-left. The PSOE is the former ruling party of Spain, until beaten in the elections of November 2011 and the second oldest, exceeded only by the Partido Carlista, founded in...
, currently the main opposition party at the regional parliament, keeps País Valencià in its name, but in its documents and public statements they no longer use País Valencià, but rather "Comunitat Valenciana".
Both the 1982 and the 2006 Statutes of Autonomy included the term in the Preamble. The current Statute of Autonomy states that the "Valencian tradition coming from the historic Kingdom of Valencia
Kingdom of Valencia
The Kingdom of Valencia , located in the eastern shore of the Iberian Peninsula, was one of the component realms of the Crown of Aragon. When the Crown of Aragon merged by dynastic union with the Crown of Castile to form the Kingdom of Spain, the Kingdom of Valencia became a component realm of the...
met with the modern conception of the Valencian Country and produced the Valencian autonomy".
Valencian Country is one attempt at rendering the term "País Valencià" in English. Another rendition in English, also locally created: Land of Valencia. This appeared in Valencian tourist department advertising and since then has been used by some other travel publications in English.. It is unclear whether the original term translated is either "Region Valenciana" or "País Valencià".
Valencian Region and Levante
The term Valencian Region (in ValencianValencian
Valencian is the traditional and official name of the Catalan language in the Valencian Community. There are dialectical differences from standard Catalan, and under the Valencian Statute of Autonomy, the Acadèmia Valenciana de la Llengua has been established as its regulator...
: Regió Valenciana) was a denomination that became majoritary during Franco's dictatorship with the intention of emphasizing the intended nature of the territory under the political structure of the time: a region within Spain. In fact, before the twentieth century, several territories dominated by Spain were called "kingdoms", as a synonym of "country" in spite of the fact that they were not monarchies
Monarchy
A monarchy is a form of government in which the office of head of state is usually held until death or abdication and is often hereditary and includes a royal house. In some cases, the monarch is elected...
. From the nineteenth century onwards, the term "kingdom" began to be substituted by the term "region", especially in books which imitated the French regional geographical nomenclature. In that sense region designated any state, country or nation (all previously used terms that designated the diverse territories of the Spanish Empire
Spanish Empire
The Spanish Empire comprised territories and colonies administered directly by Spain in Europe, in America, Africa, Asia and Oceania. It originated during the Age of Exploration and was therefore one of the first global empires. At the time of Habsburgs, Spain reached the peak of its world power....
or under the King of Spain), regardless of their political and administrative nature of the territory, whereas "kingdom" was reserved to the particular State, country or nation governed by a monarch. Today, the concept of "region" does not refer to a particular political entity, but alludes to regional geography. Within the dictatorship, the term had a centralizing
Unitary state
A unitary state is a state governed as one single unit in which the central government is supreme and any administrative divisions exercise only powers that their central government chooses to delegate...
connotation and not simply a geographical meaning.
One more term which gained wide acceptance during the Francoist times was Levante
Levante, Spain
The Levante is a name used to refer to the eastern region of the Iberian Peninsula, on the Spanish Mediterranean coast. It roughly corresponds to the former Xarq Al-Andalus, but has no modern geopolitical definition...
, which roughly translates as "East", in a similar fashion to the francophone Levant
Levant
The Levant or ) is the geographic region and culture zone of the "eastern Mediterranean littoral between Anatolia and Egypt" . The Levant includes most of modern Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, Israel, the Palestinian territories, and sometimes parts of Turkey and Iraq, and corresponds roughly to the...
. In Spanish, "levante" (llevant in Valencian) are easterly winds and, geographically speaking, anything coming from or originating in the east, such as the eastern slopes of a range (the western ones are called "Poniente").
In its attempt to homogenize the Spanish territory, the Francoist governments and media often used this "Levante" term to refer to the eastern Mediterranean coast of Spain. Since Catalonia had a well defined identity already, "Levante" came to designate, roughly, the territories which used to make the Kingdom of Valencia and, often, additionally the Región de Murcia. Since by population and extension, the Valencian Community is quite larger than the Región de Murcia, for some this term was narrowed to vaguely designate what today is the Valencian Community.
The term may still be heard today, mainly informally, designating for example motorways names such as in Autovía de Levante
Autovía A-32
The Autovía A-32, also known as the Autovía de Levante is a highway in Spain.It has been re-numbered from the N-332,N-330 and N-430. It connects Jaén with Albacete where it joins the Autovía A-30....
. It remains in use also within private organizations such as companies, chiefly to designate a sales territory. Some public organizations such as the trade union CNT-FAI also use it for their territorial organization.
Also, the oldest newspaper in the Valencian Community, edited in the city of Valencia is called Levante-El Mercantil Valenciano. The football team Levante UD
Levante UD
Levante Unión Deportiva, S.A.D. is a Spanish football club based in Valencia, in the namesake community.Founded in 1909, it plays in La Liga, holding home games at Estadi Ciutat de València.-Early years:...
, from the city of Valencia and currently in the Spanish Primera División
La Liga
The Primera División of the Liga Nacional de Fútbol Profesional , commonly known as La Liga or, for sponsorship reasons, Liga BBVA since 2008, is the top professional association football division of the Spanish football league system...
is also named in this fashion, even despite its name has origin in the Levante Beach in Valencia, nowadays called Malva-rosa.
Valencian Community
Senyera
The Senyera is a vexillological symbol based on the coat of arms of the Crown of Aragon, which consists of four red stripes on a golden background...
including a blue strip and the coat of arms of the Generalitat, and the right-wing parties accepted the term "País Valencià" in the Statute's preamble.
Nonetheless, when this proposal was presented before the Chamber of Deputies of Spain, consensus was broken; UCD did not comply with the Agreement of Benicàssim, and proposed to change the flag to include the crown in the blue strip, i.e., to use the flag of the city of Valencia as the flag of the whole territory, they also moved back to retain the term "Regne de Valencia" (Kingdom of Valencia).
Given that center and right-wing political parties formed an absolute majority in the Congress, the Socialist Workers' Party
Spanish Socialist Workers' Party
The Spanish Socialist Workers' Party is a social-democratic political party in Spain. Its political position is Centre-left. The PSOE is the former ruling party of Spain, until beaten in the elections of November 2011 and the second oldest, exceeded only by the Partido Carlista, founded in...
(PSOE), reached a compromise with the UCD (by the proposal of deputy Emilio Attard), through which the term "Regne de Valencia" was replaced by Comunidad Valenciana ("Valencian Community", "Community" such as in "Autonomous Community") within the articles of the legal text, and the terms "Regne de Valencia" and "País Valencià" were included only as incidental mentions in the Preamble, so that whichever party was in power in a particular time would use whichever denomination it preferred.
Later on, by the mid and late 1980s, when the PSOE won absolute majorities both in the Spanish Parliament and the Valencian one
Corts Valencianes
The Corts Valencianes are the main legislative body of the Generalitat Valenciana and therefore of the Valencian Community. The main location of the Corts is in the Palace of Benicarló in Valencia; however it can meet at any location in Valencian territory. The Corts has its origins in bodies...
, it decided to keep the existing solution unchanged rather than reopening the topic, which had been harshly fought over. The same stance has been followed by the PP. It has been under the latter's ruling that the name has been officially made "Comunitat Valenciana" (in Valencian) rather than the previous bilingual Spanish/Valencian (Comunidad/Comunitat Valenciana).