Palma (Catalan: [ˈpalmə], also [ˈpawmə]; Spanish: [ˈpalma]), also known as Palma de Mallorca (officially between 1983 and 1988, 2006–2008, and 2012–2016), is the capital and largest city of the autonomous community of the Balearic Islands in Spain. It is situated on the south coast of Mallorca on the Bay of Palma. With a population of 438,234 as of 2024, it is the 8th-largest city in Spain.
The Cabrera Archipelago, though widely separated from Palma proper, is part of the municipality.
The Balearic Islands are an archipelago in the western Mediterranean Sea, near the eastern coast of the Iberian Peninsula. The archipelago forms a province and autonomous community of Spain, with Palma de Mallorca being its capital and largest city.
Formerly part of the Kingdom of Mallorca, the islands were made a province in the 19th century provincial division, which in 1983 received a Statute of Autonomy. In its later reform of 2007, the Statute designates the Balearic Islands as one of the nationalities of Spain. The official languages of the Balearic Islands are Catalan and Spanish.
Spain, officially the Kingdom of Spain, is a country in Southern and Western Europe with territories in North Africa. Featuring the southernmost point of continental Europe, it is the largest country in Southern Europe and the fourth-most populous European Union (EU) member state. Spanning the majority of the Iberian Peninsula, its territory also includes the Canary Islands, in the Eastern Atlantic Ocean; the Balearic Islands, in the Western Mediterranean Sea; and the autonomous cities of Ceuta and Melilla, in mainland Africa. Peninsular Spain is bordered to the north by France, Andorra, and the Bay of Biscay; to the east and south by the Mediterranean Sea and Gibraltar; and to the west by Portugal and the Atlantic Ocean. Spain's capital and largest city is Madrid; other major urban areas include Barcelona, Valencia, Seville, Zaragoza, Málaga, Murcia, and Palma de Mallorca.
In early antiquity, the Iberian Peninsula was inhabited by Celts, Iberians, and other pre-Roman peoples. The Roman conquest of the Iberian peninsula created the province of Hispania, which became deeply Romanised and later Christianised. After the fall of the Western Roman Empire, the peninsula was conquered by tribes from Central Europe, among them the Visigoths, who established the Visigothic Kingdom centred on Toledo. In the early 8th century, most of the peninsula was conquered by the Umayyad Caliphate, with Al-Andalus centred on Córdoba. The northern Christian kingdoms of Iberia launched the so-called Reconquista, gradually repelling and ultimately expelling Islamic rule from the peninsula, culminating with the fall of the Nasrid Kingdom of Granada. The dynastic union of the Crown of Castile and the Crown of Aragon in 1479 under the Catholic Monarchs is often seen as the de facto unification of Spain as a nation state.
Lufthansa Flight 181, a Boeing 737-230C jet airliner (reg. D-ABCE) named Landshut, was hijacked on 13 October 1977 by four militants of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine while en route from Palma de Mallorca, Spain, to Frankfurt am Main, West Germany. The hijacking aimed to secure the release of eleven notorious Red Army Faction leaders held in West German prisons and two Palestinians held in Turkey. This event was part of the so-called German Autumn, intended to increase pressure on the West German government. The hijackers diverted the flight to several locations before ending in Mogadishu, Somalia, where the crisis concluded in the early morning hours of 18 October 1977 under the cover of darkness. The West German counter-terrorism unit GSG 9, with ground support from the Somali Armed Forces, stormed the aircraft, rescuing all 87 passengers and four crew members. The captain of the flight was killed by the hijackers earlier in the ordeal.
Cabrera (Balearic Catalan: [kəˈbɾeɾə], Spanish: [kaˈβɾeɾa], Latin: Capraria) is an island in the Balearic Islands, Spain located in the Mediterranean Sea off the southern coast of Mallorca. A National Park, its highest point is Na Picamosques (172 m). Uninhabited, it is administratively part of the city of Palma in Mallorca.
Cabrera is the largest island of the small archipelago that includes (from south to north) the islands of Estells de Fora, L'Imperial, Illa de ses Bledes, Na Redona, Conillera, L'Esponja, Na Plana, Illot Pla, Na Pobra and Na Foradada.
The conquest of the island of Majorca on behalf of the Roman Catholic kingdoms was carried out by King James I of Aragon between 1229 and 1231. The pact to carry out the invasion, concluded between James I and the ecclesiastical and secular leaders, was ratified in Tarragona on 28 August 1229. It was open and promised conditions of parity for all who wished to participate.
James I reached an agreement regarding the arrival of the Catholic troops with a local chief in the Port de Pollença, but the strong mistral winds forced the king to divert to the southern part of the island. He landed at midnight on 10 September 1229, on the coast where there is now the tourist resort of Santa Ponsa, the population centre of the Calviá municipality. Although the city of Madina Mayurqa (now Palma de Mallorca) fell within the first year of the conquest, the Muslim resistance in the mountains lasted for three years.
Santa Ponsa (Catalan and officially: Santa Ponça) is a small town in the southwest of Mallorca. Located in the municipality of Calvià, it is 18 kilometres from the capital Palma.