The night that changed the Rambla

On St. James' Day in 1835, some events occurred in Barcelona that definitively changed the appearance of La Rambla. That day, Torín de la Barceloneta was full to witness a bullfight, one of the most popular events in the city at that time. The bulls fought that afternoon were very tame, which exacerbated the emotions of a public already very tense due to the civil war between liberals and absolutists.

Spontaneously, a demonstration was formed that began to release its anger and frustration against the nearest convents, and then headed towards those on La Rambla and its surroundings. This fact is explained by the deep anti-clerical sentiment that the working classes and the bourgeoisie of Barcelona held against the friars and nuns. The friars were accused of supporting and sheltering the Carlist factions, hoarding wheat and food, the cholera outbreak the previous autumn, poisoning the waters, and immobilizing a good part of the urban land with convents, at a time when the city's urbanizable plots had been exhausted and the citizens crowded together and were forced to build upwards, thus worsening living conditions.

During that St. James' evening and night, the citizens stormed a dozen convents, five of which were completely destroyed, and many friars and nuns were killed.

This popular revolt probably spurred the project of the seizure of ecclesiastical property, which was regulated the following year by Mendizábal's decree of February 19, 1836. In this way, large areas of urban land began to be released, whose new construction and new use transformed the city and especially La Rambla.

Thus, the same year that the seizure began, the old convent of San José was converted into La Boquería market.

The same was done, although years later, with the Capuchin convent on La Rambla, which was demolished and became Plaça Reial.

The plots of land of the convents on La Rambla and its surroundings allowed for the definitive transformation of this ancient promenade, which, from the mid-19th century onwards, became a walkway filled with buildings promoted by the liberal bourgeoisie, the most emblematic of which, undoubtedly, was and still is the Liceu, also built on the grounds of an old convent.