Does anyone know much about LLivia, Spain? All I know is that it is a town that belongs to Spain but is entirely within France. I heard this is a result of a clerical error a long time ago. Anyone know for sure?
Spain ceded 33 villages to France in 1659, by the Treaty of the Pyrenees. However, they retained Llivia. The road from Llivia to the Spanish frontier is “neutral,” according to Encyclopædia Britannica. Not sure who gets the bill for paving it.
I found no evidence of a clerical error, but then I didn’t look very hard. There should be more detailed information here, if your Spanish or French is good enough to plow through the local language. Here’s a sample:
Seems to be in Catalan, (well, at least not French.)
But it still begs the question: Why keep one village? I heard it was accidentally left off of the Treaty when it was signed.
This site (in french) implies that the Spaniards were being “sneaky”, and signed a treaty returning villages in Cerdaña to France. But Llivia was a former roman capital, hence a city, not a village, and so wasn’t part of the treaty.
Why keep one village? If it was bigger than the other towns surrounding it, then it might have been a not insignificant tax base.
Llivia is an enclave, a part of one country surrounded on all sides by another. There are other enclaves in Europe:
Baarle-Nassau and Baarle-Hertog, Belgium, are surrounded by the Netherlands
Busingen, Germany, is surrounded by Switzerland
Campione, Italy, is surrounded by Switzerland