There is no official birth date on record for Cervantes but Michael, the name he was given, after St. Michael, suggests September 29th, the feast of St. Michael the Archangel. It is noted that Cervantes was christened on October 9th, 1547 and born in Alcala, a city near Madrid.

Cervantes´ childhood was somewhat nomadic and very unsettled. His father, Rodrigo de Cervantes is recorded as being a barber-surgeon or pharmacist-surgeon. The family was constantly moving around in search of towns in need of his services. And quite a large family it was, Cervantes was the 4th of 7 children, Cervantes mother was named Leonor de Cortinas.

In terms of education, Cervantes had very little, or perhaps formal coursework was simply never recorded. He was a student of the Spanish humanist Juan Lopez de Hoyos in Madrid, from 1568-1569 only to go to Rome the next year under the watch of Guilio Acquavita. Acquavita was ordained as a cardinal in 1570.

Cervantes, with many other Spanish men, next went to Rome to find a better life and seek opportunity to fund his writing. Cervantes ended up joining the Spanish infantry in Naples instead. It should be noted that throughout his military experiences Cervantes enjoyed his time and was popular amongst the ranks.

In 1571 the headwaters of war met at Cyprus. In the Mediterranean, on the Gulf of Lepanto, the Ottman Empire was moving to expand power and land control. Cervantes´s company was called to fight. Cervantes fought honorably as many accounts have stated. However he also sustained a wound to the chest, and a debilitating wound to the left hand that earned him the nickname Manco de Lepanto (Maimed of Lepanto).

Shortly after the Gulf of Lepanto, Cervantes was on passage home when his vessel was captured by pirates. Cervantes was taken to Algiers and kept in slavery for 5 years despite several failed escape attempts.

In 1580 with the help of family and enormous sums of money gathered by the Trinitarian monastery, Cervantes was released. It is speculated during his captivity Cervantes gathered material and inspiration for his first works and Don Quijote characters. His first play, Los tratos de Argel (The Treatment of Algiers) was based on his time held captive in Africa.

In 1584 Cervantes married Catalina de Salazary Palacios, the couple did not have any children although Cervantes did have a daughter through an affair with an actress. Cervantes would leave his wife and face unrelated financial difficulties that landed him in jail several times, once suspected of murder (he was never tried).

In 1605, now in Madrid, the first installment of Don Quijote was released and was met with immediate success. In 1615, the second and final installment was published and also had great success; both pieces were translated into English, French, and Italian. Unfortunately Cervantes had sold the rights to his work and although some of his financial burdens were eased he never managed his money well enough to be a wealthy man. The silver lining for Cervantes could only have been the literary recognition for his talent, the majority of which came after his death.

Cervantes also wrote dozens of plays and short stories though none as popular or as heralded as Don Quijote. For example, 12 Novelas Ejemplares (12 Exemplay Novels) published in 1613. In Ocho Comedias y Ocho Entremeses (Eight Comedies and Eight Interludes, 1615) Cervantes says his farewell to his readers in the prologue as he knew death was approaching. His final novel, Los trabajos de Persiles y Segismunda (The Exploits of Persiles and Segismunda) was published at the end of his life in 1616.

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This last statistic makes Spanish the second most spoken language in the world, ranking higher than both Hindi and English. Spanish is also the world’s third most used language in the media in its various formatting: radio, television, paper and internet. Spanish also makes up 10% of the language used on the internet.

Despite the current financial crisis, Spain is still ranked as having the thirteenth highest GDP (gross domestic product in the world). Also among the 50 countries with the highest GDPs are Mexico in 14th place, Argentina (24th), Colombia (27th), Venezuela (28th), Chile (33rd), and Peru (45th).

The importance of Spanish as a language of business has been increasing in the last few decades, due in large part to the constant economic growth Latin American countries have been experiencing –many of these countries have taken huge leaps forward in terms of their international economic positions. Latin America is a rich source of raw materials, which has helped make knowledge of Spanish a necessity in seemingly distant countries such as Japan, where international trade is done with Spain and Latin America.

Spanish-speaking culture has been steadily attracting greater interest on all different levels in the last twenty years, particularly in the arts: distinguished Spanish language writers have revolutionized the narrative world through their writing, Spanish language music is no longer only heard in Spanish speaking countries (where it’s still heard more than English language music), and dance academies teaching salsa, merengue, and flamenco (Spain is also a part of the Hispanic boom)have been filling up around the world.

530 million Spanish speakers from around the world make up a group of consumers that no company can ignore. The increase in this group’s buying power, slow but steady, makes it a market that is just too attractive to overlook, which is why Spanish and Spanish speakers are increasingly being considered by companies when promoting their products.

Another pertinent phenomenon has also occurred in the last few years: the Spanish language itself has become a significant economic resource. The various courses that cater to the different needs of Spanish learners have helped elevate the number of people studying Spanish around the world to nearly 20 million, including study on an official level in high schools and universities, as well as education on a private level in schools that specialize in Spanish as a foreign language instruction and study abroad experiences.

The United States, the European Union, and China are all placing great interest in Spain and Latin America (including Brazil). Investment in these regions is increasing rapidly.

While English has been, and continues to be, a language of fundamental importance in terms of international communication, it is also true that in our constantly globalizing world Spanish has become an obligatory second language for anyone who wants to be “someone” in the international business sphere.

It may be a fact that today the international community speaks English, but considering the latest estimates from the U.N. and its various organizations on population and economic growth in Spanish speaking countries, in the future it will also speak Spanish.

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Every Spanish word has an accent, or a syllable which is stressed, but they do not always need to be written. The rules of knowing where accents fall and why can be quite difficult for non-native speakers to understand. Hopefully these rules will help clear things up:

• If a word ends with an s or n or any of the 5 vowels, a, e, i, o or u, the stress falls on the second to last syllable of the word. The accent does not need to be marked. Most Spanish words fall into this category.

  Examples: me-sa, za-pa-tos, pa-dre

• In other words, which do not end in an s, n or a vowel, and do not have any written accent, the stress falls on the last syllable of the word. This also does not need to be marked.

  Examples: co-mer, pa-pel, or-de-na-dor

• If the stress of a word falls anywhere else (other than where the rules above say it should be) a written accent is used to show where it is.

  Examples: di-fí-cil, ár-bol (as both of these words end in l, they would normally be in the second category, with the stress falling on the last syllable. However, as this is not the case, an accent is written to show which syllable is stressed instead.)

• This includes when the stress falls on the third to last or fourth to last syllable of a word, for example, which is common in compound words.

  Examples: dí-me-lo (an imperative plus two pronouns), du-chán-do-se (present participle plus reflexive pronoun), fan-tás-ti-co.

Foreign words used in the Spanish language can be exceptions to these rules.

There are also other special cases for the use of written accents:

• Some accents are actually not used for pronunciation, but simply to differentiate them from other words which are spelt the same but have different meanings, such as:

  tu (your) tú (you)
  si (if) sí (yes)
  este (this, adjective) éste (this one, demonstrative pronoun)

  There is no difference in pronunciation, but the written accents help avoid misunderstandings in written texts. These accents are called orthographic accents.

• Vowels can be split into strong vowels (a, e and o) and weak vowels (i and u). When a weak and a strong vowel, or two weak vowels come together, it creates a one syllable sound, called a diphthong.

  In the case of a strong and a weak vowel, the emphasis should fall on the strong vowel.
  In the case of two weak vowels, it should be on the second vowel.
  When these rules are not followed and there is emphasis on the other vowel, an accent needs to be written, for example: río, vía.

Another point to remember is that, due to the change in spelling, nouns can gain or lose accents when they change between singular and plural. The same can occur with adjectives when they change from masculine to feminine.
Examples: can-ci-ón à can-ci-on-es, inglés à inglesa

The letter ñ is a letter of the Spanish alphabet, but can be sometimes considered as an accent too. The mark above the n signifies that the letter should be pronounced like nya, as in español (pronounced espanyol).

How to write Spanish accents on your keyboard

The accents on Spanish words are an important part of the spelling, so make sure you don't forget to use them. Here are the codes that you need to press in order to type them on a non-Spanish keyboard. Simply hold down Alt and type in the required number on the number pad:

• Á Alt + 0193 á Alt + 0225
• É Alt + 0201 é Alt + 0233
• Í Alt + 0205 í Alt + 0237
• Ó Alt + 0211 ó Alt + 0243
• Ú Alt + 0218 ú Alt + 0250
• Ñ Alt + 0209 ñ Alt + 0241

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In the early years of its history, Spanish King Fernando VI conceded the Academy certain royal privileges such as allowing scholars to publish their works without previous censorship.

Later, when the Spanish colonies of the Americas gained independence from Spain, various other academies emerged nationally. These additions include the Philippine Spanish Language Academy and the North American Academy of Spanish. Finally, all twenty-one Academies created the Association of Spanish Language Academy in order to work side by side in the unification of the great legacy that is Spanish.

The Royal Spanish Academy is made up of
 

• 46 numerary members
• A maximum of 60 Spanish-born members
• The corresponding amount of foreign-born members
• Numerary members coming from the academies in the Americas
• Honorary members
   

The scholars who become members in RAE are elected by the rest of the active members, and upon being chosen, they become members for life. Each member occupies a letter-assigned seat within the Academy: the letter comes from the Spanish alphabet, with uppercase and lowercase letters differentiated and given separate seats. A current member of the Academy is writer Arturo Pérez Reverte (holder of uppercase letter "T"). The Academy also holds other notable famous writers as former members, which is the case of Nobel laureate Camilo José Cela.

El Diccionario de la Lengua Española, El Diccionario Panhispánico de Dudas o la Ortografía de la Lengua Española are part of the important publications done by the Academy.
 

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He headlined in some fifty performances, appearing on showbills with important figures such as R. Nureyev or Maya Plisetskaya. At this point, Canales had become an international dance celebrity.

In 1988, he received the Navisela award in Italy for best dancer. In 1990, Canales was also joint recipient of the Best International Dancer prize in Mexico with Julio Bocca.

The following turning point  came in 1992, when he created his own company with which he offered two choreographies in Bilbao: one was entitled “A ti, Carmen Amaya”, which paid tribute to famed flamenco dancer Carmen Amaya  and the other was called “siempre flamenco”. These pieces marked a change in direction in the dancer’s career, moving from classical and modern dance to the world of flamenco-fusion.

From this period on, Antonio Canales’ artistic catalogue features a nearly endless string of works, awards and critical praise for his unique vision of the flamenco arts and dance.

In 1992, the 500 year anniversary of Christopher Columbus’ first voyage to America provided a reason for holding a great deal of cultural events all over Spain and America. That year, Canales performed at the World Financial Center of New York, in the Holland Festival and in the Heiki (Tokyo).

His next show, “Torero” premiered in Montreal (Canada) in 1993, after which an extensive and successful tour followed. Just one year later, the show opened in Madrid, where it was so successful that to date, the show has been performed on more 1,000 occasions.

Antonio Canales received the National award for Dance in 1995.

One year later, the show entitled “Gitano” premiered in the Teatro Central of Seville during the Flamenco Biennial Festival celebrated in that city. In 1998, he teamed with the Catalan stage designer Lluis Pasqual to present “Bengues” in the Madrid Autumn Festival. As a result of a commission from the National Ballet of Spain, he created the choreography “Grito”, which premiered in New York’s city center.

1999 was a good year for Antonio. He had just opened the school that bore his name, his “Fuerza Latina” opened in Avila, he received the Max Award for Best Dance Performer, he filmed the movie “Vengo” and he was given the Medal of Andalusia, his homeland. Nice year!

In 2000, the Theatre Festival of Merida invited him to premiere his “Prometeo” in the Roman theatre in the Extremadura capital city.

Over 2001, he toured Latin American and Spain with “Bailaor”. The following year he celebrated the tenth anniversary of his company with the reopening of “Torero”. In 2003 he offered a show in Seville that paid tribute to Fernando Villalon called “Ojos Verdes”, also receiving another Max Theatre Award for Best Dance Performer.

The choreography “Carmen, Carmela” (2004 )showed Canales’ vision of Carmen de P. Merimee. He also took part in the Seville Biennial Flamenco Festival along with flamenco giants such as Paco de Lucia, Tomatito and Eva Yerbabuena. He also participated in the Festival of Classical Theatre in Merida in 2005 with “Sangre de Edipo”.

In 2006, he presented “Musical Flamenco Los Grandes” in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, touring with that show until 2007.

In Caracas, Venezuela he presented in 2009 his personal version of “The House of Bernarda Alba”, the timeless play written by Federico Garcia Lorca.

In the last few years, Antonio Canales has worked in Guanajuato, Mexico participating in events related to the bicentenary of Mexico’s independence. He has also taught lessons at the Theatre of Madrid, collaborated with the Cervantes institute and continued offering his shows in different European and American capital cities.

Aside from his somewhat stormy personal life, Antonio Canales’ almost unlimited creativity and versatility has helped make him an emblematic figure in the history of Spanish dance and flamenco.

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The changes that took place throughout the XIX century led it to be the age in which various constitutions took place in Spain. Some only applied during war time, others were completely disregarded by either the political parties or the people, and a few only lasted as long as the man who promoted them was the government's leader. What is true is that all of them were short-lived, and none of them carried the voice of the people, which is considered a fundamental key element of any government.

In 1808 there was the Bayonne constitution, which was never enacted. In 1812 the Cádiz constitution came at a time when people thought that things were going to change after the Napoleonic wars, but no change came. There was a constitution written in 1837, one in 1845, in 1856, in 1869, and in 1873, each one suppressed by changes in the ruling body of the Spanish government. With the second Republic came the 1931 constitution which approved the first Catalan Statute. Then the Civil War arrived and was followed by the long dark years of Franco dictatorship, during which neither constitutions nor statutes were considered to be safe. An official referendum in 1947 made the Spanish state a monarchy, but dictator Francisco Franco reserved his powers as regent and the right to personally designate a successor. He avoided naming one right away to avoid political conflict, although later, in 1969, he finally designated Bourbon Prince Juan Carlos as his successor.

The Spanish Constitution of 1978

After the death of the Franco, representatives of all the Spanish political groups got together in 1978 to write Spain's present-day constitution. It was put to a referendum on 6th December of the same year with 87% of the votes in favor of its approval. It was sanctioned by King Juan Carlos on 12th December and published in the Boletín Oficial del Estado (Official State Bulletin) on 29th December 1978. The 1978 Constitution proclaims that Spain is a social and democratic state governed by law and declares liberty, justice, equality, and political pluralism to be the country's foremost values. This new constitution came into effect on 1st January 1979 and defined Spain as a parliamentary monarchy with no official religion, where the head of state reigns but does not rule. It also prescribed a limited role for the armed forces and the church, the abolition of the death penalty, and an extension of suffrage.

This new constitution also granted the right for historical communities to form autonomous regions in Spain. It acknowledges the existence of more nationalities within a united and indivisible Spanish nation. The first regions to be recognized as “historical nationalities” were the Euskadi (Basque Country), Catalonia and Galicia. The nation is openly multilingual and the defense of regional tongues is explicitly cited in the pivotal Article 3:

1. Castilian (Spanish) is the official language of the State. All Spaniards have the duty to know it and the right to use it.
2. Other (Iberian) languages are official in their respective autonomous communities according to the Statutes.
3. The wealth of the different language variations in Spain is a cultural heritage that shall be the object of special respect and protection.

This was widely criticized by right-wing groups which thought the unity of Spain was compromised, and it is still a source of argument today.

The approval of the Spanish Constitution of 1978 signifies for Spain and the Spaniards years of joy and progress after two difficult centuries (19th and 20th). In Spain, 6th December is a national holiday in which the Spanish nation celebrates “Dia de la Constitución” (Constitution Day).

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Columbus set forth commanding three small ships, and after a long drawn-out journey landed on the coast of a Caribbean island. Thus commenced the Spanish conquest of America.

The widely published report of the 1492 voyage granted Christopher Columbus widespread European recognition, and secured him the title of Admiral of the Ocean Sea. More importantly, it enabled him to obtain further royal patronage and thus lead three more expeditions to the Caribbean (although Columbus continued to believe that he had reached Asia).

The Azteca and the Inca empires in Mexico were conquered by Spain in the 16th century, while the terrotory that would eventually became the US was explored by Hernando de Soto and Cabeza de Vaca.

The later travelled extensively through eastern and central United States, arriving at modern day Chicago, and during three years hoped to cross the sea to China, considered to be the finest market in the world.

His journey from Florida to the Mexican Gulf is described in the logbook Naufragios, which also recounts his experience of shipwreck. He and other five men had been living as natives in Texas, New Mexico and Arizona. Early in 1536 they came across Spanish soldiers on a slave expedition in Northern Mexico, and by July they had arrived in Mexico City.

Mexican territory was conquered by Hernán Cortés. The Aztec people believed Cortés to be their white-skinned god Quetzalcoatlin, a belief which facilitated the Spanish conquest. The Spanish fleet had landed in Villa Rica de la Vera Cruz in February 1519, and by the month of November, commanded by Cortés, they entered Tenochtitlán and arrested the Aztec Emperor, Moctezuma. Within two years Cortés had completely overthrown the Aztec Empire, securing control of Tenochtitlán and its surrounding territories, upon the ruins of which he would build Mexico City.

In 1532 the Inca Empire was conquered by Francisco Pizarro, whose men kidnapped Emperor Atahualpa in exchange for a ransom of gold and silver; once the ransom was paid, however, Atahualpa was murdered.

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During Columbus´s first voyage on the Atlantic, 1476, the commercial fleet he was with was attacked by French sailors off of the coast of Portugal. His ship was burned and Columbus was forced to swim ashore. The sailor settled in Lisbon and married Felipa Perestrello, the two had one son, Diego, in 1480.

Columbus would eventually move to Spain after the death of his first wife. With Beatriz Enriquez de Arana in 1488 Columbus had his second son, Fernando, out of wedlock.

By the late 1400s Columbus began lobbying for finance to take men and ships to discover a route to India and Asia via an un-interrupted eastward passage. Columbus argued the circumference of the Earth to be effectively shorter, 63% the actual size. Contemporaries of Columbus however argued the circumference to be 25,000mi, while the actual circumference is 24, 901.55mi and a bit shorter at the poles, 24,859.82mi.

Columbus was first rejected for funding for a 3-ship fleet by Portugal, then again by Genoa and Venice. Finally, the explorer arrived on the doorstep of the Spanish monarchy of Isabella of Castille and Ferdinand of Aragon in 1486. However during this period of Spain´s history (711-1492) the Muslims dominated the attention and finances of Spain´s government for the re-conquest. Columbus would have to wait until monies were freed up or the war came to an end.

A solution came to Columbus in January 1492 when the last Muslim stronghold in Granada was captured. With the momentum of victory, the royal court decided to finance Columbus. He was outfitted with the Santa Maria, the Pinta, and the Niña. In August of 1492 Columbus set sail from Spain´s coast and was at sea for 36 days until landing on a Bahamian island in the Caribbean Ocean, claiming it for Spain.

Columbus would travel between Spain and the Americas several more times to try and fulfill King Ferdinand with the gold and riches he promised. Columbus did bring back potatoes, tomatoes, and corn to Europe which became staples and helped increase European populations. Likewise, coffee from Africa and sugar cane from Asia became booming cash crops in Latin America.

Columbus's legacy is a mixed one due to the illness and disease that spread to the New World via ship rats, i.e., small pox. However, as a result of the Spanish influence in Central and Latin America, Spanish evolved to become the dominant language of the hemisphere. Spain´s Modern Age and subsequent Golden Age are also considered to have begun from the momentum of exploration of Spain that started with Columbus.

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Allegiances were not always clear-cut during this conflict. Essentially, the ranks of the Left (also known as Loyalist and Republican) comprised workers, peasants and trade unions, but also the Spanish government, Socialists, Communists and Anarchists. The Right (also known as Nationalist), was supported by rebellious factions of the army, industry, landowners, the middle classes and the Catholic Church. For various and somewhat contradictory reasons, the Loyalists received the support of the Soviet Union and European democracies, while the Nationalists were armed and equipped by the Fascist governments of Germany and Italy.

The Spanish Civil War would prove to be both fierce and bloody. Although the resources of the two sides were not that unequal, the Nationalists were better organized and received extensive material aid from Germany. The Loyalists received very little assistance from the Soviet Union and, moreover, were divided by internal conflicts between Communist, Socialist and Anarchist factions.

While European and North American volunteers fought for the Republic in the framework of the International Brigades, and a number of foreign artists and intellectuals supported the Loyalist cause, including Ernest Hemingway (who was working as a reporter and photographer) and George Orwell (who fought on the Republican side only to be prosecuted later on and thus becoming profoundly disillusioned by the rivalry in the ranks of the Left), the Nationalists were finally triumphant.

General Franco's victory marked the beginning of a forty-year dictatorship in Spain (1939-1975). In the aftermath of the Spanish Civil War, Hitler sought Franco's support for his own military campaign, but Spain was in no position to provide either financial or human aid. Although the Spanish Civil War had been a training field for the battles to be waged in the Second World War, Spain would play no part in the latter but agred to sponsor a small army of volunteers known as La División Azul.

Under the Franco regime Spain suffered international isolation, although in varying degrees. In 1955 the country was accepted as a member of the United Nations, and in 1970 General Franco named prince Juan Carlos his successor as the future king of Spain, thereby re-establishing the monarchy. Upon the dictator's death in 1975 King Juan Carlos I was crowned and the country set out on the long journey back to full democracy in Spain.

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