County of Besalú

The County of Besalú was the landlocked Catalan county of the Garrotxa, capped by its cliff town of Besalú in the Garrotxa, which enjoyed a century of independence before Barcelona swallowed it for good. Reconquered from the Moors by 785 as a pagus of Girona in the Spanish March, assigned to Aquitaine in 817 under the Visigoth Bera, it spent most of its life hitched to stronger neighbors. Then for a hundred years its counts ruled alone: Miro of Cerdanya seized it in the 910s, his widow Ava ruled for their boys from 927, Sunyer of Barcelona attacked in 943, Oliba Cabreta held the line, and the county reached Corbieres in France, coining, judging and warring in their volcanic hills. The freedom ended as bloodlines failed: the last count died heirless and Barcelona annexed the county irrevocably in 1111, keeping its bridge, its abbey and its name as Catalan ornaments.