Barberà de la Conca
Tarragona · Catalonia
DO CataluñaDO CavaDO Conca de Barberà476inhabitants
945first mention
1894wine documented
A village in the Conca de Barberà, the comarca to which it gives its name. Resettled in the 11th century around a castle, in the 12th century it passed to the Order of the Temple, which established a commandery there; at the end of the 19th century it saw the building of what is considered the first cooperative winery (celler cooperatiu) in Catalonia.
First mention: Donation of the church of Saint Peter to the monastery of Santa Cecília de Montserrat (945), where it appears as ‘Campo Barberano’. By 1012 the castrum of Barberà is already mentioned.
The legend
Templar commandery 1132-1172 (its winegrowing role is tradition); cooperative documented 1894From Templar commandery to the first cooperative bodega
Barberà, the town that gives its name to the district and the DO, was handed over to the Order of the Temple in 1132-1133, and around 1172 the knights founded their commandery here. In local memory, the Templars of Barberà and the Cistercian monks of Poblet taught the peasants how to tend the vine. Centuries later, when phylloxera reached the Conca in 1893, the town’s smallholders and sharecroppers approved on 8 March 1894 the statutes of the Society of Agricultural Workers to make their wine in common: the first cooperative bodega in Catalonia and, according to several authors, in Spain. In 1903 they put up the first building designed as a cooperative bodega.
Alive today: La Agrícola de Barberà is still active and makes DO Conca de Barberà wines and the cava Castell de la Comanda, a name that recalls the Templar castle. Its Modernista bodega by Cèsar Martinell (1920-21) can be visited. Since 2009 the town has celebrated the Festa del Trepat at the end of June, dedicated to the red grape native to the area. The Regulatory Council has its headquarters in neighbouring Montblanc.
Wineries and their wines
- Cabanal Brut Natural
- Cabanal Vi Blanc
- Cabanal Vi Negre – Trepat
- Castell de la Comanda
Wine towns nearby