It is believed that trade contacts with the Phoenicians existed from the late 10th century, and it is even assumed that Tartessos was located at this site. In addition to objects made of silver, copper, iron, ivory and stone, many thousands of fragments of clay vessels were found during excavations from around 900 to 770 B.C. in 1998. Huelva was probably an early Phoenician emporium and it was flourishing under the Carthaginians and Romans, who began to mine ore deposits. Under the Visigoths and Arabs, from whom the city was reconquered by Alfonso X the Wise in 1257, the city came to a standstill.

In 1880 it still only had 13,000 inhabitants, then it grew fast. It owes its boom to the mineral deposits on the Rio Tinto (Minas de Riotinto), as from the last quarter of the 19th century, the town became a small British colony. The reason for this was the permission granted by the Spanish government in 1873 for the mines of Riotinto to be commercially developed and utilised by the Rio Tinto Company Limited. As a result, the town and its infrastructure began to grow and the sleepy little village became a modern industrial town of the 19th century.

The British also brought football to Spain, which led to the founding of the first football club in Spain - Recreativo Huelva - in 1889.


Progress is unstoppable.