Seville is a municipality and Spanish city, capital of the homonymous province and of the autonomous community of Andalucía.3 It has 696 676 inhabitants in 2014,4, making it the most populated city in Andalusia, the fourth in Spain after Madrid, Barcelona and Valencia, and the 31st of the European Union. The municipality has an extension of 140.8 km².5 The metropolitan area of Seville is composed of 46 municipalities, includes a population of 1 519 630 inhabitants (INE, 2011), and occupies an area of 4900 km².6
Its old town is the largest in Spain and one of the three largest in Europe with those of Venice and Genoa, with 3.94 square kilometers, and its historical center, one of the largest in Spain7 (note the difference between old town, which only includes the historic area before the Industrial Revolution, and historic center, which includes later stages). Its historical and monumental heritage and its diverse scenic and cultural spaces make it a host city for national and international tourism, in fact it is the third most visited capital in Spain, after Barcelona and Madrid.8 Among its most representative monuments are the cathedral (which includes the Giralda), the Alcazar, the Archivo de Indias and the Torre del Oro, of which the first three have been declared a World Heritage Site by Unesco jointly in 1987.
