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The first traces of human life in Andorra go back to the end of the last ice age. Archaeological research has discovered remains dating back to the 10th millennium B.C. Traces of sizeable population centers in the Bronze Age (2000 B.C.) have also been unearthed.

In the year 1159 the bishop of Urgell and the Nobel Caboet family reached an agreement establishing their joint sovereign ruling of Andorran Territory. The first constitutional documents creating Andorra’s institutional framework were signed in 1278 and 1288.

In the 16th century the rights of the Count of Foix, heir to the old house of Caboet, passed to the French Crown. Following the Napoleonic period, the right of co-suzerainty passed to the President of the French Republic. In simpler terms, co-princes ruled the country, one from Spain, one from France.

Today Andorra is governed by the Govern (Executive Council) initiated in 1981 and the Council General (General Council of Parliament). It is only recently, 1993, that the Principality of Andorra became an internationally recognized constitutional state. It became the 184th full member of the United Nations and entered the Council of Europe the same year.

The official language is Catalan yet French and Spanish are commonly spoken. Emma a four-year-old girl goes to an Andorran school where she is taught in Catalan, Spanish and French. At home she speaks Danish as well as English; five languages in one little person. Christian a six-year-old boy also speaks five languages including Portuguese instead of Danish like Emma.

Andorra was a very poor country until recently. A local Andorran man that I met recently told me how he worked in the fields and only went to school during the winter. He was taught in French and Spanish in Barcelona where he was educated. When it was time to tend the crops he was sent back to Andorra. Speaking Catalan was forbidden, though at home this is what they spoke.

The native population basically lived off of the land raising a wide variety of vegetables, tobacco and maintaining herds of cows, sheep. Hunting of various game; the Jugged boar, “Isard” (Pyrenean chamois) and hare was of considerable importance until the middle of the 20th century.

When I first visited in the late 1980’s one could still see the Basque Shepherd on foot with their sheep heading up the mountains to graze, usually accompanied by a dog and a couple of goats. As Andorra has developed into a tax haven and duty free center, the wealth has increased to a point where the local shop keeper or postman might actually be a multi-millionaire despite their “day-time” job. All of the sudden the dogs watching the sheep refuse to hike, they insist on being driven in their master’s Range Rover.

I was surprised when a couple of months ago I actually saw a Shepherd with a flock of sheep coming down from the mountain on foot and walking down the road to greener pastures.

Remnants of days of yore can be seen in the fields where Andorrans continue to grow Tobacco. A few of the elderly population grow vegetable gardens beside the road, tending them with great care. There is one Andorran family of photographers who have made a point of documenting this population, which is becoming a mere memory.

Slowly the shops and pubs owned by this earlier generation are closing and being replaced with contemporary coffee and pastry shops, sparking boutiques with the latest of fashion, and new butcher shops filled with the finest cuts of meat, the air-dried legs of ham and rabbit.

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Iron Stone

Basque Shepherd

Basque Shepherd

Scene from Andorra

Scene from Andorra

Wildflower