Did you know that the largest municipality in the Barcelona area has fewer than 700 inhabitants?

BarcelonaBarcelona, ​​​​although it is the most populated city in Catalonia, is not the largest city in the country. In fact, it is not even the largest in its district. Tremp, with an area of ​​302.8 square kilometers and 6,015 inhabitants, is the largest municipality in Catalonia. But which is the largest in the Barcelona district? It is Sant Mateu de Bages, which has only 637 inhabitants, but an area of ​​102.9 km². The municipal area of ​​​​the capital covers 101.3 km².

The municipality of Sant Mateu de Bages, created in 1840, is made up of five different villages: its namesake, Castelltallat, Coaner, Salo, and Valls de Torroella. Of these, Valls de Torroella is the most populated—in 2023 it had 317 citizens—while Coaner has only 20 inhabitants. Sant Mateu de Bages is located in the northwest of the Bages region and has an altitude of 569 meters. The current area also includes the old stables of Meià and Claret de Cavallers.

The area contains numerous fortified farmhouses and monuments such as the Castelltallat dolmen, Romanesque churches, and even the Archaeological and Agricultural Instrument Museum. The area of ​​Sant Mateu de Bages is predominantly mountainous and has a very important natural and forest heritage. The different forest formations are distributed according to orientation: in the south there are pine forests, especially Aleppo pine, stone pine in the lower areas, and black pine above 700 m; while in the north and east there are oak and holm oak forests. Where there are no forests, rush meadows or Fenassar meadows predominate. The crops located in the flatter areas are dryland, mainly cereals.