Slingers gave these Mediterranean islands their classical name
Spain’s Balearic Islands sit in the western Mediterranean as an autonomous community whose capital is Palma de Mallorca. Western Pityuses (Ibiza, Formentera) and eastern Gymnesians (Mallorca, Menorca) plus Cabrera and Dragonera draw millions, yet Greeks and Romans first argued over whether the name meant naked islanders or expert stone-throwers.
The islands lie off Spain's eastern coast, with Algeria southward, Catalonia and Valencia westward, France northward, and Corsica with Sardinia eastward. They form both a province and an autonomous community, with Palma de Mallorca as capital and largest city. Once part of the Kingdom of Majorca, they became a Spanish province in the nineteenth century, won a Statute of Autonomy in 1983 and were recognised as one of Spain's nationalities in 2007. Catalan and Spanish share official status, the names being Illes Balears and Islas Baleares.
Geologically they are uplifted blocks on an undersea plateau called the Balearic Promontory, sliced by faults running north-west to south-east. The eastern Gymnesians comprise Mallorca, Menorca and Cabrera; the western Pityuses, sometimes called the Pine Islands, are Ibiza and Formentera. Dozens of islets such as Dragonera, Es Vedrà and S'Espalmador cluster nearby, and Cabrera hosts a combined land and marine national park. After the Canaries this is Spain's second-largest and second most populous archipelago, and its 1,428 kilometres of shore is the longest coastline of any Spanish province. North of the islands, a density boundary on the shelf slope known as the Balearic Front shapes surface currents in the Balearic Sea.
A Mediterranean climate makes all four main islands major holiday destinations, and Ibiza in particular draws famous DJs to its clubs. Food and culture broadly match mainland Spain, with local twists. The islands also once held a dwarf cave goat, Myotragus balearicus, now listed as extinct.
Nobody recorded what the original islanders called their home. Greeks used Gymnesiai, Carthaginians a form like Baleareis and Romans Baleares. Lycophron linked Gymnesiai to the Greek for naked, claiming the warm climate kept locals unclothed, while Strabo tied it to the lightly equipped troops the islands supplied. Most ancient writers derived Baleares from a Greek verb for throwing, honouring the islanders' fame as slingers, but Strabo argued for a Phoenician word meaning light-armed soldiers, pointing to the root bal.
Source: Balearic Islands
