Ateneo de Sevilla
Encyclopedia
The Ateneo de Sevilla ("Seville Atheneum") founded in Seville
Seville
Seville is the artistic, historic, cultural, and financial capital of southern Spain. It is the capital of the autonomous community of Andalusia and of the province of Seville. It is situated on the plain of the River Guadalquivir, with an average elevation of above sea level...

, Spain
Spain
Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...

 in 1887 by Manuel Sales y Ferré as the Ateneo y Sociedad de Excursiones ("Atheneum and Society of Excursions") continues today in that city as a cultural, scientific, literary, and artistic association.

Among its activities, it organizes Seville's annual Cavalcade of Magi
Cavalcade of Magi
The Cavalcade of Magi is a typical parade of coaches practically in all the Spanish cities and also some cities and towns in Mexico. The Magi ride through the streets, as their page boys throw candies to children.It is celebrated every January 5 in the evening...

 (initiated by the Ateneo in 1918) and grants the literary prizes known as the Premio Ateneo de Sevilla. A gathering there on the occasion of the 300th anniversary of the death of the poet Luis de Góngora y Argote is seen as the flowering of Spain's Generation of 1927. Members of the Ateneo have included illustrious Sevillian politicians and writers such as García Bravo-Ferrer and José María Izquierdo. Also, since the early 20th century the Ateneo has had a section dedicated to chess
Chess
Chess is a two-player board game played on a chessboard, a square-checkered board with 64 squares arranged in an eight-by-eight grid. It is one of the world's most popular games, played by millions of people worldwide at home, in clubs, online, by correspondence, and in tournaments.Each player...

, with such important figures as Joaquín Torres Caravaca and Juan de la Mata y Ortigosa in the 1920s and '30s, and Rafael E. Cid Pérez, president of the Andalusian Chess Federation and organizer of the 1987 World Chess Championship
World Chess Championship
The World Chess Championship is played to determine the World Champion in the board game chess. Men and women of any age are eligible to contest this title....

 in Seville, where competitors included Gary Kasparov and Anatoli Karpov.

The Ateneo de Sevilla also has a distinguished record as a publisher, especially of works about leading figures of the city with the intention of perpetuating their memory. Prominent among the writers of these works are José María Izquierdo and the president of the Ateneo, Enrique Barrero.

Owing to its importance and influence, the Ateneo has sparked imitations elsewhere in Andalusia. The Ateneo in Isla Cristina
Isla Cristina
Isla Cristina is a city and municipality located in the province of Huelva, Spain. According to the 2009 census, the city has a population of 21,324 inhabitants....

 (Province of Huelva) founded by Blas Infante
Blas Infante
Blas Infante Pérez de Vargas . Blas Infante was an andalusist politician, writer, historian and musicologist, known as the "Father" of Andalusian fatherland ....

and others, and which opened 10 September 1926, has a plaque acknowledging that it was established in imitation of the Ateneo de Sevilla.
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