May Days

Barcelona May Days
Part of the Spanish Revolution of 1936 and the Spanish Civil War
Date 3–8 May 1937 Location Barcelona and wider Catalonia Result Recovery of government control in Barcelona and Catalonia
Belligerents
Spanish Republic Guardia de Asalto Generalitat of Catalonia Communist Party of Spain Unified Socialist Party of Catalonia Supported by Soviet Union	CNT-FAI FIJL Friends of Durruti Group POUM
Strength
Variable[note 1]
Casualties and losses
500–1,000 dead[1] 1,500 wounded[1]

The May Days, sometimes also called May Events, refer to a series of clashes between 3 and 8 May 1937 during which factions on the Republican side of the Spanish Civil War engaged one another in street battles in various parts of Catalonia, centered on the city of Barcelona.

In those events, libertarian socialist supporters of the Spanish Revolution, such as the anarchist CNT and the anti-Stalinist POUM, which opposed a centralized government, faced others, such as the Republican government, Catalan government and the Communist Party of Spain, which believed in a strong central government.

The events were the culmination of the confrontation between prewar Republican legality and the Spanish Revolution, which had been in constant strife since the beginning of the Spanish Civil War.

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