LEBRIJA

city, Seville provincia, Andalusia comunidad autnoma (autonomous community), southwestern Spain. It is located south of the city of Seville in the lower basin of the Guadalquivir River. Founded as Nebritza by the Phoenicians, it was called Nebrixa by the Romans, Nebrisa by the Arabs, and Nebrija, or Lebrija, by the Spaniards, who reconquered it in 1249. Lebrija was the birthplace of the humanist scholar Elio Antonio de Nebrija, author of the first Castilian grammar, and of Juan Daz de Sols, the first European to explore the Ro de la Plata in South America. The city's architecture reflects the Moorish influence in various Mozarabic temples, in the Church of Santa Mara de la Oliva (12th16th century) with its early sculptures of Alonso Cano, and in the ruins of a Moorish castle. Lebrija markets local agricultural products (cereals, foodstuffs, meats) and exports aluminum silicate from nearby mines. Pop. (1991 prelim.) 28,597.