[2] In the late nineteenth century, the neo-Gothic façade was constructed over the nondescript exterior that was common to Catalan churches.

The enraged Romans put her into a barrel with knives stuck into it and rolled it down a street (according to tradition, the one now called Baixada de Santa Eulàlia).

The king had arrived for his investiture as Count of Barcelona, and the city, as a Mediterranean port, offered the closest communication with other far-flung Habsburg dominions, while the large proportions of the cathedral would accommodate required grand ceremonies.

In 1518 the Order's herald, Thomas Isaac, and its treasurer, Jean Micault, were commissioned to prepare the sanctuary for the first sitting of the chapter in 1519.

The cathedral has a secluded Gothic cloister where 13 white geese are kept, the number explained by the assertion that Eulalia was 13 when she was martyred.

In 1046, Count Ramon Berenguer I and his wife Almodis, together with Bishop Guislabert, began construction of a Romanesque cathedral at the site; it was consecrated in November 1058.

The present Gothic cathedral was begun on the foundations of the previous churches on 1 May 1298; James II the Just was King of Aragon at the time, and Bernat Pelegri was Bishop of Barcelona.

In the late nineteenth century, Miguel Girona i Agrafel [es] offered to complete the neo-Gothic façade and central tower as inspired by the original fifteenth-century design prepared by master Carlí and rearranged and drawn by the architect Josep Oriol Mestres [ca].

It was rebuilt in the seventeenth century to house the tomb of San Olegarius, Bishop of Barcelona, and Archbishop of Tarragona.

The "Holy Christ of Lepanto" crucifix, is located on the upper part of the chapel entrance's front façade.

The curved shape of the body, of Our Lord Jesus Christ on the Cross, is explained by a Catalan legend which holds that the cross was carried on the prow of the galley captained by Juan of Austria, half-brother of Spanish Philip II of Spain during the Battle of Lepanto in 1571.

Rebuilding the gothic quarter around the rebuilt facade of the Barcelona Cathedral and the Catalan house gave the opportunity to embellish the city with its most important buildings.