MANCHA, La. This name, when employed in its widest sense, denotes that bare and monotonous elevated plateau of central Spain which stretches between the mountains of Toledo and the western spurs of the hills of Cuenca, being bounded on the S. by the Sierra Morena and on the N. by the Alcarria, which skirts the upper course of the Tagus. It thus comprises portions of the modern provinces of Toledo, Albacete, apd Cuenca, and almost the whole of Ciudad Real. Down to the 16th century the eastern portion was known as La Mancha de Montearagon or de Aragon, and the western simply as La Mancha; afterward,“the north-eastern and south-western sections respectively were distinguished by the epithets “Alta” and “Baja” (upper and lower). La Mancha was created a province in 1691; its officially recognized boundaries have since that time varied considerably, and in common parlance it is often now identified with the modern province of Ciudad Real. Ciudad Real, which is bounded on the N. by Toledo and Cuenca, on the E. by Albacete, on the S. by Jaen and Cordova, and on the W. by Badajoz, ranks next to. Badajoz and Caceres in point of extent, containing an area of 7840 square miles. The population in 1877 was 260,641. From the scarcity of water and the absence of trees and fences, as also from the circumstance of the rural population being concentrated only at certain points, it as a whole presents to the traveller the arid and cheerless aspect of a desert. The principal river is the Guadiana, which rises in the so-called Ojos (“Eyes ”) del Guadiana in the north-east, and is joined by the Azuer and the Jabalon on the left, and by the united waters of the Zancara and Giguela on the right. No advantage, unfortunately, is taken of these or any of the other streams in the ...