Basque people

:This article is about the Basque people. For other meanings, see Basque.

Classification

As with the Basque language, the Basques are generally considered to be an isolated ethnic group.

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The Basques are clearly a distinct ethnic group in their native region. They are culturally and especially linguistically distinct from their surrounding neighbors, and the controversial claim has often been made that they are comparably genetically distinct as well. Many Basques, especially in Spain, are strongly, even violently, nationalist, identifying far more firmly as Basques than as citizens of any existing state. Indeed, the only question would seem to be whether the term "ethnic group" is too weak, and whether one should favor the term "nation."

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In modern times, as a European people living in a highly industrialized area, cultural differences from the rest of Europe are inevitably blurred, although a conscious cultural identity as a people or nation remains very strong, as does an identification with their homeland, even among many Basques who have emigrated to other parts of Spain or France, or to other parts of the world.

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The strongest distinction between the Basques and their traditional neighbors is linguistic. Surrounded by Romance-language speakers, the Basques traditionally spoke (and many still speak) a language that was not only non-Romance but non-Indo-European. Although the evidence is open to question, the prevailing belief among Basques, and forming part of their national identity, is that their language has continuity to the people who were in this region not merely in pre-Roman times, but in pre-Celtic times, quite possibly before the great invasions of Europe by Asian tribes.

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Genetics

As part of the Basque national identity, the Iberian idea of the "limpieza de sangre" ("cleanliness of blood") was adopted by Sabino Arana, founder of the nationalist party PNV, who propagated the idea that Basque people were genetically distinct and even superior to neighbouring people and immigrants, pejoratively referred as "Maketos". Such arguments are considered racist from a modern point of view, but the idea still surfaces occasionally in a certain racialist current inside the Basque nationalism.

Related Topics:
Limpieza de sangre - Sabino Arana - PNV - Maketos

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Because of this, research of the genetics of Basques is prone to be interpreted with political intentions, while in the Spanish side it has brought to a total denial of any existing genetic study or even the proper validity of any genetic study in humans.

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Investigations of Basque blood types have found that there are more Basques with type O blood than in the general European population. Basques also have a comparatively lower chance of being either type B or type AB. The Basques have a high incidence of the Rhesus negative blood type, also common in several North African Berber tribes.

Related Topics:
Blood type - Rhesus - Berber

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