Basque people

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

History

Origin of the Basques

The key sources for the early history of the Basques are the classical writers, especially Strabo, who in the 1st century AD reports that the north of modern-day Navarre and Aragon were inhabited by a people known as the Vascones (this is not the area of the modern-day autonomous community of the Basque Country (here "the present Basque Country"), but an area immediately east of it). Although the word Vascones is clearly related to the modern word "Basque", we do not know for sure if the Vascones were indeed the ancestors of the modern Basques, or whether they spoke an old form of the Basque language. Surviving place names and a few personal names tend to suggest they spoke old Basque, but we cannot be sure.

Related Topics:
Strabo - Navarre - Aragon - Autonomous community - Basque Country - Basque language

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On the territory of the present Basque Country lived three different peoples: the Vardulli, the Caristi, and the Autrigones. Nobody knows if these three peoples were related to the Vascones, or if they spoke a language related to old Basque, as they have left no written records. Some researchers, based on the meager historical evidence we possess, think that they were Celtiberian peoples, speaking languages not related to old Basque, but we cannot be sure. In fact, the place where a Basque-related language is the best attested is Gascony, in the southwest of France, where the local Aquitanians spoke a language which is proven beyond doubt to be akin to Basque.

Related Topics:
Celtiberian - Gascony - Aquitanian

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Later in the period of the Roman Empire, the Vascones seem to have moved west into what is the present Basque Country (while some also clearly stayed in Navarre), either absorbing or displacing the Vardulli, Caristi, and Autrigones, and from this emerged the Basque nation.

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The pre-history of the Basques before that time is necessarily conjectural. Among the theories in contention are:

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• The Basques arrived as part of the Indo-European invasion of Europe, circa 2000 BC.
• The Basques arrived far earlier, when the Cro-Magnon invasion displaced the Homo neanderthalensis.

In any event, it is widely believed that the Basques have occupied a single region of Europe longer than any other identifiable ethnic group. There is also considerable evidence that the Basque language was once spoken over a much wider area than the modern day Basque country.

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The Middle Ages and the Reconquista extended the Basque territory beyond the limits of the Roman age.

Related Topics:
Middle Ages - Reconquista

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Did the Basques arrive with the Indo-Europeans?

One theory of the origins for the Basques has them arriving along with the Indo-Europeans four thousand years ago. There have been later examples of such an event. During the Germanic migrations that swept Europe after the fall of Rome, for instance, almost all the tribes were Indo-Europeans, except the Huns and the Avars.

Related Topics:
Germanic migrations - Huns - Avars

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Furthermore it is now believed the Indo-Europeans began their invasion of Europe from a position just north of, and between, the Black Sea and Caspian Sea. South of this region is the Caucasus, a small and mountainous region home to some thirty separate languages, from two separate language groups of which there are no other relatives. Similarities between Basque and the Caucasian language groups have been advocated on a number of occasions. It has been argued that a group of Caucasians could have joined the invasion of Europe by the Indo-Europeans who were departing just north of them. However, the relationship between Basque and the Caucasian languages is denied by authors such as Larry Trask who see no evidence of a connection (and most modern scholars agree with this view), leaving little evidence for this theory.

Related Topics:
Black Sea - Caspian Sea - Caucasus - Caucasian language groups - Larry Trask

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A second argument against the idea of the Basques arriving sometime around the arrival of the Indo-Europeans is archeological. There is no evidence of a new group of people arriving in the Basque Country at this time. While traditions changed (for instance the building of dolmens slowly faded out) such changes often occur internally to a culture rather than through the arrival of immigrants.

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Do the Basques date back to the Cro-Magnon invasion of Europe?

The only archeological evidence for an invasion of the Basque Country dates some 40,000 years ago when Cro-Magnon people first arrived in Europe and superseded Homo neanderthalensis. It is possible that the ancestors of the Basques first arrived in Europe at this time, but the archeological evidence is shaky. Another possibility is that a precursor of the Basque language may have arrived with the advance of agriculture, some 6,000 years ago.

Related Topics:
Cro-Magnon - Homo neanderthalensis - Agriculture

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Thousands of years in the same region

Regardless of which theories are correct, it is quite likely that the Basques arrived before the Indo-Europeans and thus that they are the oldest continuously surviving people inhabiting a particular location in Europe. It is believed that they have lived in or near their present location for thousands of years, a relatively small group of people surviving when many others were overwhelmed by invaders. A number of early Basque writers sought to explain this, in keeping with the academic fashion of their time, through speculation about racial superiority, but the endurance of the Basques can also be explained by good fortune: they happened to be in the right place over and over again.

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Whether the Basques chose their easily defended home in the Pyrenees or were forced into it at some time in the past, it is common for mountainous regions, as for islands, to remain as bastions of an otherwise vanished culture or people. In a similar manner, for example, when the extensive Celtic cultures of Europe were overwhelmed by invaders, the only remaining areas speaking Celtic languages were Ireland and a number of remote mountainous or coastal bastions in Brittany, Scotland, Wales and so forth which still retain Celtic speakers to the present day. Despite the fact that new research has claimed that the Basque speaking populations may share genetic markers with populations of Celts in Ireland and Wales - http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/wales/1256894.stm, there is little reason to suppose that Indo-European Celtic languages are closely related to Basque. It may be the case that older British populations related to the Iberian population switched to Celtic, but we can only speculate on whether these ancient Irish and British speakers were using a precursor to Basque or some other language.

Related Topics:
Celtic language - Ireland - Brittany - Scotland - Wales - Celts - Indo-European

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In any case, the Basque homeland is well suited to survival. Its low mountains are combined with dense forests and vegetation which make it impassable to outsiders en masse, but still temperate enough to support a large agricultural base—yet one where the soil is poorer than the surrounding plains, leaving the area a much less tempting target for invaders. Furthermore, the Basque areas have few reserves of precious metals, especially in comparison to the gold reserves to the west in Spain or to the wealth in Gascony just to the north. The Basques seem to have ended up in the best locale on the European continent for uninterrupted survival.

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Roman rule

The north-west of Spain, including the Basque regions, was first reached by the Romans under Pompey in the 1st century BC, but not consolidated until the time of the Emperor Augustus. The looseness of Roman rule well suited the Basques, who retained their traditional laws and leadership. This poor region was little developed by the Romans and there is not much evidence of Romanization; this certainly contributed to the survival of the separate Basque language.

Related Topics:
Pompey - 1st century BC - Augustus

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A large Roman presence was situated in the garrison of Pompaelo (now Pamplona), a city founded by Pompey on the south side of the Pyrenees. The area to the north was conquered after a fierce campaign in which the Romans fought against the Cantabrians (see Cantabrian Wars). There are archaeological remains from this period of garrisons situated to protect the commercial routes all along the Ebro river and along a Roman causeway between Asturica and Burdigala.

Related Topics:
Pamplona - Cantabrian Wars - Roman causeway - Asturica - Burdigala

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The Basques were used by the Romans to guard their empire. For example, a unit of Vardulli was stationed on Hadrian's Wall in the north of Britain for many years, and at some time earned the title fida (faithful) for some now forgotten service to the emperor. Even today, nationalist Basques look back on the Roman Empire as an ideal time, claiming that even though there was no Basque independence, the Basques still had almost total internal control. As well as their lack of exposure to Roman garrisons, the survival of Basque culture was aided by the fact that the Basque Country was a poor region. It had no unused cropland that could be used to settle Roman colonists and it had few commodities that would interest the Romans. Only a small number of Roman traders would have come there. This isolation is no doubt what allowed Basque to survive and not be overwhelmed by Latin as other languages were.

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Middle Ages

The history of the Basque Country darkens, however, with the arrival of the Germanic peoples and the collapse of the Roman Empire. Rather than being an isolated area in the centre of a large empire, the Basques were placed at the border between the warring Visigothic and Frankish kingdoms. The Basque Country became a strategically important territory desired by both sides.

Related Topics:
Visigothic - Frankish

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At the same time, the Basques lost their lifestyle, which was dependent on trade with the Roman Empire. These two changes transformed the Basques from being one of the most docile people in Europe into a group of dedicated warriors bent on survival. There are scattered reports from this period of presumed Basque brigands (in Latin, bagaudae) in Aquitaine and Spain stealing those things which they used to be able to trade for. Most of the confrontations with the Basques were, however, instigated by outsiders. Both the Franks and Visigoths sent armies through the Basque Country repeatedly.

Related Topics:
Bagaudae - Aquitaine

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The rugged Basque territory is ideal for banditry and it is not surprising that the Basques could still survive despite oppressive neighbours. Just as in every time of persecution in their history, the Basques simply moved to the hills and held out there until the threat had gone.

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The Basques also proved during this period that despite the lack of central authority, they could protect their homeland when the need arose. After Charlemagne's Franks invaded northern Spain, they returned home and en route pillaged the Basque Country. The Basques, however, intercepted the Frankish army while it made its way through a mountain pass. Despite poor weaponry and fewer fighters the Basques destroyed much of the Frankish force. The Battle of the Roncesvalles Pass was the only major defeat Charlemagne suffered in his long career. These events were immortalized in the French-language Chanson de Roland, an important piece of medieval verse.

Related Topics:
Charlemagne - Mountain pass - Battle of the Roncesvalles Pass - Chanson de Roland

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The Basques did not similarly mobilise against the Islamic invaders who, just a few years earlier, had seized most of the Iberian peninsula. Although Christians, Basques did not resist the Muslim advance; it was stopped only by Frankish troops in Poitiers. Later, the Christian kingdom of Pamplona (later the Kingdom of Navarre) and the short-lived Muslim kingdom of the Banu-Qasi Muladis (indigenous converts), with its capital in Tudela, had an alliance with cross-marriages. However. the Basques did take part in the Reconquista. The frontier land of Alava was secured and the neighbouring kingdoms called Basques to colonize the new territories, mainly in La Rioja and parts of Castile.

Related Topics:
Islamic - Poitiers - Kingdom of Navarre - Muladi - Tudela - Reconquista - La Rioja

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At one point, the kingdom of Navarre extended southwards beyond the Ebro river. In a later age, Basque mariners were to take part in the sea battles of the Castilian conquest of Andalusia.

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Most of the western part of the present Basque Country (Guipúzcoa, Vizcaya and Álava) became from time to time part of the Kingdom of Navarre or the kingdom of Castile, in each case so long as the king pledged allegiance to their local laws or fueros.

Related Topics:
Castile - Fueros

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Basques began hunting whales in the Bay of Biscay as early as the 9th century. At least six Basque towns incorporated whales or whaling into their coat of arms.

Related Topics:
9th century - Coat of arms

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During the Late Middle Ages, the Basque towns were divided in clashes among families, later polarized in two bands (Agramont and Beaumont in Navarre, Oñaz and Gamboa in Biscay).

Related Topics:
Late Middle Ages - Agramont - Beaumont

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Local nobility built towerhouses, nowadays razed by fires and kingly decrees.

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(Compare with the earlier Italian Guelphs and Ghibellines).

Related Topics:
Guelphs - Ghibellines

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From the Renaissance Era to the 19th Century

As the Middle Ages came to an end, the Basque lands came to be divided between France and Spain. Most of the Basque population ended up in Spain, a situation which persists to this day. The Navarrese and the Basques from Guipúzcoa, Vizcaya and Álava were able to keep a large degree of self-government of their provinces in Spain and France, functioning practically as separate nation-states: the fueros gave each Basque province separate local laws, taxes and law courts. The Basques, serving under the Spanish flag, were renowned mariners, and at the end of the 16th century, taught Dutch sailors how to use the harpoon for whaling. Spanish ships with many Basque sailors were some of the first Europeans to reach North America, and many early European settlers in Canada and the United States were of Basque origin.

Related Topics:
Middle Ages - 16th century - Harpoon - Whaling

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The Protestant Reformation made some inroads, supported by Jeanne d'Albret, queen of Lower Navarre.

Related Topics:
Protestant Reformation - Jeanne d'Albret - Lower Navarre

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In the 16th century, around Bayonne, a Basque-speaking bourgeoisie induced the printing of Basque-language books, mostly with Christian themes. Protestantism was however persecuted by the Spanish Inquisition, and, in the Northeast, the Protestant Navarrese king converted to Roman Catholicism and became king Henry IV of France.

Related Topics:
Bayonne - Bourgeois - Spanish Inquisition - Henry IV of France

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The self-government of the northern Basque provinces came to an end with the French Revolution, which centralized government and abolished all of the various local privileges granted by the ancien régime. Some Basques were pushed to counter-revolutionary positions while others actively participated, even writing a Basque constitutional project by Basque revolutionary Garat. It brought the Basque Country to the Convention War (1793), with all Basque territories being nominally French for a time. Later on, when the Napoleonic Army invaded Spain, it had almost no trouble in keeping the southern Basque provinces loyal to the occupier, and the southern Basque Country was the last part of Spain kept by the French because of this lack of resistance (see Battle of Vitoria). It all ended with the August 31, 1813 burning of San Sebastian;

Related Topics:
French Revolution - Ancien régime - Garat - Convention War - 1793 - Napoleon - Battle of Vitoria - August 31 - 1813 - Burning of San Sebastian

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In Spain, with some irony, through the various civil wars of the 19th century the fueros were upheld by the traditionalist and nominally absolutist Carlists and opposed by the victorious constitutional forces. The southern Basque provinces and Navarre made up the backbone of the (Carlist) upheavals, which sought to give the crown of Spain to the male heir Carlos (and, later, to the heirs of his line), who promised to defend the Basque foral System.

Related Topics:
19th century - ''fueros'' - Absolutist - Carlists

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Very much Christianized at that time, and fearing that, under modern liberal uniformizing constitutions they would lose their self-government or Fueros, Spanish Basques massively joined the traditionalist army, which was mostly paid by the provincial governments of the Basque provinces. The forces of the Isabeline Army on the other hand had a vital participation of British (whose Irish legion (Tercio) was virtually annihilated by the Basques on the Battle of Oriamendi), French (also with an important Algerian legion), and Portuguese legions and those governments support against the Basques. During the First Carlist War, as the differences between the Apostolic (official) and the Navarrese (Basque basis) parties inside the Carlist rebel band grew, the latter signed an armistice which included the promise by the Spaniards of keeping Basque self-government. As this promise was not accomplished fully, there was a further upheaval, the Second Carlist War, which ended in a similar way. Ultimately, the Basque provinces and Navarre lost most of their autonomous power, but retained control over fiscal laws and collections with Ley Paccionada, a power they still retain in modern day Spain in the form of fiscal conciertos with the national government in Madrid.

Related Topics:
Isabeline Army - Battle of Oriamendi - Algerian - First Carlist War - Second Carlist War - Ley Paccionada - Conciertos

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Thus the same wars that brought relative liberty to most of Spain abolished most (but not all) of the traditional liberties of the Basques. However, the Spanish Basque provinces retained the widest autonomy in peninsular Spain, but far less than they had previously experienced.

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However, the advance of Spanish customs from the Basque borders to the French border formed a new protected market in Spain for the incipient Basque industry.

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• Braudel, Fernand, The Perspective of the World, 1984

Modern history

The new markets encouraged the replacement of the old forges by modern blast furnaces, that processed the local iron ore instead of sending it to Britain. The mining and the iron industry required workers, first among Basque peasants, later from the surrounding Navarre, Castile, Rioja, and farther away in Galicia and Andalusia. The awful conditions of these workers (Biscay had one of the highest mortality rates in Europe) prompted the diffusion of leftist ideologies.

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The end of the 19th century witnessed the appearance of the new Basque nationalism which came with the foundation of the Basque Nationalist Party (EAJ-PNV), in which Christian-Democratic ideas were mixed with racism against Spanish immigrant workers who were seen as perverting the purity of the mythical Basque race. The party asked for independence or at least autonomy.

Related Topics:
Basque nationalism - EAJ-PNV - Christian-Democratic

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In 1931 Spain became a Republic and soon Catalonia (the next most ethnically distinct region inside Spain, also with a strong independence movement) was given self-government. However, the Basques had to wait until the Spanish Civil War was already under way to be granted the same rights.

Related Topics:
1931 - Catalonia - Spanish Civil War

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Basques fought on both sides in the Spanish Civil War, with Basque nationalists and leftists from Biscay and Guipúzcoa siding with the Second Spanish Republic, and the Navarrese Carlists siding with General Francisco Franco's insurgent forces (who were known in the rest of Spain as "Nacionales"—literally "Nationals", usually rendered in English as "Nationalists"—a very misleading phrase in Basque terms). Today, some Basque nationalists claim that the Spanish Civil War was a war of Spain against the Basques, despite there having been Basques on both sides. There is no question, though, that one of the greatest atrocities of this war was the bombing of Guernica, the traditional Biscayne capital, by German planes. Much of the city was destroyed and a great deal of Basque history was erased.

Related Topics:
Basque nationalist - Leftists - Second Spanish Republic - Francisco Franco - Guernica - Biscay - German planes

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In 1937, roughly halfway through the war, the troops of the Autonomous Basque Government surrendered in Santoña to the Italian allies of General Franco on condition that the Basque heavy industry and economy was left untouched, beginning one of the hardest periods of Basque history in Spain. For many leftists in Spain this event is known as the Treason of Santoña. After the war, Franco began a dedicated effort to consolidate Spain as a uniform nation state. Franco's regime introduced severe laws against all Spanish minorities, not least the Basques, in an effort to suppress their cultures and languages. Considering Biscay and Guipúzcoa as "traitor provinces", he abolished the remains of their autonomy, but Navarre and Alava maintained small local police forces and some tax self-government.

Related Topics:
1937 - The troops - Autonomous Basque Government - Santoña - The Italian allies - Treason of Santoña - Nation state

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The backlash against these actions created a violent Basque separatist movement. The armed group responsible for most of the attacks is known as Euskadi Ta Askatasuna (ETA), meaning "Basque land and Liberty". Franco's death and the end of his regime saw an end to most repression and the creation of an autonomous Basque region in Spain, but not an end to sepratist violence, which as of 2005 has resulted about 850 deaths in the intervening 30 years. Between 1979 and 1983, the Basque Country and surrounding areas were granted extensive autonomy by the Spanish government. This autonomy includes an elected parliament, police force, educational system, tax system, etc.

Related Topics:
Euskadi Ta Askatasuna - As of 2005

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Navarre was offered the opportunity to join the autonomous Basque Country, but chose the status of a separate autonomous region.

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