The Romans arrived in the lands of the Basque Country in 196 B.C., with whom the ancient Basques lived in peace and cooperation. However, the Aquitanians opposed fiercely to the Roman conquest. When the Aquitanians were attacked, they asked for help to the inhabitants of Basque speech from southern Pyrenees instead of contacting the Gauls, due to that they felt the southern population closer, given their cultural similarities. This southern Pyrenean help arrived by means of commanders that achieved combat experience together with Sertorius, and they went into action against Caesar's legions in Aquitaine in 56 B.C..

The Basque Country became part of the Empire before the change of era, much earlier than other regions such as Britannia or Dacia and that unlike the last one, was able to keep its ancient culture before the immense Latin pressure. The Basque tribes were divided into two great political demarcations: on the one hand, Hispania (Autrigones, Caristii, Varduli and Vascones) and on the other, Gaul (Aquitanians). The provinces involved were Hispania Tarraconensis and Novempopulania (Gaul).

Theseus, fighting against the Minotaur. Mosaic found in  Pamplona (Navarra)The Romans, as well as the Basque tribes, had the same common enemies, what ensured a good understanding. While the Romans collaborated with the Basque tribes in repelling the Celts (that arrived to the Pyrenean area from the 8th century B.C.), the tribes cooperated with the Romans in their fights against Cantabri and Astures, of Celtic origin.

As imperial allies, the tribes of Basque speech repopulated the areas that the Romans conquered to the Celts and Iberians. Thus, Euskara spread southwards and consolidated towards east. There we have an example of this in Aragon, where the Vascones collaborated with the Romans in the fights against the Celtiberians. Once they were defeated in 72 B.C., the Vascon cooperation was rewarded by Rome with the jurisdiction over huge areas of western Aragon. Those territories extended southwards at 15 km away from Salduba, the place that after its conquest the Romans named as Cæsar Augusta, the current Zaragoza.

Hispania in  Roman timesDue to respect of Rome for the different Basque tribes and their territories, there arose such a degree of harmony that the Basques even joined the legions in their fights against the Britons, the wars that took place in the region currently known as Great Britain. There have been found several gravestones of the Roman age near London (the ancient Roman Londinium) on which Basque names were written.

By means of this good relationship, the Roman colonists settled in the south of the lands that belonged to the tribes and in the mining areas such as Somorrostro in Autrigonia (Biscay), as well as in the plains of Aquitaine, what would become the Roman colonies of Novempopulania (the country of the nine peoples), currently known as Gascony. Some centuries after, those settlements would give rise to the Latin languages and peoples of Castile and Gascony, as a consequence of the Romanisation of the Basque population.

In order to explain the survival of Euskara, it has been traditionally considered the Basques as a primitive people, isolated for centuries from the surrounding peoples and that was not part of the Roman civilization, due to lack of economic interest of the territory for the Empire. The archaeological discoveries in the Basque lands continuously refute those theories since they prove that the Romanisation process was higher in all aspects than it was in other territories of the Romance-speaking Europe, and even much higher in the south of the Basque tribes, in the coastal areas and in Aquitaine. If the Basque culture survived, it was because of the alliance between the tribes and Rome as well as their collaboration and good understanding, instead of an isolation that never took place. However, the late The territories under Vascon jurisdiction during the Roman Imperial period (1st century A.D.). Click on the map to enlarge.development of the Mare Externum (Atlantic Ocean) as an interesting economic area to the Empire contributed to its continuity, what enabled the Basque population to remain apart from the intense migration flows that arose in other areas of the Iberian peninsula and Aquitaine thanks to their agricultural potential.

There were mines in the Basque lands, such as in Arditurri (Oiartzun, Guipúzcoa), Banka (Lower Navarre), Lantz (Navarre), Eskoriatza (Guipúzcoa) and Somorrostro (Biscay), where minerals (iron, silver...) were extracted for export to different regions of the Roman Empire. On the other hand, the ceramics production was carried out in Pamplona (Navarre) and in Donazaharre (Saint-Jean-Le-Viex, Lower Navarre). Wines were produced in Falces and Funes (Navarre), while salted fish products were made in Getaria (Guipúzcoa) and in a town of the same name, but in Labort (the name comes from the Latin Floor mosaics from the main Roman city in the Caristii territory, Iruña-Veleia, near Vitoria-Gasteiz (Álava)term 'Caetaria' > 'Salting'). There were also Roman baths in Fitero (Navarre), roads to link the main Basque cities with Rome and ports on the Basque coast, such as Oiasso (Irún, Guipúzcoa), which were linked with everywhere in the Empire. Another example of this lack of isolation and, on the contrary, the existing trade, is shown by the discovery of several coins that were minted by Rome in the Vascon territory already since the early years of domination. Those coins were recovered from different points of the Basque geography. (The image on the lower left side shows a Vascon denarius dated in the second half of the 2nd century B.C.).

Vascon denarius of the 2nd century B.C. and the word 'baskunes', written in Iberian characters.Obverse: it represents a masculine head with beard. Hairstyle with small curls very close together. Behind it, there is the inscription 'Benkota' in Iberian writing (a Vascon settlement of unknown location).

This writing was used by most of the Iberian peoples. Although it was of Tartessian origin, it was widely used to write texts in Iberian, since this language was possibly the peninsular 'lingua franca' for many pre-Roman peoples before the arrival of Rome. To a lesser extent, the Celtiberian language was also used to write, as in this coin, but with Iberian characters since Celt was the 'lingua franca' in this area of the peninsula.

Reverse side: it represents a horseman wielding a sword on his right hand. Below the image, there is the inscription 'Baskunes' (Vascones) in Iberian writing.

Stele of the Roman age, found in Gastiain (Navarre)One of the main archaeological discoveries from that period, and that refutes again the theories about the survival of Eukara due to lack of Romanisation, is the recent discovery of the Roman port of Oiasso (also Oiarso) in the current Irún. This city is located in Guipúzcoa, the territory in which the Basque culture is best preserved. In this locality it has been recovered the wooden structure of the dock and the slipway of the ancient Oiasso. Furthermore, there have been found Roman baths near a necropolis, which was already known, while other research outline an urban nucleus of 12 / 15 hectares with a grid-pattern structure, in which stores, shops and workshops appeared. It is also thought that there was a forum and even a theatre.

Oiasso was the commercial base of the maritime routes from which goods were distributed towards inland, to the valley of the Ebro river and to the great Roman road A34, Ab Asturica Augusta (Astorga, León) - Burdigala (Bordeaux, Aquitaine). There was another road that linked the ancient Oiasso with Tarraco (Tarragona), through Ilerda (Lleida) and Osca (Huesca). The amphoras that were recovered in this settlement show that even at the end of the Roman empire, the oil and the wine from Byzantium (the current Istambul, Turkey) arrived regularly at the Atlantic ports.

The city of Oiasso was also engaged in mining, in addition to the maritime trade and the fact that it was one of the main ports of the Mare Externum. There have been found three km of Roman galleries in the nearby mountains of Aia and close to a modern mining site, where silver was extracted. The discovery of drainage galleries, a notable example of Roman hydraulic engineering, indicate us that there was a great administrative structure behind it.

 

 

 

 

 

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The History of the Basque Country continues on the following page >> Visigoths and Franks