Captivating History - The Basques: A Captivating Guide to the History of the Basque Country, Starting from Prehistory through Roman Rule and the Middle Ages to the Present

The Basques live in a modestly small, triangular-shaped country that straddles the farthest northeastern portion of Spain and the southeastern portion of France. While some live outside this area today, many still call this region home. These hardy people have dwelt in the foothills of the jagged Pyrenees Mountains since prehistoric times, and theyre still there to this day.

The Basques manifest a genetic makeup that is prehistorically distinct from that of their neighbors in Spain or France. This has puzzled scientists and researchers for years. A genetic study conducted by Uppsala University in Sweden in 2015 discovered that the Basques established themselves as an ethnic group during Neolithic times, anywhere from 12,000 to 4,500 years ago.

The Basques were isolated from other human migrations into Europe for millennia. Anthropologists have said that they are descendants of the Neolithic farmers who intermingled with a hunter-gatherer culture. About 850,000 pure Basques live in Spain, while 130,000 dwell in France.

Their language is unique; it is a language isolate, meaning it has no genealogical relationship with other languages. It is not one of the Romance languages, that is, derived from Latin. It is not derived from the Indo-European family of languages either, which is characteristic of Germany, Europe, or the Slavic countries.

The principal propelling agent for the success of the Basques throughout the ages is the peoples need for survival. For generations, the Basques lived in the foothills and mountains of the Pyrenees. They learned how to harness that challenging terrain and make it their own.

In Spain, the Basques mainly live in the Southern Basque Country, which is composed of three provinces. lava (or Araba-lava), Biscay (or Vizcaya), and Gipuzkoa are autonomous Spanish Basque communities, which means they have their own administration and political organizations, as well as their own leaders, legislatures, courts, and assemblies. Navarre is also an autonomous community, but it has separated itself from the other three provinces. They continue to have a relationship with the country of Spain in terms of taxation and tariffs.

In France, many Basques live in the Northern Basque Country, also called the French Basque Country. It lays west of the Pyrnes-Atlantique. The Northern Basque Country incorporates the three historical Basque provinces of Labourd, Soule, and Lower Navarre. In 2017, a single commonwealth was created in France for the French Basque Country, and it is known as the Agglomerate Community of Basque Country. The French Basque Country is also called Iparralde. In Basque, it means the northern region.

There is also a diaspora of Basque, who mostly live in France, Spain, the United States South America, and a curious collection of French islands called Saint Pierre and Miquelon.

A great effort has been made here to present the clearest explanation possible to elucidate the history of these fascinating people. However, through the ravages of history and its turnover of conquerors, the borders of the Basque lands have shifted, and the names of places have changed with unnerving frequency.