The Organization for
Iberian Preservation
USA
Copyright © 1995-2001 The
Organization for Iberian Preservation USA. All rights reserved.
A SUMMARY OF THE ORIGIN
OF THE PEOPLE OF SPAIN
General Origin
The people of Spain are members of the Caucasoid racial group. The Caucasoid racial group is comprised of those persons originally inhabiting Europe and parts of North Africa, western Asia, and India. The Caucasoid people are diverse in appearance. They are characterized by a complexion that varies from fair to very dark; the hair texture ranges from kinky to straight; the lips tend to be thin, the nose straight, and the iris either light or dark in hue.
Specific Origin
The people of Spain are essentially a mixture of the aboriginal peoples of the Iberian Peninsula with the successive people who conquered the peninsula and occupied it for extended periods.
The following is an exhaustive summary of the ethnologic composite of the Spanish people:
IBERIANS
Originally a North African people, who, about 1100 B.C., became the most prominent ethnologic element in the peninsula and gave it its later name.
BASQUES
These people were of unknown origin inhabiting the western Pyrenees regions in France and Spain around the same time as the Iberians, i.e., 1100 B.C. The Pyrenees are a mountain range between Spain and France. The highest peak, Pic de Néthou, is 11,165 feet.
As early as c. 1100 B.C., the Phoenicians established colonies along the Spanish coast followed by the Greeks. The Phoenicians sailed their tiny vessels to Spain, seeking its iron and tin.
CELTS
In the 7th century B.C. the Iberian peninsula was invaded by Celtic tribes from the north, these people are the second most important ethnologic element. These ancient European people were warlike, muscular, red-haired wanderers who most likely came from the distant steppes beyond the Caspian Sea. By 500 B.C. they were living in northeastern France, southwestern Germany, and Bohemia. The Celts, who were also called Gauls, continued to migrate in all directions. About 400 B.C. Celtic tribes crossed the Swiss Alps into northern Italy. After capturing the fertile Po Valley region, they laid siege to Rome. At the same time other groups of Celts pushed down into France and Spain, eastward to Asia Minor, and westward to the British Isles. To what is now France they gave the ancient name of Gaul. In Asia Minor they founded the kingdom of Galatia. St. Paul's Epistle to the Galatians in the New Testament is addressed to the descendants of these Celts. In Britain, Celtic warriors overran and conquered the islands.
CARTHAGINIANS
The Carthaginians colonized the land in about 500 B.C. They conquered most of the peninsula in the 3rd century B.C. They held it until Roman galleys and armies drove them out in 201 B.C. Cartegena, Spain, was founded in the 3rd century B.C. by the Carthaginians.
ROMANS
In c. 201 B.C. the peninsula was conquered by the ancient kingdom, republic, and empire of Rome. Under six centuries of Roman rule, political unity was established and Christianity introduced. During this time most of the Spanish cities were founded, and the population of Spain may have reached nine million. Three Roman emperors - Trajan, Hadrian, and Theodosius - were born in Spain. Many of the notable writers of the Silver Age of Latin literature were of Spanish origin.
TEUTONICS
In the 5th century A.D. began 300 years of invasion by the Teutonic tribes. These tribes include the Alans, Vandals, Suevi, and Visigoths. These people are members of the Germanic tribes of Northern European stock which includes the German, Dutch, Scandinavian, British, and related peoples. In 409 A.D. Teutonic invaders crossed the Pyrenees. Alans, Vandals, and Suevi swept over and desolated the peninsula. The unity of Hispania under Rome was destroyed, and not entirely recreated for more than a thousand years. (See Appendix I.)
MOORS
The Moors are descendants of the Hamites and Semites. In 711 A.D., Roderick, the last of the Visigothic kings, was defeated in the battle of Guadalete by the Moors who gained control over virtually the entire peninsula, except for Asturias and the Basque country. Thus began seven centuries of Muslim power in Spain. Cordoba was transformed into a Moorish center of learning. Moorish Spain produced distinguished scientists, mathematicians, philosophers, and writers, while Christian northern Spain remained divided into small barbaric kingdoms. The splendid irrigation projects of the Moors made a garden land out of the arid coastlands and southern hills of Spain. The Moors rebuilt the old Roman cities on Arabic lines, with graceful palaces and vast mosques. Fine metalwork, silk and leather goods, as beautiful as any from the Orient, were made in Moorish Spain. Toledo blades became as famous as those from Damascus. Asturias became the focus of the Christian reconquest. (See Appendix II.)
In an attempt to stem the havoc brought by the barbarian invasions, Rome appealed to the Visigoths who in 412 A.D. brought their armies into the region and within seven years became the dominant power. The Visigothic kingdom of Toulouse, a nominal vassal of Rome, was established in 419, and at its fullest extent included the territory from the Strait of Gibraltar N. to the Loire R. For three centuries (419-711) the kings of Toulouse implanted Roman culture and Christianity in the peninsula. Euric ruled (466-84) at the height of Visigothic power, and codified the Roman and Gothic law. Leovigild (ruled 569-86) effected the final subjugation of the Suevi tribes and united the Roman and Visigothic elements of the peninsula into a single people. Reccared (ruled 586-601) established Roman Catholicism as the official state religion.
Appendix II.
The Christian kings continued their advance. In a great battle fought on the plains of Toledo in July, 1212, the Almohades were defeated by the united Christian power, and expelled from Spain shortly thereafter. The Moorish power was then limited to several ports around Cadiz and to the kingdom of Granada which endured until 1492 and was one of the greatest and most splendid of Moslem realms.
For the next two centuries Spain consisted, except for those regions still controlled by Saracens, of two great kingdoms: in the W. (except for Portugal), Castile and Leon, including Asturias, Cordoba, Estremadura, Galicia, Jaen, and Sevilla; and in the E., Aragon, including Barcelona, Valencia, and the Balearic Islands. Both realms were characterized, as a legacy of their previous history, by a diversity of language dialects, by composite populations (including, principally, Christians, Moors, and Jews), and by divergent political forms.
In 1469 the marriage of Isabella I, Queen of Castile, and Ferdinand the Catholic, King of Aragon, initiated the developments that made Spain a great power. The greatest immediate result of the marriage was the centralization of the joint administration. In both religious and state power Ferdinand and Isabella worked to make themselves absolute monarchs, diminishing the power of the Spanish nobility and establishing the supreme power of the throne. The queen, whose fervor caused her to be surnamed "la Catolica," had exceedingly oppressive measures against Jews passed by the Toledo Cortes, and in 1478 established the Inquisition in Castile. Political unification of all Spain was shortly accomplished: Granada, the last Moorish stronghold, fell in 1492, and in 1512 Ferdinand acquired all Navarre s. of the Pyrenees. Finances to further Ferdinand's ambitions beyond the peninsula were obtained by confiscation of the property of the Jews; in 1492 the Jews were expelled from Spain. Ferdinand, in 1497, invaded Italy and made Spain the greatest power there.
The same period marked the ascendancy of the Spanish colonial empire. In 1492, sponsored and aided by Ferdinand and Isabella, Christopher Columbus, an Italian navigator, discovered the West Indies. The opening of the New World made Spain the richest and most powerful European state of the 16th century. Through conquest and exploration the Spanish colonies came to include the West Indies and Cuba, parts of North America, Mexico, all Central America, the greater part of South America, Florida, and the Philippine Islands. In a series of Spanish campaigns (1509-11) Oran, Bougie, and Tripoli, in North Africa, became Spanish tributaries. The Spanish empire extended into the East Indies, where part of the Moluccas and Malacca were brought under control. To consolidate his position in Europe Ferdinand arranged strategic family alliances, marrying his daughter Catherine of Aragon to Henry, heir to the English throne (later King Henry VIII), and his daughter Juana to Philip, the Habsburg archduke of Austria.
|