Iberian Peninsula
The
Iberian Peninsula, or
Iberia, is located in the extreme southwest of
Europe. It is the western and southernmost of the three southern European peninsulas (the Iberian,
Italian and
Balkan peninsulas). It is bordered on the south and east by the
Mediterranean Sea, and on the north and west by the
Atlantic Ocean. The
Pyrenees form the northeast edge of the
peninsula, connecting it to the rest of Europe. In the south, it approaches the northern coast of
Africa. It is the third biggest peninsula of Europe with an area of 582 860 km².
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The positions of the different countries/territories. |
Political divisions of the Iberian Peninsula sorted by area:
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Spain, occupying most of the peninsula, including the center, east and northwest
*
Portugal, occupying most of the west of the peninsula
*
Andorra, a
microstate at the northern edge of the peninsula in the
Pyrenees between Spain and
France*
Gibraltar, a tiny
British overseas territory at the southernmost tip, bordering Spain
The following languages are spoken in the Iberian peninsula:
*
Andorra:
**
Catalan (official recognition)
**
Spanish**
French*
Gibraltar:
**
English (official recognition)
**
Spanish **
Llanito (a mixture of the two above.)
*
Portugal:
**
Portuguese (official recognition)
**
Mirandese (only spoken in a small eastern area of the
Norte region, near Portuguese-Spanish border; official recognition)
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Spain:
**
Spanish (also called Castilian)
**
Catalan (called
Valencian in the
Land of Valencia,official recognition)
**
Basque (official recognition)
**
Galician (official recognition)
**
Bable (also called Astur-Leonese, little protection)
**
Occitan (locally called
Aranese, official recognition)
The following languages were spoken in the Iberian peninsula before the Roman occupation:
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Lusitanian*
Aquitan (Basque)*
Iberian*
Celtiberian*
Tartessian |
Satellite view of the Iberian peninsula |
 |
Topographic map of the Iberian Peninsula |
The Iberian Peninsula has been inhabited for at least 500,000 years, first by
Neanderthals and then by
modern humans.
The original peoples of the Iberian peninsula (in the sense that they are not known to have come from elsewhere), consisting of a number of separate tribes, are given the generic name of
Iberians. This may have included the
Basques, the only pre-
Celtic people in Iberia surviving to the present day as a separate ethnic group.
The seafaring
Phoenicians,
Greeks and
Carthaginians successively settled along the Mediterranean coast and founded trading colonies there over a period of several centuries.
Around
1100 BC Phoenician merchants founded the trading colony of
Gadir or Gades (modern day
Cádiz) near
Tartessos. In the 8th century BC the first Greek colonies, such as Emporion (modern
Empúries), were founded along the Mediterranean coast on the East, leaving the south coast to the Phoenicians. The Greeks are responsible for the name Iberia, after the river Iber (
Ebro). In the 6th century BC the
Carthaginians arrived in Iberia while struggling with the Greeks for control of the Western Mediterranean. Their most important colony was
Carthago Nova (Latin name of modern day
Cartagena).
In
219 BC, the first
Roman troops invaded the Iberian Peninsula, during the
Second Punic war against the Carthaginians, and annexed it under
Augustus after two centuries of war with the Celtic and Iberian tribes and the Phoenician, Greek and Carthaginian colonies becoming the province of
Hispania. It was divided in
Hispania Ulterior and
Hispania Citerior during the late
Roman Republic; and, during the
Roman Empire,
Hispania Taraconensis in the northeast,
Hispania Baetica in the south and
Lusitania in the southwest.
Hispania supplied the Roman Empire with food, olive oil, wine and metal. The emperors
Trajan,
Hadrian and
Theodosius I, the philosopher
Seneca and the poets
Martial and
Lucan were born in Iberia.
In the early
5th century,
Germanic tribes invaded the peninsula, namely the
Suevi, the
Vandals (
Silingi and
Hasdingi) and their allies, the
Sarmatian Alans. Only the kingdom of the
Suevi (
Quadi and
Marcomanni) would endure after the arrival of another wave of Germanic invaders, the
Visigoths, who conquered all of the Iberian peninsula and expelled or partially integrated the Vandals and the Alans. The Visigoths eventually conquered the Suevi kingdom and its capital city
Bracara (modern day
Braga) in
584-
585.
In
711 CE, a
Moorish Umayyad army from
North Africa invaded
Visigoth Christian Spain. Under their leader
Tariq ibn-Ziyad, they landed at
Gibraltar and brought most of the Iberian Peninsula under Islamic rule in an eight-year campaign.
Al-ʾAndalūs (
Arabic الإندلس : Land of the Vandals) is the Arabic name given the Iberian Peninsula by its
Muslim conquerors.
From the
8th to the
15th centuries, parts of the Iberian peninsula were ruled by the
Moors (mainly
Berber with some
Arab) who had crossed over from
North Africa. Many of the ousted
Gothic nobles took refuge in the unconquered north
Asturian highlands. From there they aimed to reconquer their lands from the Moors: this war of reconquest is known as the
Reconquista.Christian and Muslim kingdoms fought and allied among themselves. The Muslim
taifa kings competed in patronage of the arts, the
Way of Saint James attracted pilgrims from all Western Europe and the
Jewish population of Iberia set the basis of
Sephardic culture.
In
medieval times the peninsula housed many small states including
Castile,
Aragon,
Navarre,
León and
Portugal. The peninsula was part of the Islamic
Almohad empire until they were finally uprooted. The last major Muslim stronghold was
Granada which was eliminated by a combined Castilian and Aragonese force in
1492. The small states gradually amalgamated over time, and for a brief period (1580-1640) the whole peninsula was united politically under the
Iberian Union. After that point the modern position was reached and the peninsula now consists of the countries of
Spain and
Portugal (excluding their islands - the Portuguese
Azores and
Madeira Islands and the Spanish
Canary Islands and
Balearic Islands; and the Spanish possessions of
Ceuta and
Melilla),
Andorra, and the territory of
Gibraltar.
*
IberianatureA guide to the environment, geography, climate, wildlife, natural history and landscape of Iberia
*
Detailed map of the Pre-Roman Peoples of Iberia (around 200 BC)
