Northern Basque Country

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Location of the Basque Country

Northern Basque Country in green

Basque Country flag, widely seen in Iparralde

Basque Portal

The Northern Basque Country, French Basque Country or Continental Basque Country (French: Pays Basque, Basque: Iparralde) constitutes the Western part of the French department of the Pyrénées-Atlantiques. It is delimited in the north by the department of the Landes, in the west by the Atlantic Ocean, in the south by the Spain and in the east by Béarn which is the Eastern part of the department. It is a popular tourist destination and is somewhat distinct from neighbouring parts of either France or the Spanish Basque Country and Navarre.

A Basque tradition describes the Northern Basque Country as the union of three "French provinces" in the Northeast of the traditional Basque Country:

Basse-Navarre (Nafarroa Beherea in Basque, Lower Navarre in English)
Labourd (Lapurdi in Basque)
Soule (Zuberoa in Basque)

though its northernmost towns, and notably Bayonne (Baiona in Basque and Gascon languages) were not part of these provinces when they were abolished by the French Revolution.

Its Basque name is Iparralde ("Northern part") while the part of the Basque Country located in Spain is called Hegoalde ("Southern part").

There is a Basque nationalist political movement headed by Abertzaleen Batasuna asking for a split of Pyrénées-Atlantiques in two French departments: Pays Basque and Béarn; some other nationalist parties are EAJ, EA and Batasuna which have a reduced, almost symbolic presence, specially if compared to the Spanish Basque country. The representation of these political parties historically takes less than 15% of the votes in the district elections.

In the 1980s and 90s, there was a paramilitary group called Iparretarrak (the northerners) using violent actions to claim for independence but it has been inactive for almost a decade now.

[edit] History

The Northern Basque Country was for long largely undiferentiated from other areas of what is now Gascony. When Caesar conquered Gaul he found all the region south and west of the Garonne inhabited by a people known as the Aquitani, who were not Celtic and are modernly regarded as Basques (see Aquitanian language).

In Roman times, the region was first known as Aquitania and later as Novempopulania or Aquitania Tertia.

After the Basque rebellions against Roman feudalism in the late 4th and 5th century, the area eventually formed part of the independent Duchy of Vasconia, being segregated as separate County of Vasconia in the early 9th century.

In this period Northern Basques surely participated in the successive battles of Roncevaux against the Franks, in 778, 812 and 824.

Count Sans Sancion fought against the Franks again between 848 and 858 eventually becoming Duke of Vasconia.

In 1020 Gascony ceded its juridsiction over Labourd, then also including Lower Navarre, to Sancho the Great of Pamplona. This monarch made it a Viscounty in 1023. The area became disputed by the Angevin Dukes of Aquitaine until 1191 when Sancho the Wise and Richard Lionheart agreed to divide the country, remaining Labourd under Angevin sovereignity and Lower Navarre under Navarrese control.

Meanwhile, Soule (Zuberoa) was constitued as an independent viscounty, generally supported by Navarre against the pretensions of the Counts of Béarn, though at times also admitted certain Angevin overlordship ^[1].

With the end of the Hundred Years' War, Labourd passed to the Crown of France as an autonomous province, while Soule remained attached to Navarre, specially as Béarn was incorporated to the Basque kingdom.

After the conquest of High Navarre by Castile in 1512-21, the still independent Navarre took the lead of the Huguenot party in the French Wars of Religion. In this time the Bible was first translated to Basque language^{[citation needed]}. Eventually Henry II of Navarre would become King of France but kept Navarre as a formally independent state, until in 1610 this separation was suppressed.

The three Northern Basque provinces would still enjoy of great autonomy until the French Revolution suppressed it radically, as it did elsewhere in France, eventually creating the department of the Pyrenees Atlantiques, half Basque and half Gascon.