Talk:Iberians

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Contents 1 I have completely reformed the article 2 Iberians, from Iberia 3 Etymology of Iberia 4 Ancient and Modern Iberians 5 Dead Link 6 Celts arrived in Spain 7 Problem with the map 8 Proposal to merge Prehistoric Spain with Prehistoric Portugal & move to Prehistoric Iberia 9 Maps 10 History and origins 11 The issue of the tribes

[edit] I have completely reformed the article

I have added quite a lot of information, pictures, and restructurated the sections.

Feel free to make more changes but please, keep the current structure, I think the article looks pretty well now.

This is how I took it [1], and this is how it is by now [2].

There's also something I'd like to comment: if you search Pre-Roman at the Wikipedia's searcher, you can find LOTS of stub-articles about Iberian and Celtiberian tribes (Indigetes, Cassetani, Laietani, Edetani, Contestani, etc). It would be pretty cool that whoever made all those articles (all they look like the same, so I guess someone has created them all) grouped all those tribes in a single article, or in an additional section to this article, so from this article one can check the articles of all the Iberian tribes. I would do it but as I said there are lots of stub-articles, so I would probably miss most of them.

Onofre Bouvila 21:49, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Iberians, from Iberia

As Wikipedia specifies in its own articles, Iberians didn't come from anywhere... In fact the most accepted theory nowadays is that Iberians were simple the branch of Western Europe original inhabitants who lived in the Iberian peninsula. A little look at Great Britain, Ireland or France histories shows that Iberians or Iberian-related people lived in all the area long before historic records or the immigration of Indoeuropeans, and were responsible for all the great megalithic culture in Western Europe.

[edit] Etymology of Iberia

Perhaps, the word Iberia is related, etymologically, with word Europe.

A minority, however, suggest a Greek etymology really based on the word Erebus. The word "Erebus" has a Semitic/Akkadian origin (i.e. erebu, which means "sunset").

From a Greek viewpoint, the sun sets over Iberian peniscula: the lands to the West.

--IonnKorr 21:21, 4 November 2005 (UTC)

Perhaps not. NO ORIGINAL RESEARCH. Your guessing has no place. Try looking up the opinions of professional historical linguists. --Victim of signature fascism 19:04, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

What was the relationship between the Iberians and the Tartessos civilization? are they the same people?--Burgas00 20:15, 13 January 2006 (UTC)

I think their relationship may be debated, but the Iberians definitely came after and are distinct. They may have been influenced by the Tartessos, but I think that's debated. Most theories say they had a different origin.--Bkwillwm 20:34, 13 January 2006 (UTC)

I was under the impression that Tartessians were part of the migration to Iberia from Lybia along with the other native Iberians, but formed a more "civilized" society than other Iberians... -Zulu, King Of The Dwarf People 18:00, 30 January 2006 (UTC)

There was no "migration to Iberia from Lybia", where did you get that from? There was maybe one or two epysodes of migration of unknown origin (possibly Northern Africa but more likely to be Morocco than anywhere else) in Neolithic and maybe early Bronze Age but they would not be related with the formation of Iberians in any case, though maybe with that of Tartessians. The existent data is not enough to draw firm conclussions. In any case, it's most likely that North Africans spoke Tamazhig (Berber language) already in the Neolithic and Tartessian (nor Iberian, nor Basque) does not show show any relation with this language.

The area of would-be Iberians was colonized/culturized from the European Mediterranean shores in the Neolithic, over a native substrate that shows pervivence in most cases (as does in SE France and most of Italy too). Later the foundation of Los Millares and its successor El Argar, specially, created the basis of civilizaion and, at least since El Argar, of transmediterranean trade with the Aegean and the Levant. This would evolve into colonialism and the Iberian culture, properly speaking (Iron Age), was largely a product of Greek influence in the area. An area that already had certain cultural homogeneity previously.

As for the etymology: Iberia (the country) < Iberi (the people) < Iber(-us) (the river Ebro) < Ibar (Basque for river basin or valley, cognate of ibai: river). The reletationship between Iberian and Basque language is something that has been speculated upon a lot, but without firm conclussions (they seem to share some vocabulary but they are distict languages). --Sugaar (talk) 07:40, 9 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Ancient and Modern Iberians

I was interested in adding a section that mentions the relation between the original inhabitants of Iberia to modern Iberians (Portuguese and Spanish, Spanish including Castilian, Catalán, Basque, etc.). Useful statistics are given in the article Spanish people:

[QUOTE=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_people#Ancestry]It should be noted, that 68% of paternal lineages and 39.4% of maternal lineages in Spain can be traced to the earliest settlers of the Iberian Peninsula, carriers of the male R1b and the female H haplogroups, which are the most frequent haplogroups in Europe. The people with these genetic markers expanded into Western Europe from an Iberian refuge at the end of the Ice Age, 10,000 years ago. 18. Origins of Europeans. Haplogroup R1b.[/QUOTE]

--Zulu, King Of The Dwarf People 11:35, 21 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Dead Link

External link deleted S710 08:59, 14 September 2006 (UTC)

Yes... it's a pity but the site is down. They say they'll be back soon. When that happens I'll try to put a good link back on the article. The Ogre 12:16, 14 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Celts arrived in Spain

They never made their way to Portugal, is that what it means? Spain, in the article, is refered as what? Because as far as I know Spain is a country in the Iberian peninsula, it is not the Iberian peninsula. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 89.152.95.63 (talk • contribs)

What do you mean? Whom never arrived in Portugal? The Celts or the Iberians? The first did, the later didn't. There were, of course, pre-celtic populations in Portugal, but they weren't Iberians in the strict ethno-linguistic sense. The Ogre 13:01, 19 October 2006 (UTC)

I see what you mean. Just fixed it. I also added an external link with a detailed map of the Pre-Roman Peoples of Iberia (around 200 BC). That gives a good picture of the whole Peninsula. The Ogre 13:05, 19 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Problem with the map

The map depicting the approximate location of Ibero (Iberian) settlement is not acurate, since it elarges the area of Iberian settlement to include the Tartessian (later Turdetani) areas. Tartessians wee not Iberians and Tartessian language is "seemingly unrelated to all other languages, including the Indo-European or Iberian language families, and is therefore a language isolate." A better map should be found. The Ogre 13:10, 19 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Proposal to merge Prehistoric Spain with Prehistoric Portugal & move to Prehistoric Iberia

Currently, the text of Prehistoric Spain seems really to be about prehistoric Iberia. Similarly, the text of Prehistoric Portugal seems really to be about the same thing. This would be perfectly understandable seeing as there was no Spain and no Portugal in prehistoric times. I have argued therefore that it would be best to have these articles merged under a title which indicates the geographical region rather than the modern states. I have proposed the articles be merged and moved to Prehistoric Iberia. Please come and discuss my proposal. Jimp 09:05, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

Hello Jim. If the merge goes through, what shall we do with Pre-Roman Portugal? You see, Prehistoric Spain encompasses a period that the "Portuguese" articles differentiated into Prehistoric Portugal and Pre-Roman Portugal. Should we merge them all? The Ogre 13:48, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Maps

I believe none of the two maps trying to represent the ethno-linguistic situation is accurate. Bothe commit the same error: to fear leaving blanks, and therefore they presume way too many things. We do not know:

• If Cantabri were Celtic of Vasco-Aquitanian. There are reasons to suspect the latter.
• If Astures were Celtic or not.
• If the Oretani were Celtic or Iberian.
• If the Lusitani were Celtic or other Indo-European.
• If Turduli were fully Celtic or just somewhat celtizied.
• How deep was the celtization of Galicia.
• What cultural group would have the Baleares have placed themselves in if asked (nobody did, it seems).
• How much Celticied were the Conisci.

We do know and it's not reflected in either map:

• That the Caristii and surely their neighbours Varduli and Autrigones spoke Basque.
• That the Talayotic culture was over by 700 BCE.

Can you two admit that we know only that much and either prepare a map that satisfies the demands of our ignorance or just leave it with the quite good maps from Commons?

Note: I have only intervened because somebody called me upon. --Sugaar (talk) 07:52, 9 March 2008 (UTC)

Alternatively you can use Image:Languages of pre-Roman Iberia.jpg, that I created for another article without realizing there were already similar maps around. I admit that even that purely scholarly copycat work has some shortcomings (for instance lacks of any info in Basque-Aquitanian language, and it exists) but it's a lot better than your too ambitious maps.

Another possibility is to positivize this discussion and draw an even better map. --Sugaar (talk) 07:58, 9 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] History and origins

It's a complex issue because all we can say of Iberians for sure is that they existed in their whole historical area since c. 600 BCE until the Roman conquest and aculturation.

The posited two theories are not contradictory actually but they have some shortcomings as they stand now:

1. There's absolutely no reason to believe in any Lybian origin of Iberians.
2. The would-be Iberian area was mostly non-Megalithic (with very few exceptions).

What can't stand in an article like this is to place the Iberians as out of the blue in the 6th century: they are culturally continuous with the previous substrate, at least that of Argar/post-Argar and Levante cultural areas. These two areas show clear connection since at least the El Argar civilization. More intriguing is the case of the NE that had belonged to the Urnfield cultural area (presumably Celic or at least Indo-European) for six centuries before becoming Iberian. The simplest explanation is that they were assimilated by they more developed neighbours of the south, a more adventurous one would dare to suggest that they had preserved the Neolithic cultural substrate shared with them (but that implies many milennia), a more radical idea (that I dislike) is that Iberians arrived with Urnfield culture[3]. I dislike this latter theory because that would leave no possible origins for Iberian Celts - but well.

I suggest to recapitulate the background of the area:

1. Paleolithic and epipaleolithic more or less homogeneous province.
2. Neolithic: Cardium Pottery - aculturating in most cases, mere colonization only in few areas (specially southern Valencian Country).
3. El Argar (and post-Argarian culture) and its connection with the Bronze of Levante.
4. The final constitution as historical Iberians under Greek influence - main "lingua franca" theory.

And then, if you wish, mention the alternative theories, like the one of Ramos.

In any case, as it is now, it's a mere rare hybrid of commonplaces that often have nothing to do with real scholarly research. The fact that most of its sources are online encyclopedias is quite meaningful. --Sugaar (talk) 08:45, 9 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] The issue of the tribes

I suggest creating a separate section to mention all the tribes that are consesually accepted as Iberians. To that, add a subsection to deal with tribes of contested Iberian character (Carpetani, maybe Baleares) and others that might be somewhat iberized (Celtiberi) or are otherwise confused with Iberians, things like the Turdetani (link to Tartessian language), the Aquitani (called "Iberians" by the Romans, as to make them apart from Celts), etc. --Sugaar (talk) 08:58, 9 March 2008 (UTC)