Celtic-Iberians & Roman Influence in Ancient Spain

Celtic-Iberians and the Iberian Peninsula

Iberians

Iberians was the name the Greeks gave to the people of the Iberian Peninsula. Unlike its diverse origins, one of the main cultural developments is their language. Numerous excavated texts have been found, but mostly in Iberian languages. Not being related to another known language, it has not been able to be deciphered yet.

Iberian art highlights ceramics. Among all the Iberians who inhabited the Iberian Peninsula, historical sources mention the Tartessians, Turduli, and Turdetani as the most cultured among them.

Effectively, the Tartessos civilization was the first known civilization in Western Europe. This civilization was later known as Turdetania, named after the people who inhabited the region upon the arrival of the Romans.

Celts

The Celts, native tribes of the Alps who shared a culture that began in the Iron Age, would cross the Pyrenees in great migrations in the 9th and 7th centuries BC. They settled mostly in the north (Galicia, Asturias, Cantabria, and north of Castile), where they mixed with the Iberians to form the group called Celtiberians.

This people was not only found in northern Spain but also in France, the British Isles, and the eastern part of the mountains of Europe.

It seems that the Basque people were never penetrated by any kind of invasion, so it is considered that this population has been in this land without mixing since very ancient times. Their language also has ancient roots that today have no parallel with any other known language.

Roman Spain

The Carthaginian general Hamilcar Barca realized that to defeat the Romans, he had to organize a powerful army. In 238 BC, the Carthaginians landed in Ghadir, and in a few years, they dominated the peoples of the south and southeast of the peninsula. They founded Carthage, which became their capital.

In 220 BC, Hannibal (head of the army) planned the conquest of Rome from the Iberian Peninsula. The Romans then sent armies and landed on the peninsula at Ampurias in 218 BC. During the next 12 years, they fought against the Carthaginians, and by 202 BC, they dominated the Mediterranean coastline and drove out the Carthaginians.

The second conquest period was characterized by wars in the Meseta. In 139 BC, Viriato was killed by his own officers, allowing the Romans to occupy Numancia and the rest of the Meseta.

In the 1st century AD, during the time of Emperor Augustus, the warring tribes of Cantabria and Asturia were subdued, thus terminating the conquest of the peninsula.