This section of the timeline of Spanish history concerns events from before the Carthaginian conquests (c. 236 BC).
Pre-Roman Iberia edit
Pre-History edit
- c. 1.5 and 1.8 million years Before Present (BP) Paleolithic – Tools used by hominids at Orce in the province of Granada[1]
- c. 1 Million Years BP – Tools used by hominids living near Burgos[2]
- c. 50,000 Years BP – Ancient mtDNA was partially sequenced in HVR region for three distinct Neanderthals from El Sidrón cave near Piloña province of Asturias
- c. 2,000 years BP Pleistocene era – Homo heidelbergensis living near Burgos discovered at Atapuerca Mountains at start of Holocene (the current ongoing warm climate period, during which modern human civilization has prospered)[3]
- c. 1800 BC – The El Argar civilization appears in Almería, south-east of Spain, replacing the earlier civilization of Los Millares. The adoption of bronze metallurgy allows gradual dominance and influence in the region.[4]
- c. 1500 BC
- A culture of smaller fortified villages known as Bronze of Levante appears in the modern-day region of Valencia, particularly in the southern half, being close culturally to El Argar. This people starts to install the first settlements in the semi-desertic La Mancha called Motillas (fortifications in the top of man-made hills).[4]
- For the first time the cattle-herding tribes of the central plateau get organize into a single culture, known as Cogotas I, practicing transhumance herding.[4]
- The presence of strategic tin resources in the North Western Iberia is probably the cause of some development in this region. The Montelavar group is characterized especially by its bronze axes.
- c. 1300 BC
- El Argar disappears abruptly, giving way to a less homogeneous post-Argarian culture.[4]
- The Motillas are abandoned, perhaps due to the disappearance of the Argarian state and its military needs.
- The Urnfield culture is the first wave of Indo-European migrations to enter in the Peninsula. Although they stayed in Catalonia, they triggered the Atlantic Bronze Age in the Northwest of the peninsula (modern Galicia and northern Portugal), that maintained commercial relations with Brittany and the British Isles.[5]
- In Western Andalusia appears a internally burnished pottery culture.
- The Northwest is defined by their typical axes, divided into two types: Galician and Astur-Cantabrian.
Iron Age edit
- 1104 BC – Phoenicians found the first walled city Gadir now Cadiz as a trading post.[6]
- c. 1000 BC – Development of Tartessos, the first Iberian State mentioned in writing sources, a centralized Monarchy brought about under Phoenician influence.[7]
- c. 900 BC – The Castro Village culture appears in the northwestern part of the peninsula (roughly present-day northern Portugal, Galicia and Asturias). This culture is characterized by their walled villages and hill forts. It expanded from south to north and from the coast to the interior of the peninsula during the next centuries.[5]
- c. 800 BC
- The Celtic Hallstatt culture reaches the local Urnfields Celts of the Northeast, bringing the iron working technology to Iberia. This culture starts to expand to the nearby areas, embracing the northern region of the Levante and the upper Ebro valley.
- The Phoenicians establish a colony in Almuñécar called Sexi.
- c. 700 BC – The cattle herding culture of Cogotas I is transformed into Cogotas II, mixing the Celtic culture with the Iberian culture (Celtiberians).[8]
- 654 BC – Phoenician settlers found a port in the Balearic Islands as Ibossim (Ibiza).[9]
- c. 600 BC
- Celts penetrate in the Northwest of the Peninsula, although it has been debated whether all tribes of this area are actually Celtic, Celtizied or just native with Celtic influences.
- Penetration of Celtic culture into the northern mountainous strip is minimal and most likely the tribes of this region remain fully pre-Indo European.
- 575 BC
- Foundation of Emporion (Ampurias), in the Catalan coast, by Greek colonists from Phocaea.[10]
- Soon afterwards the Northwest is rapidly re-Iberized from the south. This process cut the Celts of Iberia off from their continental counterparts, preventing the late Celtic culture of La Tène from affecting the peninsular Celts.
- c. 500 BC
- Decadence of Phoenician colonization of the Mediterranean coast of Iberia. Many of the colonies are deserted. Carthago slowly replaces the Phoenician in its former areas of dominion.
- Tartessos disappears suddenly, probably destroyed by the Carthaginians as revenge of the Tartessian alliance with the Greeks during the battle of Alalia, in the coast of Corsica. The Turdetanians become their successors, although with a strong Carthaginian influence.[10]
- c. 400 BC
- The Greek historian Herodotus of Halicarnassus cites the word Iberia to designate what is now the Iberian peninsula, according to ancient Greek costume.[7]
- Further development of strong Central European (Celtic) influences and migrations in western Iberia north of the Tagus river.
- The Autrigones, along with the Turmodigi and Belli, migrate from Gaul, overruning the entire area of the modern provinces of Santander and Burgos, where they establish their first capital Autraca or Austraca, located at the banks of the river Autra (Odra). They also gain an outlet to the sea by seizing from the Caristii further east the coastal highland region between the rivers Asón and Nervión, in the modern Vizcaya and Álava Basque provinces.[11]
- The Belli settle along the lower Jalón river valley alongside their neighbours and clients, the Titii.[12]
- c. 300 BC
- The Celtic Calaicians or Gallaeci inhabit all the region above the Douro river (modern Galicia and northern Portugal).[13]
- The Autrigones are driven out from southern Autrigonia (the western Burgos region) by the Turmodigi and the Vaccaei, who seize the Autrigones’ early capital Autraca.
- The Belli join the Celtiberian confederacy alongside the Arevaci, Lusones and Titii, with whom they develop close political and military ties.
- The Turboletae settle in the modern Teruel province.[14]
See also edit
References edit
- ^ Bruce Bower, Ancient Roads to Europe: African ancestors may have entered Europe surprisingly early (Science News, v. 151 no. 1. January 4, 1997), 12-13
- ^ 'First west Europe tooth' found, BBC News, 2007-06-30
- ^ Stanley Greenspan, The First Idea: How Symbols, Language, and Intelligence Evolved from Our Primate Ancestors to Modern Humans (DaCapa Press, 2004), ISBN 0306814498
- ^ a b c d María Dolores Fernández-Posse, Antonio Gilman, Concepción Martin, Consideraciones Cronológicas sobre la Edad del Bronce en La Mancha (Complutum Extra, 1996), 6 (II), 111-137, ISSN 1131-6993
- ^ a b Javier Rodríguez-Corral, A Galicia Castrexa (Lóstrego, 2009), ISBN 978-84-936613-3-5
- ^ Velleius Paterculus, Compendium of Roman History I, 2
- ^ a b Herodotus of Halicarnassus, The Histories, I, 163; IV, 152
- ^ Alberto J. Lorrio, Los Celtíberos (Universidad Complutense de Madrid, 1997), ISBN 84-7908-335-2
- ^ Michael Dietler, Carolina Lopez-Ruiz, Colonial Encounters in Ancient Iberia: Phoenician, Greek, and Indigenous relations (University Of Chicago Press, 2009), 80, ISBN 978-0226148472
- ^ a b Strabo, Geographica, III, 4
- ^ Martín Almagro Gorbea, Etnogénesis del País Vasco: de los antiguos mitos a la investigación actual (Munibe (Antropologia-Arkeologia) 57, 2005), ISSN 1132-2217
- ^ Francisco Burillo Mozota, Sobre el territorio de los Lusones, Belos y Titos en el siglo II A. de C. in Estudios en homenaje al Dr. Antonio Beltrán Martínez (Universidad de Zaragoza, facultad de Filosofía y Letras, 1986)
- ^ Alberto Álvarez Peña, Celtas en Asturies (Picu Urriellu, 1992), ISBN 84-932070-4-7
- ^ Appian, Iberiké, 10