Rugby Star Imanol Harinordoquy

Here you have an article from The Telegraph about the newest Basque Rugby star, Imanol Harinordoquy:

France look to Basque prodigy

By Brendan Gallagher in Paris
Last Updated: 7:35PM GMT 27 Feb 2002

PICK UP a programme for France's game with England on Saturday and you'll read that Imanol Harinordoquy - don't worry he's going to be around for years, you'll get used to the name - hails from St Jean Pied de Port in the Pyrenees. That is not a place name the young man himself would recognise, however. Harinordoquy is a proud French Basque and has always known the town of his youth as Garazi. He has no wish to be awkward but these things matter.

Just 22, he has already made French rugby history in a minor sort of way. He is the first in a long line of distinguished French internationals to keep his Basque Christian name into adult life. Imanol is common enough among Basques either side of the French-Spanish border - many of Harinordoquy's generation being named after the famous Basque singer-storyteller Bertsolaritza, known simply as Imanol.

Harinordoquy, who made an impressive debut against Wales two weeks ago, is the current flag-bearer for Basque rugby. It is a role he takes seriously. Before him there was the enigmatic Jean Dauger, who is generally credited with encouraging and inspiring French flair and improvisation behind the scrum. Alas he was mistrusted by the selectors and won only three caps. An early Stuart Barnes perhaps.

Then there were the teak-tough forwards, characters you did not mess around with. Pierre Dospital, the mighty prop known as Peyo who always led the post-match singing with his Basque ballads, the menacing Pascal Ondarts and powerful hooker Jean-Marie Gonzales.

On Saturday Harinordoquy lines-up alongside Olivier Magne and Serge Betsen in the French back row for the biggest day of his life. He'll look up into the stands to try to locate the 30 or so members of his family who are making the trip, but there will be no visible evidence of his Basque heritage, no brandishing of flags or slogans.

"It's there in my heart, that's all that matters," Harinordoquy said. "I am French and Basque. There is no conflict, I am proud of both."

Like the vast majority of French Basques he has no time for Euskadia eta Askatasuna (ETA) who fight for an independent Basque nation: "I have friends who are involved in the political side of things but that is not for me. My only interest is the culture, the Euskera language, the people, our history and ways."

So you can be different without being subversive, a message that rugby has always epitomised. Protestant and Catholic played for Ireland right through the Troubles. Harinordoquy has already made his mark on the French squad: English speaking, entertaining, laid back, mature beyond his years, sure-fire captaincy material, he embraces the old Basque proverb: Hil arteraino bizi, han arte ez izi, or live until you die and until then don't panic.

Above all he is a formidable rugby talent. After a youth spent dabbling in the traditional Basque sports of pelote and pala, he took to rugby only at the age of 14 when he joined Pau. His progress since then has been swift, and he captained France Juniors and France Under-21 before making his France A debut against Italy last month. Quick enough to shine at open-side flanker against the Welsh, he feels more at home at No 8 where his long-term future probably lies. Along with his powerful club colleague, Damien Traille, he is the brightest of French prospects.

Since first appearing for Pau in the French Championship as an 18-year-old it has been just a matter of time before he broke into the France team.

"Imanol is a tremendous talent," Magne said. "He has pace, strength and aggression. He also has very useful line-out capacity and a good attitude, he takes pleasure from the game. He could become a very great France player indeed."

Funny, the article contains a cheap shot at Basque nationalism. What else could we expect.

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Lovers of the Arctic Circle

Well, today I saw the movie "Lovers of the Arctic Circle" by Julio Medem.

This director was born in San Sebastian (Donostia) in the Basque Country, his movies have been earning good reviews both by critics and movie geeks. It is quite an unique movie, the story line keeps jumping back and forth and the characters inner struggles are very well expresed, through silence.

A friend at one of the Yahoo Clubs I belong to recommended it to me, he started by saying he liked the way the director drops the tragic events of Gernika in the movie. I went to IMDB as soon as I finished watching the movie and I found two movies by this director at Amazon on DVD.

They are called "Vacas" (Cows) and "Tierra" (Earth), and from the reviews and comments, it looks like they are good movies, I am interested on "Vacas" since it follows 3 generations of 2 basque families in Bizkaia.

Last night I watched "Requiem for a Dream" by Aronofsky, the director of "Pi". It is a gutsy movie, not easy to witness these folks lives crumble under their feet. Once again Aronofsky indulges in that weird camera takes were everything moves around the characters face. Combinations of slow and quick motion plus unique paning makes this movie great. The performances by the actors is excellent, never thought that Jennifer Connelly and the Wayans guy could be so raw.

Two movies worth watching.

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Guggo's Power of Attraction

Here you have this article from Forbes about how a building's daring architecture is reshaping the city of Bilbao:

Connoisseur's Guide

'The Bilbao Effect'

Martin Bailey for The Art Newspaper

Spain's Guggenheim Bilbao had another excellent year, despite the tourism slump following Sept. 11. Visitor numbers were 930,000, only slightly down from 2000. Foreign tourists represented 48% of the total, with the largest contingents coming from France, the U.S., Britain, Germany and Italy. Spaniards from outside the Basque Country accounted for a further 35% and the remaining 17% were locals.

With its dramatic architecture, the museum continues to be a major draw, attracting people who would otherwise not come. The Bilbao estimates that its economic impact on the local economy was worth €168 million (approximately $147 million) last year--up from €149 million ($130 million) in 2000--and it also brought in a further €27 million ($23 million) to the Basque treasury in taxes. This represents the equivalent of 4,415 jobs. A visitor survey revealed that 82% came to the city of Bilbao exclusively to see the museum or had extended their stay in the city to visit it.

In addition to €8.9 million ($7.8 million) spent inside the museum, visitors spent much larger sums in the city on accommodations ($43 million), catering ($35 million), shopping ($13 million), transport ($9.5 million) and leisure ($6.6 million). Of last year's three main exhibitions, the most popular was "Giorgio Armani," which attracted 529,000 people. The others were "The Worlds of Nam June Paik" (417,000) and "Frank Gehry" (195,000, up to Dec. 31).

The permanent collection received 250,000 visitors, while 239,000 people participated in educational programs, 14,000 paid to be individual members and 140 companies signed up to be corporate members. Last year 73% of the museum's expenditure was self-funded.

Although visitor numbers are down from the very high numbers in the first two years, this is not unexpected, and the Guggenheim Bilbao remains one of Spain's top tourist attractions.

Despite attempts to emulate the "Bilbao effect" elsewhere in the world, very few new museums or galleries outside capital cities have succeeded in getting so many visitors. Gehry's architecture and the Guggenheim's art have proved an irresistible combination.

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Taxes and EU Representation

In addition to the information about Euskal Herria (the Basque Country) and the Basques available at different web pages, I will be posting news articles so you can get a better idea about what is going on in that corner of the world that the Basques call home.

To start, we have this article that tackles the issue of the ongoing political conflict between the Basques and Spain, specifically when it comes to the relationship between the Basque Country and the rest of Europe.

Here you have it:

Basques Tax Madrid on EU Representation

By Leslie Crawford
Financial Times
February 14, 2002

Less than E 1bn ($870 m) ties the Basque country to Spain, and that link is getting weaker by the day. That is the amount the Basque regional government, which collects its own taxes, must share with Madrid to pay for services provided by central government, such as justice and defence.

But the tax-sharing agreement is under pressure over one of the thorniest issues in Spanish politics: whether regions that are largely self-governing, such as the Basque country, have the right to represent themselves in the European Union.

This became the Basques' central demand when negotiations began last year over a new tax-sharing regime. The Basque Nationalist party (PNV), which controls Spain's three Basque provinces, wants an independent voice in Brussels. The nationalists do not hide the fact that their ultimate goal is to become an independent country in Europe.

Their demands, however, have been rejected by José María Aznar, prime minister, who has refused to make any concessions to Basque nationalists for fear that it will undermine the unity of Spain. "The European Union is a treaty between states, not regions," Mr Aznar said at the first press conference of Spain's EU presidency. Romano Prodi, president of the European Commission, concurred. "It is up to each member state to decide how it organises itself internally," he said. Mr Prodi indicated that regional representation was not on the EU's agenda, already overcrowded by negotiations for the admission of new member states.

But the Basques are not giving up yet. Juan José Ibarretxe, leader of the regional government, visited Mr Prodi in Brussels last month and offered to co-operate with the Commission in its drive to harmonise taxes - provided Brussels recognised the exclusive competence of Spain's three Basque provinces in fiscal affairs.

"If we have the right to decide our tax policies, we also want to be consulted when the EU discusses fiscal matters that affect us directly," says Javier Urizarbarrena, a top tax official in the province of Vizcaya. "We want to participate in the decision making, as part of the Spanish delegation. We are not seeking to undermine the position of the Spanish finance minister."

The Basque demands are catching on. Catalonia is one of the most vocal defenders of a bigger decision-making role for regional governments within the EU. Even Galicia, a fiefdom of Mr Aznar's Popular party, would like to be included in delegations to the EU when fishing or agricultural matters are discussed.

Basque authorities say there are precedents within the EU to accommodate regional representation. Scottish ministers, they say, attend about 12 per cent of all ministerial meetings in Brussels, while German states, or Länder, are present at one third of all EU gatherings.

Not all Basque citizens approve of the way their political leaders have used the issue of EU representation to further the cause of independence. Businessmen have warned Mr Ibarretxe that secession would bring painful economic consequences for the wealthiest region in Spain. "Basque nationalists pretend that nothing would change after independence; that the EU would happily accept the secession from a member state, and that our relations with the rest of Spain would not be affected," says José María Vizcaíno, leader of the Círculo de Empresarios Vascos, a lobby group formed by the top 60 companies in the Basque country. "This is a sentimental fantasy that has dangerous political consequences."

Mr Vizcaíno's lobby group has asked Mr Ibarretxe to commission a study on the economic consequences of secession "in order to inject a dose of realism in the independence debate".

Mr Vizcaíno laments the collapse of the tax-sharing agreement, which he says deepens the mistrust between the governments in Vitoria, capital of the Basque region, and Madrid. "They should be seeking points in common, not further confrontations that drive them apart," he says.

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Meaning of Basque

Once again I will point you towards the web page Reference.com, this time to provide with some background on the origin of the word Basque.

Here you have it:

Etymology of the word Basque

The English word Basque comes from French Basque (pronounced ), which itself comes from Gascon Basco (pronounced ) and Spanish Vasco (pronounced ). These, in turn, come from Latin Vasco (pronounced ), plural Vascones (see History section below). The Latin labial-velar approximant /w/ typically evolved into the voiced bilabial plosive /b/ in Gascon and Spanish, probably under the influence of Basque and Aquitanian (a language related to old Basque and spoken in Gascony in Antiquity). This explains the Roman pun at the expense of the Aquitanians (ancestor of the Gascons): "Beati Hispani quibus vivere bibere est", which translates as "Blessed Iberians, Romans considered the Aquitanians akin to the Iberians, for whom living (vivere) is drinking (bibere)".

One frequent theory about the origin of Latin Vasco is that it derives from Latin boscus or buscus meaning "wooded area" (cf. Spanish bosque, forest). Thus Vascones would mean "those living in the wooded land". However, this fake etymology is now proven wrong, as Latin boscus/buscus only appeared in the Middle Ages, and is probably a corruption of classical Latin arbustus (meaning "planted with tree", from arbor, "tree"), possibly under the influence of Germanic busk or bosk (cf. English bush, German Busch), whose origin is itself unknown.

Another side of that theory sees Latin Vasco still meaning "of the wooded land", but this time coming from (modern) Basque basoko where baso- means forest, and -ko is the ending denoting possession/genitive. Besides the fact that basoko is a modern Basque word (it may have been quite a different word 2000 years ago), this etymology once popular among Basque people is now totally discredited by researchers.

To add to the mystery, several coins from the 1st and 2nd centuries BC were found in the north of Spain, bearing the inscription barscunes written in the Iberian alphabet. The place were they were minted is not certain but has been identified as Pamplona or Rocafort, the area where historians think the Vascones lived.

Today, it is thought that Latin Vasco comes from a Basque and Aquitanian root used by these people to call themselves. This root is eusk-, pronounced , which is indeed close from Latin . There was also an Aquitanian people whose name the Romans recorded as Ausci (pronounced in Latin), and which also seems to come from the same root.

In modern Basque, Basques call themselves euskaldunak, singular euskaldun, formed from euskal- (i.e. "Basque (language)") and -dun (i.e. "one who has"), so euskaldun literally means a Basque speaker. It should be noted that not all Basques are Basque speakers (euskaldunak), and not all Basque speakers are Basque (foreigners who learnt Basque are also euskaldunak). To remedy this inconvenience, a neologism was coined in the 19th century, the word euskotar, plural euskotarak, which means an ethnically Basque person, whether speaking Basque or not.

These Basque words all originate from the name the Basques use to call their language: euskara. Modern researchers have reconstructed the pronunciation and vocabulary of ancient Basque, and Alfonso Irigoyen proposes that the word euskara comes from the verb "to say" in ancient Basque, which was pronounced enautsi (modern Basque esan), and from the suffix -(k)ara ("way (of doing something)"). Thus euskara would literally mean "way of saying", "way of speaking". A proof of this is found in the Spanish book Compendio Historial written in 1571 by Basque writer Esteban de Garibay, who recorded the native name of the Basque language as "enusquera". However, as with most things related to Basque history, this hypothesis is not totally certain.

In the 19th century, Basque nationalist activist Sabino Arana thought that there was an original root euzko from eguzkiko ("of the sun" presuming a solar religion). From it he created the neologism Euzkadi for his purported independent Basque Country. This theory is totally discredited today, the only serious etymology being from enautsi and -(k)ara, but the neologism Euzkadi, in the regularized spelling Euskadi, is still widely used in Basque and Spanish.

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Vascons: Ancient Basques

Reading about the Kingdom of Navarre, I found some information about he Vascons, the people who appears in some Roman chronicles.

Seems like their warriors were used as mercenaries by both Carthage and Rome.

Anyway, here you have the information available about this topic at Reference.com:

Vascons

The Vascons (Latin : Vascones) were an ancient people who, before the arrival of the Romans, inhabited the region in what is now Spain, north of the Ebro river (present day Navarre). It is likely that they are ancestors of the present-day Basques.

Having suffered defeats at the hands of Pompey and Augustus, they were absorbed into the Roman Empire, under which they may have prospered.

The Vascons were finally forced to retreat from their lands and head northward by the invasion of the Visigoths in the 5th and 6th centuries and to move into what is today Basque country.

From the6th to 7th centuries, the Vascons north crossed over the Pyrenees into the Aquitaine of France where they influenced the Occitan language spoken in that region (Gascon) and gave that region its name : Gascony (French: Gascogne).

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Araba

Araba is a Basque province located in Hegoalde, the southern portion of Euskal Herria currently occupied by Spain. Araba is one of the three provinces that conform the Basque Autonomous Community. The province has a population of 300,000 and an area of 2.963 km² .

It is bordered by the provinces of Burgos, La Rioja, Navarre, Guipúzcoa, and Biscay. Within Araba is Condado de Treviño, an enclave which is part of Burgos province, Castile and León, although there is some support for Treviño joining the Basque Community.

The capital of Araba is Gasteiz (Vitoria is the Spanish name), which also serves as the capital of the autonomous community. The province is divided into seven counties (cuadrillas): Añana; Ayala; Campezo; Laguardia; Salvatierra; Vitoria-Gasteiz; Zuya. It also contains the municipality of Berganzo.

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The Seven Provinces

Euskal Herria, known around the world as the Basque Country is divided in seven historic provinces, four of them located south of the Pyrenees and four of them located to the north of this mountain range.

 

The northern portion of the Basque Country is known as Iparralde and is comprised of three provinces, they are called Lapurdi, Behe Nafarroa and Zuberoa.  

 

The southern portion is called Hegoalde and four provinces are included, they are: Nafarroa, Bizkaia, Araba and Gipuzkoa. In the next few days I will be providing information about these provinces called "herrialdes". 

 

 

 

 

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Navarre: The Basque Kingdom

Before we go any farther, I will proceed to dispell a lie.

You will read again and again that there was never a Basque Country. Mostly people that opposes the self determination and eventual independence of the Basques will tell you that there should never be a Basque Country since there was never a Basque Country.

Well, I got a little surprise for them, for there was indeed a Basque Country, only that it was not called that way.

What was the name of this Basque political entity then?

Well, easy, it was called Navarre.

As in Navarre, one of the seven Basque provinces.

Here you have some info I found at Reference.com:

Navarre

The Kingdom of Navarre traditionally evolved from the county of Pamplona, its traditional capital, when the Basque leader Eneko Aritza (Iñigo Arista in Spanish) was chosen King in Pamplona, traditionally in 824, and led a local revolt against the Franks.

The kingdom of Pamplona and then Navarre formed part of the traditional territory of the Vascones -the Basques and Gascons- who occupied the southern slope of the western Pyrenees and part of the shore of the Bay of Biscay. Little is known of the earliest history of the country, but it is certain that neither the Romans nor the Visigoths nor the Arabs ever succeeded in permanently subjugating the inhabitants of the Western Pyrenees, who had always retained their own language. In the course of the 6th century there was a considerable emigration of Basques to the north of the Pyrenees, resulting from the pressure of attacks from the Visigoth kings to the west and south and responding to a power vacuum at the limits of Frankish control in Aquitaine. Thus the Basques maintained their independence. The population of northern and western province of Spanish Navarre is today largely of Basque stock, and the early history of the region is that of the Basques.

The name "Navarre" derives from nava a common name for a flat valley surrounded by hills (compare Las Navas de Tolosa) and Basque herri, a region or country. The name "Navarra" began to appear towards the end of the Visigoth epoch in Spain in the 7th century.

The pass of Roncesvalles in Navarrese territory was the scene of a minor defeat of Charlemagne's baggage train in 778, which features as an epic event in the Chanson de Roland. The pass of Roncesvalles, which leads from France to Navarre, made the region strategically important early in its history. The Basques defended themselves successfully against the Moorish invaders as well as against the Franks; the domination of Charlemagne, who conquered Navarre in 778, was short-lived. In 824 the Basque chieftain Iñigo Arista was chosen king of Pamplona, which was expanded under his successors and became known as the kingdom of Navarre.

The capture of Pamplona by Charlemagne in 778 was not a lasting victory: in the same year the Basques and Navarrese defeated him at the Pass of Roncesvalles. In 806 and 812, Pamplona seems to have been again taken by the Franks. When, however, the Frankish emperors, on account of difficulties at home, were no longer able to give their attention to the outlying borderlands of their empire, the country, little by little, entirely withdrew from their allegiance, and about this time began the formation of a Basque dynasty which soon became very powerful. The first King of Pamplona of this dynasty was Inigo Arista, his elder brother or kinsman, Garcia Jimenez, having received the Duchy of Vasconia, the original Navarre. After the death of Inigo Arista (852), the two territories were united and Jimeno Garcez, the son of the Count of Alava, was chosen king. In 860, the united Pamplonese and Navarrese gave the Crown to the son of Arista, Garcia II Iniguez, who zealously defended his country against the encroachments of Islam, but was killed at Ayhar (882) in a battle against the Emir of Cordova. He was succeeded by his eldest son Fortun Garcez, who was held a prisoner for fifteen years by the infidels, and who, after a reign of twenty-two years, became a monk at Leyra, the oldest convent in Navarre, to which no less than seventy-two other convents were subject.

The choice of the Navarrese now fell upon his kinsman Sancho I Garcez (905-925), who fought against the Moors with repeated success and joined Ultra-Puertos, or Basse-Navarre, to his own dominions, also extending its territory as far as Najera. As a thank-offering for his victories, he founded, in 924, the convent of Albelda. Before his death, all Moors had been driven from the country. His successor, Garcia Sanchez (925-70), who had the support, of his energetic and diplomatic mother (Teuda) Toda Aznarez of the royal branch of Larraun, likewise engaged in a number of conflicts with the Moors.

The first historic king of Navarre was his son Sancho II Garces, nicknamed Abarca, who ruled from Pamplona as king of Navarre and count of Aragon from 970 to 994. The valley of Aragon he had inherited from his mother. The Historia General de Navarra by Jaime del Burgo says that on the occasion of the donation of the villa of Alastue by the king of Pamplona to the monastery of San Juan de la Peña in 987, he titled himself "King of Navarre," the first time that title had been used. In many places he appears as the first King of Navarre and in others the third. However, he was at least the 6th king of Pamplona, and apparently the 9th.

Under Sancho and his immediate successors, Navarre reached the height of its power and its extension. Sanco III the Great (reigned 1000-1035) married the heiress of the county of Castile. The realm reached its zenith under Sancho III, who ruled over nearly all of Christian Spain. Under the sway of Sancho el Mayor, the country attained the greatest prosperity in its history. He seized the country of the Pisuerga and the Cea, which belonged to the Kingdom of Leon, conquered Castile, and ruled from the boundaries of Galicia to those of Barcelona.

On his death he divided his possessions among his four sons, so that one of them, Garcia of Najera, received Navarre, Guipuzcoa, Vizcaya, and small portions of Bearn and Bigorre; Castile and the lands between the Pisuerga and the Cea went to the eldest Fernando; to Gonzalo were given Sobrarbe and Ribagorza; the County of Aragon was allotted to the bastard son Ramiro. The realm was divided thus once more, into Navarre, Aragón, and Castile. The eldest legitimate son, Ferdinand I ruled as high king having Castile as his seat, and he enlarged his realm by various means. His Navarrese line ruled as kings of Castile and Leon.

The bastard son of Sancho III, Ramiro de Aragon founded the Navarrese line of Aragon.

An younger legitimate son of Sancho III, Garcia de Najera founded a new line of rulers of Navarre. The kingdom of Navarre then comprised the present province of Navarre, the Basque Provinces (which were later lost to Castile), and, north of the Pyrenees, the district called Lower Navarre, now a part of France. At its greatest extent the Kingdom of Navarre included all the modern Spanish province; the northern slope of the western Pyrenees called by the Spaniards the ultra puertos ("country beyond the mountain passes") or French Navarre; the Basque provinces of Spain and France; the Bureba, the valley between the Basque mountains and the Montes de Oca to the north of Burgos; the Rioja and Tarazona in the upper valley of the Ebro.

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