History of Galicia: Encyclopedia II - History of Galicia - Old Age

History of Galicia - Old Age

History of Galicia - Celtic Gallaecia

According the the first-century Geographer Strabo, the settlers resided on the north of the river Douro were known by the name of Kallaikoi; later the name Kallaikoi was translated into Latin as Gallaeci, Callaeci or Gallaicoi.

It is necessary to show, on the other hand, that prior to the Roman conquest of Gallaecia, the main name the tribe received was the one of Gallaicoi, formed as local name (gentilice) respect to the root gall, that means Celt or Gaul, in general, and that was applied to all the associated tribes of this ethnic group, beginning by the classical transalpine Gauls.

From a historical point of view, little can be deduced from the clues we can gather, aside from what is stated in the Leabhar Gabhala. Archaeological testimony indicates that towards VII to V centuries B.C., cultural influences pertaining to the Hallstatt Celtic culture began to arrive in Galicia and the north of Portugal. Together with other elements identified as coming from Eastern Mediterranean as well as those surviving from the previous culture (known as the Atlantic Bronze Age, surely carried out by Brythonic Celts, Brigantini, Albions was some of their tribal names) dominant in Galicia, they all ended up in the creation of a new culture of fusion of these portions, that is known as Cultura Castrexa, name that alludes to the main type of towns that were built, called hillforts, that the Romans named castros (dùn, dùin -or don-; in Gallaic language).

The knowledge that we have today about the society of the hillforts is very limited; if we followed what the Roman historians said, the Galicians were a reunion of barbarians who spent the day fighting and the night eating, drinking and dancing to the moon. But today it seems absolutely clear that the the last five centuries B.B.E. they developed an aristocratic and even perhaps a feudal social model. The division of the country -in concelhos, concept similar to the counties of the islands or Romania-, seems to be based on this class of social organization. Also, the structure based on hillforts, seems to be associated to a fortified occupation of the territory, resemblance to the one of the Central European classic Celtic habitat. On the other hand, this kind of territorial occupation was likely associated to the attraction that mineral wealth provoked that was in a similar way, as a certain class of gold fever. Anyway, it is also clear that the interest of the Romans for this region was mainly related to its gold mines.

When Iberia was involved in the Punic wars between [Carthaginians]] and Romans, the strategic alliance that they maintained with the Phoenicians enabled Hannibal to recruit many Gallegans. When the Romans finally undertook the conquest of Iberia, the Gallaicoi faced them in 137 B.C. in the battle at the river Douro that resulted in a great Roman victory against 60,000 Galicians, by who the Roman general, proconsul Decimus Iunius Brutus, turned to Rome as a hero, receiving the name of Gallaicus, according to the historian Paulus Orosius.

History of Galicia - Roman Gallaecia

Junius Brutus' military campaigns scored further victories in the south of modern Portugal, before going on to the north. The tribe of the Gallaicoi, faced the Roman forces in 137 BCE in a battle at the river Douro, which resulted in a great Roman victory.

At the end of Brutus' campaigns, Rome controlled the territory between the Douro and Minho rivers plus probable extensions along the coast and in the interior . The Second Invasion, of 61 B.C.E., landed at Brigantium (La Coruña), under the command of Julius Caesar.

The evidences suggest that the resistance of the Gaedels against the Romans ended here; from now on, they would be enlisted massively as auxiliaries of the Roman legions, fulfilling destinies sometimes completely separate from Galicia, as far as Thrace and Dacia. It has been estimated ^{[citation needed]} that of the total of Roman auxiliary troops coming from Iberia, more than 30% belonged to tribes of the peninsular northwest.

The final extinction of Celtic resistance was the aim of the violent and ruthless Cantabrian Wars fought under the emperor Octavian from 26 BCE to 19 BCE. The resistance was appalling: collective suicide rather than surrender, mothers who killed their children before committing suicide, crucified prisoners of war who sang triumphant hymns, rebellions of captives who killed their guards and returned home from Gaul.

In the 3rd century, Diocletian created an administrative division which included the conventus of Gallaecia, Asturica and perhaps Cluniense. This province took the name of Gallaecia since Gallaecia was the most populous and important zone within the province. In 409, as Roman control collapsed, the Suebi conquests transformed Roman Gallaecia (convents Lucense and Bracarense) into the kingdom of Gallaecia (the Galliciense Regnum recorded by Hydatius and Gregory of Tours).

History of Galicia - Suebi Kingdom

In the year 411, Galicia fell to the Suebi, who formed a kingdom of their own.

The number of the original Suebic invaders is estimated as fewer than 30,000 people, settled mainly in the urbanized zones of Braga (Bracara Augusta), Porto, Lugo (Lucus Augusta) and Astorga (Asturica Augusta). Bracara Augusta, the modern city of Braga, became the capital of the Suebi, as it was previously the capital of the Gallaecia Roman province. Suebic Gallaecia was larger than the modern region: it extended south to the river Douro and to Avila in the east.

The Suebic kingdom in Gallaecia lasted from 410 to 584 and seems to have enjoyed relatively stable government for most of that time. Historians like José António Lopes Silva, the translator of Idatius' chronicles, the primary written source for the 5th century, finds that the essential temper of Galician culture was established in the blending of Ibero-Roman culture with that of the Suebi.

There were occasional clashes with the Visigoths, who arrived in the Iberian Peninsula in 416 and came to dominate most of the peninsula, but the Suebi maintained their independence until 584, when the Visigothic King Leovigild, invaded the Suebic kingdom and finally defeated it, bringing it under Visigoth control.

Richard Fletcher (Fletcher 1984) points out that in Late Antiquity Galicia was still very much a part of the Roman and Mediterranean world. He instances the Galician nun Egeria's account of her pilgrimage to the Holy Land, 381–4 and the journey of the young Idatius, though living "at the uttermost limit of the world", who had met Jerome in the East; his chronicle shows that he remained aware of the affairs of the eastern Mediterranean and refers to travellers from the east coming to Galicia. As bishop Idatius travelled to Gaul on an embassy to Aetius, 431–2. Miro, king of the Suevi, had diplomatic relations with fellow barbarian kings in Neustria and Burgundy, but also with the emperors in Constantinople. Martin of Braga the distinguished 6th century bishop, was a native of Pannonia. The Visigothic king Leovigild impounded the ships of Gaulish merchants in Galicia. At Lorenzana, the fine sarcophagus that received at a later date the mortal remains of count Osorio Gutiérrez,was probably an import from southern Gaul in the 7th century, Fletcher notes. And one of the coins in the Bordeaux hoard deposited about 700 was struck at a Galician mint, suggesting possible trade connections.

Adapted from the Wikipedia article "Old Age", under the G.N U Free Docmentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki