[Menydh]

Originally Posted by Berrocscir

Thanks for the explanations. I have assumed ethnicity to be synomomous with nationality. Is it true that the the Basque language is very old and not related to other european languages? In thhis sense are they not a separate ethnic group from the rest of the Spanish people.

It is true. Probably related to the ancient languages of the Iberians and of the Aquitanians.

What you call "Spanish" language, which is in actual fact modern Castilian language, is impregnated of Basque influence inspite of it being a Romance language. The only other language that shares this influence to a similar level is Gascon, an Occitanian language, from the ancient Aquitanian.

The Castilian (Spanish) language is not that foreign to the Basques as you might believe. In fact it has its origins in the rude Romance spoken by peoples of Basque/Iberic and Celtic adscription, little romanicized. This is something already noticed by the linguist and historian D. Ramón Menéndez Pidal. Also, the Basque philosopher D. Miguel de Unamuno makes it clear that Castilian is a language of the Basques.

The way I've been thinking is that there must not really be any spanish nation - due to aragonese, castillians, catalonians etc - I apologise if this is technically wrong. What are the differences between ethnicity and nationality?

Fine. Let me answer to this below.

Also, are mynydd & Lagun against a Portugese state?

Again, you should not confuse state with nation. At the time when Spain was at the peak of her power, the structure of government that you call state was much different. The king had to abide by the Old Laws and rules of the kingdoms, which he could not break. The same Phillip II had a rebelion in Saragossa when he ordered the imperial army to aprehend his [treacherous] secretary, because although the secretary was not Aragonese, he was in Aragonese territory and only the Justicia Mayor could decide over his fate while he was there. And certainly the king's soldiers could not enter the city without permision. His father, the Holy Roman Emperor Carlos, had much more trouble with Castilians.

A king of Spain had to read the oath of loyalty to the Fueros of each territory (kingdom, county, lordship), before being crowned as the king of that territory.

As for the territories that you mention (Aragon, Castile, Catalonia, others), Spain existed before these in most cases. They are in fact a product of an historical abnormality, which was the Islamic invasion.

Even if throughout the long centuries of the Reconquista no such thing as Spain existed as a state, it did exist as a nation and this was a fact recognized by the kings of the different territories, who battled for the hegemony of being Primus Hispaniae (the First of The Spains). Even the Reconquista starts as an ideology, which in the early chronicles of the Reconquista appears as Recuperatio Hispania (the Recuperation of Spain).

Why The Spains, and not Spain? Both denominations are equally valid, however the plural Spains is charged with the essence of Spain and her peoples.

Spain goes through a unique process of ethnogenesis in the VIth century, first with the Visigothic King Leovigildo's derogation of the Roman laws which prevented the Roman citizens (Hispano-Romans) from mixing with the Barbarians (Goths) and who achieved the territorial union (expells the Byzantines, defeats the Suevi, and suffocates the rebelions in the Salto Vasconum.. which is not clear that it referred only to Basque people). Then the religious union after his son Recaredo, together with a number of Arian bishops, abhorred of the Arian heressy --which the Goths and most other Eastern Germanics subscribed-- and embraced the Catholic Church. His father, Leovigildo, had failed to do the contrary (to convert the Hispano-Romans to Arianism), and he even ordered his son [Saint] Hermenegildo to be executed, after he converted to Catholicism and rose in arms against his father, and later refused to take the comunion from the hands of an Arian bishop while imprisoned.

The events of 711 AD break this nation. And from that moment on, the Reconquista starts at different points as an idea to recuperate Spain. However, much of what Spain is was forged during those hundred of years, included but not limited to the formation of those states.. or kingdoms. Each one of them being a "Spain" in its own right. Therefore "The Spains".

Such is our national and ethnic identity.

Put some Bizkaitarras and Giputxis together (both Basques), and you may have a fight. Put Basques, Castilians, Galicians and Catalans together, you may have a fight. Put an English or a French in front of them, and you will have a war.