Basque Country (Euskal Autonomia Erkidegoa)
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The Basque Country or Basque Autonomous Community is enshrined as a 'nationality' within the Spanish State in its 1979 statute of autonomy, pursuant to the administrative acquis laid out in the 1978 Spanish Constitution. The statute provides the legal framework for the development of the Basque people on Spanish soil. Navarre, which had narrowly rejected a joint statute with Gipuzkoa, Álava and Biscay in 1932, became a full-fledged foral autonomous community in 1982.
Currently there is no official capital in the autonomous community, but the city of Vitoria-Gasteiz, in the province of Álava, is the de facto capital as the location of the Basque Parliament, the headquarters of the Basque Government, and the residence of the President of the Basque Autonomous Community (the Palace of Ajuria Enea). The High Court of Justice of the Basque Country has its headquarters in the city of Bilbao. Whilst Vitoria-Gasteiz is the largest municipality in area, with 277 km2 (107 sq mi), Bilbao is the largest in population, with 353,187 people, located in the province of Biscay within a conurbation of 875,552 people.
The term Basque Country may also refer to the larger cultural region (Basque: Euskal Herria), the home of the Basque people, which includes the autonomous community.
The topography of the Basque Country is mainly mountainous. It is made up of the Basque Mountains and the Sierra de Cantabria in the south, with Larrasa (1453 meters) as the maximum altitude. The highest point in the Community is Mount Aitxuri, with an altitude of 1,551 meters, and located in Aizkorri Natural Park.
The following provinces make up the autonomous community:
* Álava (Basque Araba), capital Vitoria-Gasteiz
* Biscay (Spanish Vizcaya, Basque Bizkaia), capital Bilbao-Bilbo
* Gipuzkoa (Spanish Guipúzcoa), capital Donostia-San Sebastián
Map - Basque Country (Euskal Autonomia Erkidegoa)
Map
Country - Spain
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| Flag of Spain | |
Anatomically modern humans first arrived in the Iberian Peninsula around 42,000 years ago. The ancient Iberian and Celtic tribes, along with other pre-Roman peoples, dwelled the territory maintaining contacts with foreign Mediterranean cultures. The Roman conquest and colonization of the peninsula (Hispania) ensued, bringing the Romanization of the population. Receding of Western Roman imperial authority ushered in the migration of different non-Roman peoples from Central and Northern Europe with the Visigoths as the dominant power in the peninsula by the fifth century. In the early eighth century, most of the peninsula was conquered by the Umayyad Caliphate, and during early Islamic rule, Al-Andalus became a dominant peninsular power centered in Córdoba. Several Christian kingdoms emerged in Northern Iberia, chief among them León, Castile, Aragon, Portugal, and Navarre made an intermittent southward military expansion, known as Reconquista, repelling the Islamic rule in Iberia, which culminated with the Christian seizure of the Emirate of Granada in 1492. Jews and Muslims were forced to choose between conversion to Catholicism or expulsion, and eventually the converts were expelled through different royal decrees.
Currency / Language
| ISO | Currency | Symbol | Significant figures |
|---|---|---|---|
| EUR | Euro | € | 2 |
| ISO | Language |
|---|---|
| EU | Basque language |
| CA | Catalan language |
| GL | Galician language |
| OC | Occitan language |
| ES | Spanish language |
