Talk:Basque Country

Template:COTW bask country is traditional also in France,not as official "departement"

The two tables overlap each other. Can somebody fix that? RickK 05:36, 17 Feb 2004 (UTC)

OK, I did a take on it. It looks pretty ugly. RickK 05:40, 17 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Contents

1 the autonomous community vs. the larger sense 2 History of the Basque People 3 Basque Country meetings 4 Past tense regional names? 5 Removal of Navarre and "seven-make-one" 6 Foreign language (Basque) Names

the autonomous community vs. the larger sense

I think that, as someone sort-of-said above, this article's definition of Basque Country is a little confusing. While it admits halfway through that Basque Country extends into France, it opens with “The Basque Country ([…]) is an autonomous community of the Spanish state” and includes all kinds of charts on top and bottom describing it as such. In my experience, when people talk about “Basque Country” in English they always mean the traditional Basque territory that lies both in France and Spain. How about moving all the Spanish political stuff to Basque Country (Autonomous Community of Spain) and having the current address be for the larger area? Nathan 20:04, 25 May 2004 (UTC)

History of the Basque People

The second paragraph of the History section has more to do with the Basque people than the geography of the Basque Country, and its information on fueros, etc., already appears in that article. Any objections to removing it? Nathan 09:46, Jun 2, 2004 (UTC)

Ok, I've removed it from the page (Nathan 06:20, Jun 4, 2004 (UTC)). Here's the paragraph:

Until the French Revolution (and, to some extent, beyond that in Spain), Euskal Herria retained its fueros -- separate laws, taxes and law courts -- respected by both French and Spanish monarchs. With the fall of the ancien régime, the fueros were completely abolished in France, which came under a central government that abolished all local privileges. In Spain, with some irony, through the various civil wars of the Nineteenth Century the fueros were upheld by the nominally absolutist Carlists and opposed by the victorious constitutional forces. Thus the same wars that brought relative liberty to most of Spain abolished most of the traditional liberties of the Basques.

However, the Spanish provinces remained with the widest autonomy in Peninsular Spain. After the Spanish Civil War, the regime of General Franco considered Biscay and Gipuzkoa as "traitor provinces" abolishing the remains of their autonomy, but Navarre and Alava maintained small local police forces and some tax self-government.

"Since the time of Sancho III, there has been no single government over all seven territories".
The Napoleonic Empire directly governed the French Basque Country, and by taking over the kingdom of Spain, oficially also governed the Spanish Basque Country. Nowadays European Union governs over the whole Basque Country on some issues. Maybe it should read sort of no single independent government over all seven terriroties or no single government over all seven territories based on the Basque Country.--Erri4a 22:55, 12 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Basque Country meetings

I'm looking for more information on the following sentence in the History section:

The entry of Spain in the European Union and the regionalization of France has led to meetings among the Basque Autonomous Comunity, Navarre and Aquitaine within the Atlantic Arch.

At first I was stuck by “regionalization of France” as I've never heard that phrase, and Google barely has, but the List of regions in France article does have some info on administrative changes that served to decentralize the French government. (According to the French version of that page those laws were put into place in 1982.) Ok, so maybe we rephrase and link to the other article. But then what's this “Atlantic Arch”? At first I assumed it was literally an arch, some Basque monument. But apparently [1] (http://basque.unr.edu/07/7.3.1t/7.3.1.3t/7.3.1.3.2.lesson1.htm) it's the Atlantic coastline between Santiago de Compostela and Bourdeaux. That territory doesn't match up very well with Basque Country, and it's a term most people have never heard of. Can we get a little more specific? Where and when have these meetings taken place? Nathan 10:55, Jun 4, 2004 (UTC)

There are some coordinations between the ACBC and Navarre over interregional issues: Basque language, defending their tax systems at the EU, infrastructures (?).

And the EU encourages cross-border collaboration. Aquitaine is the French region encompassing the French Basque Country. There is some collaboration and talks but they don't seem very effective since French regions are weaker the Spanish ones.

A map of the Arch (http://www.eurosilvasur.net/espanol/atlas.htm)

About European regions (http://www.el-mundo.es/nuevaeconomia/2002/153/1039802088.html)

The Arc was a plan by two French regional presidents to get grants from the EU.

Tri-regional collaboration among universities (http://www.ehu.es/rrii/english/euskadi/texto.htm).

Besides the 3-member Euroregion, there is also (http://www.eustat.es/about/cooptrans_i.html) a Pyrenean Work Community

-- Error 02:07, 5 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Past tense regional names?

An anonymous user has changed the verbs in the Geography section to the past tense. I find this construction a bit more awkward. More importantly, I think it's making a political statement while the original language simply reported regional names. Anon, or anyone else, would you defend this change? If there's no response in a few days I'll change it back. Nathan 03:10, Jul 11, 2004 (UTC)

Removal of Navarre and "seven-make-one"

An anonymous user has removed reference to Navarre as a region of Basque Country. I too think that it's inaccurate to take the modern Navarre AC's borders and claim all of it as "Basque Country" when the majority of that territory has probably never been inhabited by Basques.

If you take Vascones as Basques, it was in pre-Roman times. I am not sure abot after Reconquista -- Error 00:37, 13 Aug 2004 (UTC)

And reporting the population and square km of Basque Country including all of Navarre was even worse (I apologize for bringing those cooked figures over from an article I folded in to this one; the truth is I was afraid to remove them.)

On the other hand, every map I've ever seen of Basque Country includes all of Navarre. I included it in the red area map on this page too, because I wouldn't know where else to draw the line. (Amusingly, the distinctive hammer shape of the Euskal Herria outline comes from territory that — by my reckoning, seeing as it's the southeast fringe of Navarre — probably never heard much Basque spoken.)

There are currently some Basque nationalists teaching Basque at the Ribera -- Error 00:37, 13 Aug 2004 (UTC)

So, what do we do? I suppose we can dismiss the bumper-sticker maps of Basque Country as politically motivated, and probably do the same for the slogan "seven-make-one," but I think we need to recognize that part of Navarre is in "Basque Country." Is there maybe a name for that part? And where do we draw the map line?

The current Ley del Vascuence divides Navarre in bilingual zones, something I forgot and Spanish-only lines. Detractors call this Napartheid. But I think it is more offensive to divide Navarre than to include it in EH. -- Error 00:37, 13 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Something needs to happen, because right now the map and the text are out of sync. Anon, your input would be appreciated since you've made these pretty bold changes.

Nathan 14:03, Aug 12, 2004 (UTC)

The whole of Navarre is considered part of Euskal Herria by those that use the concept. Not a part of Basque Country (autonomous community), of course. Nobody understands Basque Country as including just a part of Navarre. Nobody includes Lower Navarre while excluding Spanish Navarre.

You can argue if the Navarrese are Basques or not, it usually is linked to speaking Basque. A Navarrese might say "I am not Basque but my grandfather was." if he is from one of the areas that lost Basque recently. -- Error 00:37, 13 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Foreign language (Basque) Names

According to policy, we use other languages sparingly. I am not convinced that pages related to the Basque people should be an exception to this policy. There is no shortage of Wikipedia pages related to a people that speak languages other than English, and it's a mistake to fill up every one of them with (Native language: machin chose). The standard is to list the various native versions of a place name only at the beginning of its article, and until recently this page fit that model perfectly. If you want to know how to say "Guipúzcoa" in Basque, click on it and read the article. There's nothing unfair in that approach, and short of politics, I can't see why people want to do anything else. I'll wait a few days for discussion here before changing it back. Also, see the unresolved Navarre discussion above, unrelated but affected by the same revert. Nathan 14:56, Aug 21, 2004 (UTC)

Well, whatever you like. I didn't see that the names were unnecessarily larding the article, and it's rather convenient to have them in one place. But I don't feel strongly about it. - Montréalais 15:59, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)