# Romans in Spain



## The Judge (Dec 31, 2015)

There's not a lot of actual information in this BBC article, but I thought it was interesting nonetheless, to remind us -- particularly the would-be authors amongst us -- that conquerors don't destroy what was there before them, they re-use and adapt the structures.  

Beside, that first photo is wonderful!


----------



## JoanDrake (Dec 31, 2015)

Wasn't Spain a very early conquest of the Romans, even before the Gauls. I've heard their short sword, the Gladius, came from there


----------



## Ray McCarthy (Dec 31, 2015)

JoanDrake said:


> Spain a very early conquest of the Romans, even before the Gauls


I thought so, but I never checked the dates.


----------



## The Judge (Dec 31, 2015)

I'm not sure, so I went straight to an authoritative source, namely my Asterix collection...  Apparently "One year after his victory over the supporters of Pompey at Thapsus, Caesar has just mopped up the survivors at Munda, bringing the whole of Hispania under the Roman yoke" (well, except for one small village which is holding out against the Roman invaders).  In the Asterix world this is after the defeat of Vercingetorix at Alesia, but I see that in real life the battle of Alesia was 52 BC, and the battle of Munda was 45 BC, so as we're counting backwards here Alesia actually came first.  But Spain -- or parts of it, at least -- was almost certainly part of the empire before Pompey's lot ran off there. 

NB The Russell Crowe character in _Gladiator_ was a Spanish Roman, though I don't know if he was based on a real general/soldier.


----------



## Foxbat (Dec 31, 2015)

Spain was very important strategically during The Punic Wars (especially the second Punic War circa 211 BC) and was the launch pad for Hannibal's trek across the Alps. Scipio Africanus used invading it as a way of outflanking Hannibal's rampage through Italy and effectively cut off his supply line and conquered Nova Carthago. Unsurprising that it should still yield such finds today.


----------



## Ray McCarthy (Dec 31, 2015)

One of Rome's earliest famous playwrights was a Celt.
Celts also guarded Macedonia for Alexander the Great.
Some Celts sacked Delphi, which was unpopular with other Celts never mind the Greeks.
The German tribes actually had Celtic Overlords.
Some parts of Spain Celtic and some not. Same true of what Rome called Gaul.
I think what Romans called Belgai may have been Celts.
Different Celts ruled from Anatolia to Ireland, but were not a unified empire though they had subject tribes (i.e. the Germanic/Teutonic ones) and much language and culture in common. Otherwise the Romans would never have conquered north of Italy. Some of the Swiss tribes were Celts too.

European borders as we know them are quite modern.  Not sure how long Catalan wasn't "Spain". I think at time of Napoleon Catalan was more inclined to support Britain.

I expect at time of Conquering of "Spain" and "Gaul" that the tribes and ethnic groups living there had a different view of boundaries to that of the Romans.


----------



## mosaix (Dec 31, 2015)

Saw the item this morning TJ. Very interesting. Thanks for posting.


----------



## svalbard (Jan 1, 2016)

JoanDrake said:


> Wasn't Spain a very early conquest of the Romans, even before the Gauls. I've heard their short sword, the Gladius, came from there



Indeed it was an earlier conquest. Spain was a major battleground in the Punic Wars and later Pompey won his 'spurs' in the civil war against Quintus Sertorius in Spain. It was a source of great mineral wealth for the Roman Republic.


----------



## Foxbat (Jan 1, 2016)

svalbard said:


> It was a source of great mineral wealth for the Roman Republic.



Particularly silver if I remember correctly.


----------



## Tulius Hostilius (Jan 8, 2016)

JoanDrake said:


> Wasn't Spain a very early conquest of the Romans, even before the Gauls. I've heard their short sword, the Gladius, came from there




Gaul was conquered in 10 years. The conquest of the Iberian Peninsula took a bit more time. The Romans disembark in Ampurias in 218 BC and Agrippa and Octavian conquered Asturias when the last one was already emperor, in 29-19BC. Than means that they took 200 years to conquer it!




The Judge said:


> NB The Russell Crowe character in_Gladiator_was a Spanish Roman, though I don't know if he was based on a real general/soldier.




Yes and no, he is loosely based in a real general of the same name: Maximus. I am not familiar with the details. Read it some time ago, even before the movie. If I recall well he lead a revolt after the dead of Marcus Aurelius, and I don’t think he was from the Iberian Peninsula.




Ray McCarthy said:


> One of Rome's earliest famous playwrights was a Celt.
> 
> European borders as we know them are quite modern.  Not sure how long Catalan wasn't "Spain". I think at time of Napoleon Catalan was more inclined to support Britain.




Not sure if I understood right. Castile and Aragon are the core of the Spanish kingdom since the marriage of the Catholic Monarchs in 1469. As a matter of fact, until than the Portuguese were also considered Spanish, since Spain had the same meaning of Iberian Peninsula. So in the beginning of the 19th century Catalonia was a part of the Spanish kingdom.




Foxbat said:


> Particularly silver if I remember correctly.



Yes, silver but also gold, cooper and iron. A metal that didn’t exist much in the Iberian Peninsula was tin, necessary to make Bronze. Since Proto-historic times it seems that it was imported from the British Islands.


----------



## svalbard (Jan 9, 2016)

Tulius Hostilius said:


> Gaul was conquered in 10 years. The conquest of the Iberian Peninsula took a bit more time. The Romans disembark in Ampurias in 218 BC and Agrippa and Octavian conquered Asturias when the last one was already emperor, in 29-19BC. Than means that they took 200 years to conquer it!
> 
> 
> 
> ...



There was a Magnus Maximus, a Roman general from Spain, who governed Britain in the late 4th century. He was declared Emperor about 380ish and held Gaul and Spain until he was defeated at Aquilia(sp) circa 385.

Some historians argue that some of his defeated British legions settled in Armorica or Brittany as it is better know today. 

He entered Welsh legend as Macsen Wledig.

So there you have it. A Roman Spaniard, who governed Britain and became Emperor.


----------



## Tulius Hostilius (Jan 9, 2016)

Marcus Aurelius and Commodus are from the 2nd century, that Magnus Maximus is from the 4th, so I think that we are talking about different characters. But, since we are also talking about Hollywood, that Magnus Maximus could have been an influence.

But the Iberian Peninsula had a well known emperor: Hadrian was most probably from Italica, near Seville. By his time some parts of the Iberian Peninsula were already much romanized, so it isn’t a surprise that prominent figures in the empire may have come from those territories.


----------

