Hispania and Britan: From 7th cent. BC till 5th cent. AD (by Cecilia Acosta)

After reading some pages of the bibliography provided by the teachers of “Language and Culture IV” and “Expresión Oral y Escrita de la Lengua Española”, I came to the conclusion that although both subjects deal with different topics, the events analyzed in the last three classes took place during the same years in different geographical locations. That is why my intention is to establish some connections that might be useful to consider by the reader.

As discussed in “Exp. Oral & Esc. de la L. Española”, the origins of the Spanish language begin more or less in the 3rd cent. BC in the Iberian Peninsula, with a mixture of different dialects brought by diverse cultures. Some of these cultures were: the “Celts,” who invaded Hispania in the 7th cent. BC, and came principally from the south of Germany; the “Iberians,” coming from the centre of the Mediterranean; the “Tartessians,” from Africa; the “Phoenicians,” founders of Carthage, Greece; and the “Lingurians,” from Italy.

By the 2nd cent. BC, the Romans invaded Hispania. And as the teacher very well said, “An ideological power is imposed through language.” This imposition of the Latin language by the Romans was also a topic discussed in “L&C IV,” when debating the importance of language as a fundamental component of any culture. The Roman domination started declining and ended in the 5th cent. AC, because of difficulties in communication between Rome and the conquered land. This was mainly due to the amount of invasions Hispania suffered during these years.

Later on, in “Exp. Oral & Esc. de la L. Española”, we kept on talking about the Barbaric Invasions in the year 409 AC. Another topic discussed in both subjects was that at that time, one could call “barbaric” everything that did not belong to the Roman culture. One example of this is illustrated in “De Bello Gallico” (Caesar, Caius Julius c. 50 BC) when referring to the Celts during the 1st Roman Invasion.

In “L&C IV,” we started talking about the Roman Invasions of Britain, in the 1st cent. BC. The Fist Invasion was carried out in the year 55 BC and the Second Invasion in the year 54 BC, both commanded by Julius Caesar; and the Third Invasion, in 43 AC., commanded by the Emperor Claudius.

So, as a short conclusion it is possible to say that History is a process of interconnected events, and the bond I could establish was more or less the following:                 

•   From the 7th till the 3rd centuries BC, different cultures left traces of languages they had used while their establishment and before being invaded by other groups in the Iberian Peninsula.
  
•   In the 2nd cent. the Romans invaded Hispania, forcing the inhabitants to adapt the Latin language –the establishment of the language was completed, of course, many centuries later, but with a mixture of the previous ones, though.
  
•  During the 1st cent. BC, the Romans invaded Britain, and continued with several attacks till the 1st cent. AC.
  
•  Finally, in the 4th cent. AC, the Romans were compelled to abandon Britain due to a great crisis.
  
•  In the 5th century AC. the Romans left the territory of Hispania, due to another important crisis.