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164-484: Cantabria ( / k æ n ˈ t eɪ b r i ə / , also UK : /- ˈ t æ b -/ ; Spanish: [kanˈtaβɾja] ) is an autonomous community and province in northern Spain with Santander as its capital city. It is called a comunidad histórica , a historic community , in its current Statute of Autonomy . It is bordered on the east by the Basque autonomous community ( province of Biscay ), on

328-675: A Jewish community composed mainly of Sephardi Jews fleeing from the Spanish and Portuguese Inquisitions . There were also important Jewish and Muslim communities in Navarre before the Castilian invasion of 1512–21. Nowadays, according to one single opinion poll, only slightly more than 50% of Basques profess some kind of belief in God , while the rest are either agnostic or atheist . The number of religious skeptics increases noticeably for

492-606: A conurbation known as the Santander-Torrelavega metropolitan area. Castro Urdiales has an official population of 28,542, making it the fourth largest in the region because of its proximity to the Bilbao metropolitan area, there are a large number of people not registered in Castro Urdiales, and the true count may be double the official figure. The most populated municipalities of Cantabria as of 2018 are

656-506: A Christian veneer to pagan worship have remained speculative. At any rate, Mari (Andramari) is one of the oldest worshipped Christian icons in Basque territories. Mari's consort is Sugaar . This chthonic couple seems to bear the superior ethical power and the power of creation and destruction. It's said that when they gathered in the high caves of the sacred peaks, they engendered the storms. These meetings typically happened on Friday nights,

820-559: A century as Received Pronunciation (RP). However, due to language evolution and changing social trends, some linguists argue that RP is losing prestige or has been replaced by another accent, one that the linguist Geoff Lindsey for instance calls Standard Southern British English. Others suggest that more regionally-oriented standard accents are emerging in England. Even in Scotland and Northern Ireland, RP exerts little influence in

984-480: A dominant effect on local microclimate in Cantabria. It is the main cause of the peculiar meteorologic situations like the so-called "suradas" ( Ábrego wind), due to the foehn effect : the southerly wind coming down from the mountains blows strongly and dry, increasing the temperature closer to the coast. This causes a decrease in air humidity and rainfall. These conditions are more frequent in autumn and winter, and

1148-409: A few decades ago the Basque language had all but disappeared. Nowadays, the number of Basque speakers is maintaining its level or increasing slightly. Traditionally Basques have been mostly Catholics . In the 19th century and well into the 20th, Basques as a group remained notably devout and churchgoing. In recent years church attendance has fallen off, as in most of Western Europe. The region has been

1312-560: A framework was established and formal steps began to be taken, leading to administrative and legal unity in 1778. This all culminated in the success of the Assembly held in the Assembly House of Puente San Miguel on 28 July 1778, where the province of Cantabria was constituted. It was achieved by passing the common ordinances which had been developed to that end, and which had been discussed and approved previously in councils of all

1476-483: A geographical orientation or other locally meaningful identifying features. Such surnames provide even those Basques whose families may have left the land generations ago with an important link to their rural family origins: Bengoetxea "the house of further down", Goikoetxea "the house above", Landaburu "top of the field", Errekondo "next to the stream", Elizalde "by the church", Mendizabal "wide hill", Usetxe "house of birds" Ibarretxe "house in

1640-461: A goddess called Mari . A number of place-names contain her name, which would suggest these places were related to worship of her such as Anbotoko Mari who appears to have been related to the weather. According to one tradition, she travelled every seven years between a cave on Mount Anboto and one on another mountain (the stories vary); the weather would be wet when she was in Anboto, dry when she

1804-651: A great many enterprising figures of Basque origin who went into the world to earn their way, from Spanish conquistadors such as Lope de Aguirre and Francisco Vásquez de Coronado , to explorers, missionaries and saints of the Catholic Church, such as Francis Xavier . A widespread belief that Basque society was originally matriarchal is at odds with the current, clearly patrilineal kinship system and inheritance structures. Some scholars and commentators have attempted to reconcile these points by assuming that patrilineal kinship represents an innovation. In any case,

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1968-508: A greater movement, normally [əʊ], [əʉ] or [əɨ]. Dropping a morphological grammatical number , in collective nouns , is stronger in British English than North American English. This is to treat them as plural when once grammatically singular, a perceived natural number prevails, especially when applying to institutional nouns and groups of people. The noun 'police', for example, undergoes this treatment: Police are investigating

2132-466: A lack of resources, continued to be the main reason for Cantabria's weakness, aggravated by the progressive advance of the Bourbonic centralism and its administrative efficiency. The latter continually emphasised the impossibility of the smaller territories facing a multitude of problems on their own: from communications to the exercise of justice, from putting aside adequate reserves for hard times to

2296-417: A legendary people which explains the disappearance of a people of Stone Age culture that used to live in the high lands and with no knowledge of iron. Many legends about them tell that they were bigger and taller, with a great force, but were displaced by the ferrons , or workers of ironworks foundries, until their total fade-out. They were pagans, but one of them, Olentzero , accepted Christianity and became

2460-406: A lesser class or social status and often discounted or considered of a low intelligence. Another contribution to the standardisation of British English was the introduction of the printing press to England in the mid-15th century. In doing so, William Caxton enabled a common language and spelling to be dispersed among the entirety of England at a much faster rate. Samuel Johnson's A Dictionary of

2624-535: A major concentration of Basques, most notably in the San Joaquin Valley between Stockton , Fresno and Bakersfield . The city of Bakersfield has a large Basque community and the city has several Basque restaurants, including Noriega's which won the 2011 James Beard Foundation America's Classic Award. There is a history of Basque culture in Chino, California . In Chino, two annual Basque festivals celebrate

2788-659: A process called T-glottalisation . National media, being based in London, have seen the glottal stop spreading more widely than it once was in word endings, not being heard as "no [ʔ] " and bottle of water being heard as "bo [ʔ] le of wa [ʔ] er". It is still stigmatised when used at the beginning and central positions, such as later , while often has all but regained /t/ . Other consonants subject to this usage in Cockney English are p , as in pa [ʔ] er and k as in ba [ʔ] er. In most areas of England and Wales, outside

2952-720: A province of France in 1620. Nevertheless, the Basques enjoyed a great deal of self-government until the French Revolution (1790) and the Carlist Wars (1839, 1876), when the Basques supported heir apparent Carlos V and his descendants. On either side of the Pyrenees, the Basques lost their native institutions and laws held during the Ancien régime . Since then, despite the current limited self-governing status of

3116-484: A range of blurring and ambiguity". Variations exist in formal (both written and spoken) English in the United Kingdom. For example, the adjective wee is almost exclusively used in parts of Scotland, north-east England, Northern Ireland, Ireland, and occasionally Yorkshire , whereas the adjective little is predominant elsewhere. Nevertheless, there is a meaningful degree of uniformity in written English within

3280-545: A region stretching out far into the east. From this period on, source documents barely reference Cantabria by name, with Asturias featuring in names of the comarcas called Asturias de Santillana , Asturias de Trasmiera and Asturias de Laredo . From a central core formed by the Hermandad de las Cuatro Villas ( Brotherhood of the Four Cities ) (Santander, Laredo, Castro Urdiales and San Vicente de la Barquera ),

3444-520: A regional accent or dialect. However, about 2% of Britons speak with an accent called Received Pronunciation (also called "the King's English", "Oxford English" and " BBC English" ), that is essentially region-less. It derives from a mixture of the Midlands and Southern dialects spoken in London in the early modern period. It is frequently used as a model for teaching English to foreign learners. In

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3608-546: A separate entity, called in present-day Basque Nafarroako Foru Erkidegoa , in Spanish Comunidad Foral de Navarra (the autonomous community of Navarre). The government of this autonomous community is the Government of Navarre. In historical contexts Navarre may refer to a wider area, and that the present-day northern Basque province of Lower Navarre may also be referred to as (part of) Nafarroa , while

3772-683: A single agglomeration community was established for the Basque Country in France . The Basque region is divided into at least three administrative units, namely the Basque Autonomous Community and Navarre in Spain, and the arrondissement of Bayonne and the cantons of Mauléon-Licharre and Tardets-Sorholus in the département of Pyrénées Atlantiques , France. The autonomous community (a concept established in

3936-415: A sort of Basque Santa Claus . They gave name to several toponyms, as Jentilbaratza . Historically, Basque society can be described as being somewhat at odds with Roman and later European societal norms. Strabo 's account of the north of Spain in his Geographica (written between approximately 20 BC and 20 AD) makes a mention of "a sort of woman-rule—not at all a mark of civilization" (Hadington 1992),

4100-516: A source of missionaries like Francis Xavier and Michel Garicoïts . Ignatius Loyola , founder of the Society of Jesus , was a Basque. California Franciscan Fermín Lasuén was born in Vitoria . Lasuén was the successor to Franciscan Padre Junípero Serra and founded 9 of the 21 extant California Missions along the coast. A sprout of Protestantism in the continental Basque Country produced

4264-411: A surge of eucalyptus – see eucalyptus article on Spanish Misplaced Pages – plantations (and to a less extent of pines ) which often hid the illegal destruction of native forests, just as the spread of livestock farming had done in the past by the endemic conversion of forest into prairie. These acts have been laxly controlled by the local councils or the central governments, in a process that clearly follows

4428-534: A written and printed one used in present-day forms of publication and communication, as well as a language spoken and used in a very wide range of social and cultural contexts, styles, and registers. Basques have a close attachment to their home ( etxe(a) 'house, home'), especially when this consists of the traditional self-sufficient, family-run farm or baserri (a) . Home in this context is synonymous with family roots. Some Basque surnames were adapted from old baserri or habitation names . They typically related to

4592-489: Is Campoo , in southern Cantabria, with its Pyrenean oak. There are seven natural areas in this autonomous community designated as Natural or national parks : The most important of these is the Picos de Europa National Park, which affects Castile and León and Asturias in addition to Cantabria, the three autonomous communities sharing its management. Santoña, Victoria and Joyel marshes are also Special Protection Areas for

4756-567: Is a Basque version of the Woodwose . There is a trickster named San Martin Txiki ("St Martin the Lesser"). It is unclear whether Neolithic stone structures called dolmens have a religious significance or were built to house animals or resting shepherds. Some of the dolmens and cromlechs are burial sites serving also as border markers. The jentilak (' Giants '), on the other hand, are

4920-514: Is again on the rise due to favorable official language policies and popular support. Currently about 33 percent of the population in the Basque Autonomous Community speaks Basque. Navarre has a population of 601,000; its administrative capital and main city, also regarded by many nationalist Basques as the Basques' historical capital, is Pamplona ( Iruñea in modern Basque). Only Spanish is an official language of Navarre, and

5084-725: Is also due to London-centric influences. Examples of R-dropping are car and sugar , where the R is not pronounced. British dialects differ on the extent of diphthongisation of long vowels, with southern varieties extensively turning them into diphthongs, and with northern dialects normally preserving many of them. As a comparison, North American varieties could be said to be in-between. Long vowels /iː/ and /uː/ are usually preserved, and in several areas also /oː/ and /eː/, as in go and say (unlike other varieties of English, that change them to [oʊ] and [eɪ] respectively). Some areas go as far as not diphthongising medieval /iː/ and /uː/, that give rise to modern /aɪ/ and /aʊ/; that is, for example, in

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5248-427: Is based on British English, but has more influence from American English , often grouped together due to their close proximity. British English, for example, is the closest English to Indian English, but Indian English has extra vocabulary and some English words are assigned different meanings. Basques The English word Basque may be pronounced / b ɑː s k / or / b æ s k / and derives from

5412-457: Is derived from an ancient Basque verb enautsi "to say" (compare modern Basque esan ) and the suffix -(k)ara ("way (of doing something)"). Thus, euskara would mean literally "way of saying" or "way of speaking". One item of evidence in favour of that hypothesis is found in the Spanish book Compendio Historial , written in 1571 by the Basque writer Esteban de Garibay . He records the name of

5576-433: Is in the cave of Altamira , dating from about 37,000 BCE and declared, along with nine other Cantabrian caves, as World Heritage Sites by UNESCO . Historically, the territory sits in the area of Cantabria in the ancient period , but from the late Middle Ages to the early 19th century, the name Cantabria also referred to the territory of the Basques , especially the lordship of Biscay . The modern province of Cantabria

5740-795: Is included in style guides issued by various publishers including The Times newspaper, the Oxford University Press and the Cambridge University Press . The Oxford University Press guidelines were originally drafted as a single broadsheet page by Horace Henry Hart, and were at the time (1893) the first guide of their type in English; they were gradually expanded and eventually published, first as Hart's Rules , and in 2002 as part of The Oxford Manual of Style . Comparable in authority and stature to The Chicago Manual of Style for published American English ,

5904-698: Is more rain. The rivers of Cantabria are short and rapid, descending steeply because the sea is so close to their source in the Cantabrian Mountains. They flow perpendicular to the coastline, except for the Ebro . They also generally flow year round due to constant rainfall. Nevertheless, the rate of flow is modest (20 m/s annual average) compared to the other rivers of the Iberian Peninsula . The rapidness of their waters, caused by their steep descents, gives them great erosive power, creating

6068-625: Is no conflict, I am proud of both. ... I have friends who are involved in the political side of things but that is not for me. My only interest is the culture, the Euskera language, the people, our history and ways." As a result of state language promotion, school policies, the effects of mass media and migration, today virtually all Basques (except for some children below school age) speak the official language of their state (Spanish or French). There are extremely few Basque monolingual speakers: essentially all Basque speakers are bilingual on both sides of

6232-520: Is now northwest Germany and the northern Netherlands. The resident population at this time was generally speaking Common Brittonic —the insular variety of Continental Celtic , which was influenced by the Roman occupation. This group of languages ( Welsh , Cornish , Cumbric ) cohabited alongside English into the modern period, but due to their remoteness from the Germanic languages , influence on English

6396-463: Is the case for English used by European Union institutions. In China, both British English and American English are taught. The UK government actively teaches and promotes English around the world and operates in over 200 countries . English is a West Germanic language that originated from the Anglo-Frisian dialects brought to Britain by Germanic settlers from various parts of what

6560-547: The Chambers Dictionary , and the Collins Dictionary record actual usage rather than attempting to prescribe it. In addition, vocabulary and usage change with time; words are freely borrowed from other languages and other varieties of English, and neologisms are frequent. For historical reasons dating back to the rise of London in the ninth century, the form of language spoken in London and

6724-633: The Basque Autonomous Community and Navarre as settled by the Spanish Constitution, many Basques have attempted higher degrees of self-empowerment (see Basque nationalism ), sometimes by acts of violence. Labourd , Lower Navarre , and Soule were integrated into the French department system (starting 1790), with Basque efforts to establish a region-specific political-administrative entity failing to take off to date. However, in January 2017,

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6888-801: The Cantabrian Armaments in Santander, a section of the army whose purpose was to travel to all the mountain passes from the Central Plateau to detain any French troop. Although defeated, he managed later to regroup in Liébana under the command of General Juan Díaz Porlier, calling his forces the Cantabrian Division , in which there were various regiments and battalions, such as the Hussars of Cantabria ( cavalry ) or

7052-606: The Civil War . Following the war and the subsequent marginalization of such efforts under the Francoists regime , the use of the name of Cantabria decreased, to the point that for official purposes it was relegated to sports associations, the only arena in which Cantabria was noted as a region. In 1963, the president of the Provincial Council, Pedro Escalante y Huidobro, proposed reapplying the name of Cantabria to

7216-658: The East Midlands became standard English within the Court, and ultimately became the basis for generally accepted use in the law, government, literature and education in Britain. The standardisation of British English is thought to be from both dialect levelling and a thought of social superiority. Speaking in the Standard dialect created class distinctions; those who did not speak the standard English would be considered of

7380-537: The Ebro and Garonne rivers was known as Vasconia , a vaguely defined ethnic area and political entity struggling to fend off pressure from the Iberian Visigothic kingdom and Arab rule to the south , as well as the Frankish push from the north. By the turn of the first millennium, the territory of Vasconia had fragmented into different feudal regions, such as Soule and Labourd , while south of

7544-642: The Hermandad de las Marismas ( Brotherhood of the Marshes ) was created, thereby uniting all the important seaports to the East of Asturias. During the period of the Reconquista, the Four Cities actively participated in the re-settling of Andalusia, dispatching men and ships. The coastal port cities of Cádiz and El Puerto de Santa María were settled by families from the Cantabrian Sea ports. Ships from

7708-615: The Province of Santander , as suggested in an academic report written by the historian Tomás Maza Solano. Although further steps were taken and many of the townships were in favour of the move, the petition did not succeed, mostly due to the opposition of Santander City Council. On 30 December 1981, a process that had been started in April 1979 by the Council of Cabezón de la Sal , under the presidency of Ambrosio Calzada Hernández, culminated in

7872-633: The Reconquista , Cantabria still appears to be acknowledged as a region. In the Albendense Chronicle , when speaking of Alfonso I , it says, "This was the son of Peter , the duke of Cantabria". During the 9th century, on mentioning the monastery of Saint Zacharias, in a letter sent to Wiliesind , bishop of Pamplona, Eulogius of Córdoba pinpoints it in Seburim (maybe Zubiri ) on the river Arga , "waters all of Cantabria", suggesting

8036-493: The Royal Spanish Academy with Spanish. Standard British English differs notably in certain vocabulary, grammar, and pronunciation features from standard American English and certain other standard English varieties around the world. British and American spelling also differ in minor ways. The accent, or pronunciation system, of standard British English, based in southeastern England, has been known for over

8200-490: The Scots language or Scottish Gaelic ). Each group includes a range of dialects, some markedly different from others. The various British dialects also differ in the words that they have borrowed from other languages. Around the middle of the 15th century, there were points where within the 5 major dialects there were almost 500 ways to spell the word though . Following its last major survey of English Dialects (1949–1950),

8364-833: The Shooters of Cantabria ( infantry ). During the Carlist wars they formed a unit called the Cantabrian Brigade . The use of terms with ancestral resonance through the 18th and 19th centuries continued during the 20th century, taking on a political tone that was distinctly regionalist, until 1936. In fact, the Republican Federal Party produced an autonomy statute for a Cantabrian-Castilian Federal State that year, which would include present-day Cantabria and any neighbouring areas from Castile and Asturias willing to join it. It could not be passed because of

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8528-626: The Spanish Constitution of 1978 ) known as Euskal Autonomia Erkidegoa or EAE in Basque and as Comunidad Autónoma Vasca or CAV in Spanish (in English: Basque Autonomous Community or BAC), is made up of the three Spanish provinces of Álava , Biscay and Gipuzkoa . The corresponding Basque names of these territories are Araba , Bizkaia and Gipuzkoa , and their Spanish names are Álava , Vizcaya and Guipúzcoa . The BAC only includes three of

8692-573: The University of Leeds has started work on a new project. In May 2007 the Arts and Humanities Research Council awarded a grant to Leeds to study British regional dialects. The team are sifting through a large collection of examples of regional slang words and phrases turned up by the "Voices project" run by the BBC , in which they invited the public to send in examples of English still spoken throughout

8856-805: The Vascones . To the north of this cordon, however, the Cantabri continued to live independently until the Arab invasion. In 714, a mixed Arab / Berber army of Muslim Moors invaded the upper valleys of the Ebro and succeeded in capturing Amaya, the Cantabrian capital, forcing the Cantabrians back to their traditional frontiers, where they joined forces with the Kingdom of Asturias . In the first chronicles of

9020-502: The West Country and other near-by counties of the UK, the consonant R is not pronounced if not followed by a vowel, lengthening the preceding vowel instead. This phenomenon is known as non-rhoticity . In these same areas, a tendency exists to insert an R between a word ending in a vowel and a next word beginning with a vowel. This is called the intrusive R . It could be understood as a merger, in that words that once ended in an R and words that did not are no longer treated differently. This

9184-401: The euskaldunak , singular euskaldun , formed from euskal- (i.e. "Basque (language)") and -dun (i.e. "one who has"); euskaldun literally means a Basque-speaker. Not all Basques are Basque-speakers. Therefore, the neologism euskotar , plural euskotarrak , was coined in the 19th century to mean a Basque person, whether Basque-speaking or not. Alfonso Irigoyen posits that the word euskara

9348-422: The 21st century. RP, while long established as the standard English accent around the globe due to the spread of the British Empire , is distinct from the standard English pronunciation in some parts of the world; most prominently, RP notably contrasts with standard North American accents. In the 21st century, dictionaries like the Oxford English Dictionary , the Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English ,

9512-411: The Ancient Cantabria, as opposed to Castile , which referred solely to the Central Plateau . This distinction has survived into modern times. With the rise of the Catholic Monarchs , the Brethren of the Marshes disappeared, leaving the Coregiment of the Four Villas, which included the whole area of influence of the old Brethren of the Four Villas (almost all of Cantabria). During the ancien régime ,

9676-457: The BAC" are commonly though not universally employed. In particular in common usage the French term Pays Basque ("Basque Country"), in the absence of further qualification, refers either to the whole Basque Country ("Euskal Herria" in Basque), or not infrequently to the northern (or "French") Basque Country specifically. Under Spain's present constitution, Navarre ( Nafarroa in present-day Basque, Navarra historically in Spanish) constitutes

9840-417: The Basque Country to settle in the rest of Spain, France or other parts of the world in different historical periods, often for economic or political reasons. Historically the Basques abroad were often employed in shepherding and ranching and by maritime fisheries and merchants. Millions of Basque descendants (see Basque American and Basque Canadian ) live in North America (the United States; Canada, mainly in

10004-478: The Basque Country, especially the lordship of Biscay, and the Basques . Cantabria is a mountainous and coastal region, with important natural resources. It has two distinct areas which are well differentiated morphologically: Towards the south are higher mountains, the tops of which form the watershed between the drainage basins of the Rivers Ebro , Duero and the rivers that flow into the Bay of Biscay. These peaks generally exceed 1,500 m (4,900 ft) from

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10168-465: The Basque have been a major if not the strongest influence in the country's cultural and economic development. Basque place names are to be found, such as Nueva Vizcaya (now Chihuahua and Durango , Mexico), New Navarre (now Sonora and Sinaloa , Mexico), Biscayne Bay (United States), and Aguereberry Point (United States). Nueva Vizcaya was the first province in the north of the Viceroyalty of New Spain (Mexico) to be explored and settled by

10332-478: The Basque language as enusquera . That may, however, be a writing mistake. In the 19th century, the Basque nationalist activist Sabino Arana posited an original root euzko , which he thought came from eguzkiko ("of the sun", related to the assumption of an original solar religion ). On the basis of that putative root, Arana proposed the name Euzkadi for an independent Basque nation, composed of seven Basque historical territories. Arana's neologism Euzkadi (in

10496-426: The Basque language is only co-official in the province's northern region, where most Basque-speaking Navarrese are concentrated. About a quarter of a million people live in the French Basque Country . Nowadays Basque-speakers refer to this region as Iparralde (Basque for North), and to the Spanish provinces as Hegoalde (South). Much of this population lives in or near the Bayonne-Anglet-Biarritz (BAB) urban belt on

10660-466: The Basque nationalists. A large number of regional and local nationalist and non-nationalist representatives have waged a campaign for years advocating for the creation of a separate Basque département , while these demands have gone unheard by the French administration. There are 2,123,000 people living in the Basque Autonomous Community (279,000 in Alava, 1,160,000 in Biscay and 684,000 in Gipuzkoa). The most important cities in this region, which serve as

10824-406: The Basque people than the " antioqueños ". Also, writer Arturo Escobar Uribe said in his book " Mitos de Antioquia " (Myths of Antioquia) (1950): "Antioquia, which in its clean ascendance predominates the peninsular farmer of the Basque provinces, inherited the virtues of its ancestors. ... Despite the predominance of the white race, its extension in the mountains ... has projected over Colombia's map

10988-522: The Basques is called Basque or Euskara , spoken today by 25%-30% of the region's population. An idea of the central place the language has in cultural terms is given by the fact that Basques identify themselves by the term euskaldun and their country as Euskal Herria , literally "Basque speaker" and "Country of the Basque Language" respectively. The language has been made a political issue by official Spanish and French policies restricting its use either historically or currently; however, this has not stopped

11152-420: The Cantabri, particularly concerning the precise location of the territory that this people had occupied. It was not until the 18th century that the debate about the location and size of Ancient Cantabria was settled in a series of works which described the history of the region such as La Cantabria by the Augustinian father and historian Enrique Flórez de Setién. Concurrent with the resurgence of this interest in

11316-521: The Cantabrian Sea, the Atlantic Ocean and the Mediterranean Sea. The variation in the altitude of the region, which in a short distance ranges from sea level to 2,600 meters in the mountains, leads to a great deal of diversity in vegetation and a large number of biomes . Cantabria has vegetation typical of the Atlantic side of the Iberian Peninsula. It is characterized by forests of leafy deciduous trees such as oak and European beech . Nevertheless, human intervention dating back to ancient times has favored

11480-424: The Cantabrians and the clarification of the aforementioned polemic, many institutions, organizations and jurisdictions in the mountainous territory received the name of "Cantabrian" or "of Cantabria". In 1727, the first attempt to unify what would later become the province of Cantabria occurred. Despite this, the high level of autonomy that the small entities of the fractured estate of Cantabria enjoyed, combined with

11644-469: The Celtic root "kant" or "cant" meaning edge or rim thus "coastal district," or "corner-land", "land on the edge" thus having the same probable derivation as the name of the English county of Kent and Canterbury , one of its major cities. During the Spanish liberal regimes of the 19th century, the term came to be increasingly associated to the province of Santander. However, in late medieval and Modern Period literature, Cantabria and Cantabrians refer to

11808-572: The Country in Cantabria, and presides over the Government, coordinating its activities. British English British English (abbreviations: BrE , en-GB , and BE ) is the set of varieties of the English language native to the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland . More narrowly, it can refer specifically to the English language in England , or, more broadly, to

11972-836: The English Language (1755) was a large step in the English-language spelling reform , where the purification of language focused on standardising both speech and spelling. By the early 20th century, British authors had produced numerous books intended as guides to English grammar and usage, a few of which achieved sufficient acclaim to have remained in print for long periods and to have been reissued in new editions after some decades. These include, most notably of all, Fowler's Modern English Usage and The Complete Plain Words by Sir Ernest Gowers . Detailed guidance on many aspects of writing British English for publication

12136-519: The Four Cities took part in the taking of Seville , destroying the ship bridge linking Triana and Sevilla, a victory that is represented by the Carrack and the Torre del Oro of Sevilla in the coat of arms of Santander , Coat of arms of Cantabria and Avilés (Asturias). In the 16th century, the name La Montaña ( The Mountain ) was widespread in popular usage and in literature, as a designation of

12300-598: The French Basque ( French: [bask] ), itself derived from Gascon Basco (pronounced [ˈbasku] ), cognate with Spanish Vasco (pronounced [ˈbasko] ). Those, in turn, come from Latin Vascō (pronounced [ˈwaskoː] ; plural Vascōnēs —see history section below). The Latin / w / generally evolved into the bilabials / b / and / β̞ / in Gascon and Spanish, probably under

12464-666: The Germanic schwein ) is the animal in the field bred by the occupied Anglo-Saxons and pork (like the French porc ) is the animal at the table eaten by the occupying Normans. Another example is the Anglo-Saxon cu meaning cow, and the French bœuf meaning beef. Cohabitation with the Scandinavians resulted in a significant grammatical simplification and lexical enrichment of the Anglo-Frisian core of English;

12628-635: The Iberian Peninsula and elsewhere. It is certain that they participated in the Second Punic War , from references by Silius Italicus and Horace . When C. Hostilius Mancinus was besieging Numantia , he withdrew upon learning that Cantabri and Vaccaei were present among his auxiliaries . The Cantabrian Wars began in 29 BC. They were defeated by Agrippa with great slaughter in 19 BC , but they revolted again under Tiberius and were never entirely subdued. In older geographers,

12792-678: The Mexican/Texan border, many Basque surnames can be found. The largest concentration of Basques who settled on Mexico's north-eastern "frontera", including the states of Chihuahua , Durango , Coahuila , Nuevo León , and Tamaulipas , also settled along Texas' Rio Grande from South Texas to West Texas . Many of the historic hidalgos , or noble families from this area, had gained their titles and land grants from Spain and Mexico; they still value their land. Some of North America's largest ranches, which were founded under these colonial land grants, can be found in this region. California has

12956-922: The Oxford Manual is a fairly exhaustive standard for published British English that writers can turn to in the absence of specific guidance from their publishing house. British English is the basis of, and very similar to, Commonwealth English . Commonwealth English is English as spoken and written in the Commonwealth countries , though often with some local variation. This includes English spoken in Australia , Malta , New Zealand , Nigeria , and South Africa . It also includes South Asian English used in South Asia, in English varieties in Southeast Asia , and in parts of Africa. Canadian English

13120-686: The Parliament are: to exercise the legislative power , to approve the budgets of the Autonomous Community, to motivate and control the actions of the government, and to develop the rest of the competences that the Spanish Constitution , the Autonomy Statute and the rest of the legal order bestow on it. The President of the Autonomous Community holds the highest representation of the Community and ordinary representation of

13284-549: The Pass of San Glorio in the west to the Pass of Los Tornos in the eastern part: Peña Labra, Castro Valnera and the mountain passes of Sejos, El Escudo and La Sía. The great limestone masses of Picos de Europa also stand out in the southwest of the region: most of their summits exceed 2,500 m (8,200 ft), and their topography is shaped by the former presence of glaciers . Due to the Gulf Stream , Cantabria, as well as

13448-659: The Pyrenees the Castile , Pamplona and the Pyrenean counties of Aragon , Sobrarbe , Ribagorça (later Kingdom of Aragon ), and Pallars emerged as the main regional entities with Basque population in the 9th and 10th centuries. The Kingdom of Pamplona, a central Basque realm, later known as Navarre , underwent a process of feudalization and was subject to the influence of its much larger Aragonese, Castilian and French neighbours. Castile deprived Navarre of its coastline by conquering key western territories (1199–1201), leaving

13612-712: The South East, there are significantly different accents; the Cockney accent spoken by some East Londoners is strikingly different from Received Pronunciation (RP). Cockney rhyming slang can be (and was initially intended to be) difficult for outsiders to understand, although the extent of its use is often somewhat exaggerated. Londoners speak with a mixture of accents, depending on ethnicity, neighbourhood, class, age, upbringing, and sundry other factors. Estuary English has been gaining prominence in recent decades: it has some features of RP and some of Cockney. Immigrants to

13776-497: The Spanish Basque Country, Basques that don't have a sense of Spanish identity make up an important part of the population. As with many European states, a regional identity, be it linguistically derived or otherwise, is not mutually exclusive with the broader national one. For example, Basque rugby union player for France, Imanol Harinordoquy , has said about his national identity: "I am French and Basque. There

13940-521: The Spanish. It consisted mostly of the area which is today the states of Chihuahua and Durango (the original Durango is a known city in Biscay). In Mexico most descendants of Basque emigrees are concentrated in the cities of Monterrey , Saltillo , Reynosa , Camargo , and the states of Jalisco , Durango , Nuevo León , Tamaulipas , Coahuila , and Sonora . The Basques were important in the mining industry; many were ranchers and vaqueros ( cowboys ), and

14104-598: The UK in recent decades have brought many more languages to the country and particularly to London. Surveys started in 1979 by the Inner London Education Authority discovered over 125 languages being spoken domestically by the families of the inner city's schoolchildren. Notably Multicultural London English , a sociolect that emerged in the late 20th century spoken mainly by young, working-class people in multicultural parts of London . Since

14268-576: The United Kingdom , as well as within the countries themselves. The major divisions are normally classified as English English (or English as spoken in England (which is itself broadly grouped into Southern English , West Country , East and West Midlands English and Northern English ), Northern Irish English (in Northern Ireland), Welsh English (not to be confused with the Welsh language ), and Scottish English (not to be confused with

14432-426: The United Kingdom, and this could be described by the term British English . The forms of spoken English, however, vary considerably more than in most other areas of the world where English is spoken and so a uniform concept of British English is more difficult to apply to the spoken language. Globally, countries that are former British colonies or members of the Commonwealth tend to follow British English, as

14596-701: The United States is in the area around Boise, Idaho , home to the Basque Museum and Cultural Center, host to an annual Basque festival, as well as a festival for the Basque diaspora every five years. Reno, Nevada , where the Center for Basque Studies and the Basque Studies Library are located at the University of Nevada , is another significant nucleus of Basque population. Elko, Nevada , sponsors an annual Basque festival that celebrates

14760-529: The Villa of Pujayo, the Villa of Pie de Concha y Bárcena, the Valley of Anievas, and the Valley of Toranzo. Having learned lessons from the failed attempt of 1727, the first objective of the new entity was to obtain approval from King Charles III for the union of all the Cantabrian jurisdictions into one province. The royal ratification was granted on 22 November 1779. The 28 jurisdictions that initially comprised

14924-465: The West Scottish accent. Phonological features characteristic of British English revolve around the pronunciation of the letter R, as well as the dental plosive T and some diphthongs specific to this dialect. Once regarded as a Cockney feature, in a number of forms of spoken British English, /t/ has become commonly realised as a glottal stop [ʔ] when it is in the intervocalic position, in

15088-583: The Western half of Europe, especially along the Western fringe of the continent. Basque tribes were mentioned in Roman times by Strabo and Pliny, including the Vascones , Aquitani , and others. There is enough evidence to support the hypothesis that at that time and later they spoke old varieties of the Basque language (see: Aquitanian language ). In the Early Middle Ages , the territory between

15252-605: The approval of the General Courts on 15 December 1981, the King of Spain signed the corresponding Organic Law of Autonomy Statute for Cantabria on 30 December of the same year. Thus, the province of Santander broke its link to Castile, and left the former region of Castile and León to which it had belonged up to that time, together with the provinces of Ávila , Burgos , León , Logroño , Palencia , Salamanca , Segovia , Soria , Valladolid and Zamora . On 20 February 1982,

15416-706: The area of Santander and eastern Asturias , forming a part of Hispania Tarraconensis (" Tarragonan Spain"). The principal tribes of the area were the Pleutauri , the Varduli , the Autrigones , the Tuisi , and the Conisci or Concaui , who were known for feeding on their horses' blood . The area was well settled, with the largest city being Juliobriga , and the local mountains exploited for lead mines. Following

15580-488: The award of the grant in 2007, Leeds University stated: that they were "very pleased"—and indeed, "well chuffed"—at receiving their generous grant. He could, of course, have been "bostin" if he had come from the Black Country , or if he was a Scouser he would have been well "made up" over so many spondoolicks, because as a Geordie might say, £460,000 is a "canny load of chink". Most people in Britain speak with

15744-501: The birds (ZEPA). Furthermore, nine Sites of Community Importance (LIC) have been declared: Western Mountain, Eastern Mountain, Western Rias and Oyambre Dunes, Dunes of Liencres and Estuary of the Pas, El Puntal Dunes and Estuary of the Miera, Ria de Ajo, Marshes of Noja - Santoña , Escudo de Cabuérniga Range and several caves with important bat colonies. According to the 2009 census,

15908-414: The border. Spanish or French is typically the first language of citizens from other regions (who often feel no need to learn Basque), and Spanish or French is also the first language of many Basques, all of which maintains the dominance of the state tongues of both France and Spain. Recent Basque Government policies aim to change this pattern, as they are viewed as potential threats against mainstream usage of

16072-454: The cider is in season. At the end of the 20th century, despite ETA violence (ended in 2010) and the crisis of heavy industries, the Basque economic condition recovered remarkably. They emerged from the Franco regime with a revitalized language and culture. The Basque language expanded geographically led by large increases in the major urban centers of Pamplona, Bilbao, and Bayonne, where only

16236-585: The coast (in Basque these are Baiona , Angelu and Miarritze ). The Basque language, which was traditionally spoken by most of the region's population outside the BAB urban zone, is today rapidly losing ground to French. The French Basque Country's lack of self-government within the French state is coupled with the absence of official status for the Basque language in the region. Attempts to introduce bilingualism in local administration have so far met direct refusal from French officials. Large numbers of Basques have left

16400-584: The collapse of the Roman Empire, Cantabria regained its independence from the rule of the Visigoths . In 574, King Liuvigild attacked Cantabria and managed to capture the south of the country, including the city of Amaya , where he established a Visigothic province called the Duchy of Cantabria (see picture), which would serve as a limes or frontier zone to contain the Cantabri as well as their neighbors

16564-580: The collective dialects of English throughout the British Isles taken as a single umbrella variety, for instance additionally incorporating Scottish English , Welsh English , and Northern Irish English . Tom McArthur in the Oxford Guide to World English acknowledges that British English shares "all the ambiguities and tensions [with] the word 'British' and as a result can be used and interpreted in two ways, more broadly or more narrowly, within

16728-622: The country. The BBC Voices project also collected hundreds of news articles about how the British speak English from swearing through to items on language schools. This information will also be collated and analysed by Johnson's team both for content and for where it was reported. "Perhaps the most remarkable finding in the Voices study is that the English language is as diverse as ever, despite our increased mobility and constant exposure to other accents and dialects through TV and radio". When discussing

16892-430: The creation of pastures, allowing the existence of large areas of grassland and prairies suitable for grazing cattle. These grasslands are mingled with plantations of eucalyptus and native oak. The southern part of Cantabria, including the comarca of Campoo the fringes of the Castilian plateau, is characterized by the transition to drier vegetation. Another diversifying factor which contributes to local variation within

17056-577: The dance, cuisine and cultures of the Basque peoples of Spanish, French and Mexican nationalities who have arrived in Nevada since the late 19th century. Texas has a large percentage of Hispanics descended from Basques who participated in the conquest of New Spain . Many of the original Tejanos had Basque blood, including those who fought in the Battle of the Alamo alongside many of the other Texans. Along

17220-659: The dance, cuisine, and culture of the peoples. The surrounding area of San Bernardino County has many Basque descendants as residents. They are mostly descendants of settlers from Spain and Mexico. These Basques in California are grouped in the group known as Californios . Basques of European Spanish-French and Latin American nationalities also settled throughout the western U.S. in states like Louisiana , New Mexico , Arizona , Utah , Colorado , Wyoming , Montana , Oregon , and Washington . The identifying language of

17384-539: The day of historical akelarre or coven . Mari was said to reside in Mount Anboto ; periodically she crossed the skies as a bright light to reach her other home at Mount Txindoki . Legends also speak of many and abundant genies, like jentilak (equivalent to giants ), lamiak (equivalent to nymphs ), mairuak (builders of the cromlechs or stone circles, literally Moors ), iratxoak ( imps ), sorginak ( witches , priestess of Mari), and so on. Basajaun

17548-460: The desire to respect fundamental rights and public freedom, at the same time as consolidating and stimulating regional development through democratic channels. This document gathers all competences of the Autonomous Community that were transferred from the Government of Spain . As in other Autonomous Communities, some competences were not transferred, for example, Justice. The Statute also defines

17712-468: The different interpretations of what is considered Christianisation. Early traces of Christianity can be found in the major urban areas from the 4th century onwards, a bishopric from 589 in Pamplona and three hermit cave concentrations (two in Álava , one in Navarre ) that were in use from the 6th century onwards. In this sense, Christianity arrived "early". Pre-Christian belief seems to have focused on

17876-491: The earliest modern humans who colonised Europe. Partly for these reasons, anthropological and genetic studies from the beginning and the end of the 20th century theorized that the Basques are the descendants of the original Cro-Magnons . But although they are genetically distinctive in some ways due to isolation, the Basques are still very typically European in their Y-DNA and mtDNA sequences, and in some other genetic loci . These same sequences are widespread throughout

18040-541: The etymology of the name Cantabria , yet its origins remain uncertain. The Online Etymology Dictionary states the root cant- is said to come from the Celtic for "rock" or "rocky", while -abr was a common suffix used in Celtic regions. Thus, Cantabrian could mean "people who live in the rocks" or " highlanders ", a reference to the steep and mountainous territory of Cantabria. The name Cantabria could also be related to

18204-569: The first Regional Assembly (now Parliament) was formed, with provisional status. From this time, the former province of Santander has been known as Cantabria and has thereby regained its historic name. The first home-rule elections were held in May 1983. The 4th Legislature (1995–1999) brought into effect the first great reform of the Autonomy Statute of Cantabria, approved by all the parliamentary groups. The Autonomy Statute of Cantabria of 30 December 1981, established that Cantabria has in its institutions

18368-478: The first translation of the new Testament into Basque by Joanes Leizarraga . Queen Jeanne III of Navarre , a devout Huguenot , commissioned the translation of the New Testament into Basque and Béarnese for the benefit of her subjects. By the time Henry III of Navarre converted to Catholicism in order to become king of France, Protestantism virtually disappeared from the Basque community. Bayonne held

18532-585: The following joined in quick succession: the Abbey of Santillana , the Valleys of Tudanca , Polaciones , Herrerías , Castañeda , the Villa of Torrelavega and environs, Val de San Vicente , Valle de Carriedo , Tresviso , and the Pasiegan Villas of La Vega , San Roque and San Pedro , as well as the city of Santander with its abbey. Competition between the townships of Laredo and Santander led to

18696-673: The following: The first written reference to the name Cantabria emerges around 195 BC, in which the historian Cato the Elder speaks in his book Origines about the source of the Ebro River in the country of the Cantabri : ...The Ebro River starts in the land of the Cantabri , large and beautiful, with abundant fish... There are about 150 references to Cantabria or the Cantabri in surviving Greek and Latin texts. The Cantabri were used as mercenaries in various conflicts, both within

18860-482: The granting of self-rule to Cantabria, outlined in Article 143 of the Spanish Constitution . Cantabria based its claim to autonomy on the constitutional precept that made provision for self-government for " provinces with a historic regional character ". A Mixed Assembly formed out of provincial deputies and national members of parliament began the task of drawing up an Autonomy Statute on 10 September 1979. Following

19024-492: The greatest jurisdictional lordships of Cantabria were mainly under the control of three of the Grandee families of Spain: that of Mendoza ( Dukes of Infantado , Marquises of Santillana), of Manrique de Lara (Marquises of Aguilar de Campoo, Counts of Castañeda ), and to a lesser extent that of Velasco ( Dukes of Frías , Constables of Castile ). From the 16th century on, there was renewed interest in studying Cantabria and

19188-458: The idea of two different morphemes, one that causes the double negation, and one that is used for the point or the verb. Standard English in the United Kingdom, as in other English-speaking nations, is widely enforced in schools and by social norms for formal contexts but not by any singular authority; for instance, there is no institution equivalent to the Académie française with French or

19352-590: The indiscriminate levees for soldiers, and above all the progression of fiscal impositions. All of this led to an acceleration of contact between villas, valleys and jurisdictions, which tended to focus on the Assemblies of the provinces of the Nine Valleys, led by the deputies elected by the traditional entities of self-government. There were two events that triggered the culmination of the integration process in this second attempt: In this General Assembly

19516-535: The influence of Basque and the related Aquitanian (the Latin /w/ instead evolved into / v / in French , Italian and other Romance languages ). Several coins from the 2nd and the 1st centuries BC found in the Basque Country bear the inscription barscunes . The place in which they were minted is not certain but is thought to be somewhere near Pamplona , in the heartland of the area that historians believe

19680-558: The kingdom landlocked. The Basques were ravaged by the War of the Bands , bitter partisan wars between local ruling families. Weakened by the Navarrese civil war, the bulk of the realm eventually fell before the onslaught of the Spanish armies (1512–1524). However, the Navarrese territory north of the Pyrenees remained beyond the reach of an increasingly powerful Spain. Lower Navarre became

19844-523: The last southern Midlands accent to use the broad "a" in words like bath or grass (i.e. barth or grarss ). Conversely crass or plastic use a slender "a". A few miles northwest in Leicestershire the slender "a" becomes more widespread generally. In the town of Corby , five miles (8 km) north, one can find Corbyite which, unlike the Kettering accent, is largely influenced by

20008-518: The later Norman occupation led to the grafting onto that Germanic core of a more elaborate layer of words from the Romance branch of the European languages. This Norman influence entered English largely through the courts and government. Thus, English developed into a "borrowing" language of great flexibility and with a huge vocabulary . Dialects and accents vary amongst the four countries of

20172-416: The latter, having initially allowed the name of Cantabria for the province created at the beginning of the 19th century, later retracting its consent and demanding that it bear the name of Santander, so there would be no doubt as to which was the capital. When in 1821 the Provincial Council presented before the constitutional Courts its definitive plan for the provincial borders and legal entities, it proposed

20336-401: The mass internal migration to Northamptonshire in the 1940s and given its position between several major accent regions, it has become a source of various accent developments. In Northampton the older accent has been influenced by overspill Londoners. There is an accent known locally as the Kettering accent, which is a transitional accent between the East Midlands and East Anglian . It is

20500-672: The minority tongue. The Basque language is thought to be a genetic language isolate in contrast with other European languages, vast majority of which belong to the broad Indo-European language family . Another peculiarity of Basque is that it has probably been spoken continuously in situ , in and around its present territorial location, for longer than most other modern European languages, which are typically thought to have been introduced in historic or prehistoric times through population migrations or other processes of cultural transmission. However, popular stereotypes characterizing Basque as "the oldest language in Europe" and "unique among

20664-412: The name of province of Cantabria, to which the Township of Santander replied that " this province must retain the name of Santander ". However, many newspapers still showed in their headings the name of Cantabria, or Cantabrian. During the War of Independence (1808–1814), Bishop Rafael Tomás Menéndez de Luarca, a strong defender of absolutism, promoted himself as the "Regent of Cantabria" and established

20828-421: The narrow V-shaped valleys characteristic of Green Spain. The environmental condition of the rivers is generally good, although increasing human activity due to rising population in the valleys continues to pose a challenge. The main rivers of the region, sorted by drainage basin , are: Cantabria is the only autonomous community whose rivers flow into every one of the seas which surround the Iberian Peninsula :

20992-408: The neighboring communities and produce from the sea and the land. A 20th-century feature of Basque culture is the phenomenon of gastronomical societies (called txoko in Basque), food clubs where men gather to cook and enjoy their own food. Until recently, women were allowed entry only one day in the year. Cider houses ( Sagardotegiak ) are popular restaurants in Gipuzkoa open for a few months while

21156-431: The population were immigrants. The predominant countries of origin for immigrants to Cantabria are Colombia , Romania , Ecuador , Peru , Moldova , and Morocco . The majority of the population resides in the coastal area, particularly in two cities: Santander , with 183,000 people, and Torrelavega , the second largest urban and industrial centre in Cantabria, having a population of around 60,000. These two cities form

21320-460: The prototype of its race; in Medellín with the industrial paisa , entrepreneur, strong and steady ... in its towns, the adventurer, arrogant, world-explorer. ... Its myths, which are an evidence of their deep credulity and an indubitable proof of their Iberian ancestor, are the sequel of the conqueror's blood which runs through their veins". Bambuco , a Colombian folk music, has Basque roots. The largest of several important Basque communities in

21484-431: The province of Cantabria were clear in their intention that all the other jurisdictions that formed the Party and Baton of the Four Villas of the Coast should be included in the new province. To this end they set out the steps needed for this to happen as soon as those jurisdictions should request it. They would have to abide by the ordinances, having the same rights and duties as the founders, all on an equal footing. Thus,

21648-471: The provinces of Newfoundland and Quebec ), all over Latin America, South Africa, and Australia. Miguel de Unamuno said: "There are at least two things that clearly can be attributed to Basques: the Society of Jesus and the Republic of Chile ." Chilean historian Luis Thayer Ojeda estimated that 48 percent of immigrants to Chile in the 17th and 18th centuries were Basque. Estimates range between 2.5 and 5 million Basque descendants live in Chile ;

21812-518: The provinces' administrative centers, are Bilbao (in Biscay), San Sebastián (in Gipuzkoa), and Vitoria-Gasteiz (in Álava). The official languages are Basque and Spanish. Knowledge of Spanish is compulsory under the Spanish constitution (article no. 3), and knowledge and usage of Basque is a right under the Statute of Autonomy (article no. 6), so only knowledge of Spanish is virtually universal. Knowledge of Basque, after declining for many years during Franco's dictatorship owing to official persecution,

21976-459: The region has a population of 591,886 which constitutes 1.29% of the population of Spain, with the population density numbering 106.8 people per kilometer. The average life expectancy for male inhabitants is 75 years; for female inhabitants, it is 83 years. Eight years later in 2017 the population has fallen to 581,477 according to INE. In relative contrast to other regions of Spain, Cantabria has not experienced much immigration. In 2007, only 4.7% of

22140-468: The region is the Mediterranean ecotone , giving rise to species unique to the region, such as the holm oak and arbutus trees , which are found in poor limestone soils with little moisture. In Cantabria there are several zones of plant life: During the last two decades of the 20th century, and due mainly to European agricultural policies ( CAP ), many farmers substituted forestry for livestock farming, so as to avoid unemployment and poverty. This provoked

22304-399: The regularized spelling Euskadi ) is still widely used in both Basque and Spanish since it is now the official name of the Autonomous Community of the Basque Country . The distinctiveness noted by studies of classical genetic markers (such as blood groups ) and the pre-Indo-European of the Basque language has resulted in a popular and long-held view that Basques are "living fossils" of

22468-611: The rest of "Green Spain", has a much more temperate climate than might be expected for its latitude. The region has a humid oceanic climate , with warm summers and mild winters. Annual precipitation is around 1,200 mm at the coasts and higher in the mountains. The mean temperature is about 14 °C (57.2 °F). Snow is frequent in the higher zones of Cantabria between the months of October and March. Some zones of Picos de Europa, over 2,500 metres high, have an alpine climate with snow persisting year-round. The driest months are July and August. The mountainous relief of Cantabria has

22632-457: The rest of the family (unlike in England, with strict primogeniture, where the eldest son inherited everything and often did not provide for others). Even though they were provided for in some way, younger siblings had to make much of their living by other means. Mostly after the advent of industrialisation, this system resulted in the emigration of many rural Basques to Spain, France or the Americas. Harsh by modern standards, this custom resulted in

22796-437: The rest opened small shops in major cities such as Mexico City , Guadalajara and Puebla . In Guatemala , most Basques have been concentrated in Sacatepequez Department , Antigua Guatemala , Jalapa for six generations now, while some have migrated to Guatemala City . In Colombia, a large number of Basques settled mainly in Antioquia and the Coffee Axis . In 1955, Joaquín Ospina said: "Is there something more similar to

22960-426: The saying: " Pan para hoy, hambre para mañana " (which translates as 'Bread for today, hunger for tomorrow'; i.e., "short-term gain, long-term pain"). The plantation of pines has given way in the last decades to that of eucalyptus because this non-indigenous species has no natural attacker within the European ecosystem (while pines are highly vulnerable to the pine processionary ). Both in relative and absolute terms

23124-640: The seven provinces of the currently called historical territories. It is sometimes referred to simply as "the Basque Country" (or Euskadi ) by writers and public agencies only considering those three western provinces, but also on occasions merely as a convenient abbreviation when this does not lead to confusion in the context. Others reject this usage as inaccurate and are careful to specify the BAC (or an equivalent expression such as "the three provinces", up to 1978 referred to as "Provincias Vascongadas" in Spanish) when referring to this entity or region. Likewise, terms such as "the Basque Government" for "the government of

23288-415: The social position of women in both traditional and modern Basque society is somewhat better than in neighbouring cultures, and women have a substantial influence in decisions about the domestic economy. In the past, some women participated in collective magical ceremonies. They were key participants in a rich folklore, today largely forgotten. Basque cuisine is at the heart of Basque culture, influenced by

23452-407: The south by Castile and León ( provinces of León , Palencia and Burgos ), on the west by the Principality of Asturias , and on the north by the Cantabrian Sea , which forms part of the Bay of Biscay . Cantabria belongs to Green Spain , the name given to the strip of land between the Bay of Biscay and the Cantabrian Mountains , so called because of its particularly lush vegetation, due to

23616-403: The symbols that should represent the region: The flag , the coat of arms and the anthem of Cantabria . The Parliament of Cantabria is the principal self-government institution of the Autonomous Community, being the representative body of the Cantabrians. Presently it is constituted by thirty-nine deputies elected by universal, equal, free, direct and secret suffrage. The primary functions of

23780-400: The teaching, speaking, writing, and cultivating of this increasingly vibrant minority language. This sense of Basque identity tied to the local language does not only exist in isolation. For many Basques, it is juxtaposed with a sense of either Spanish or French identity tied with the use of the Spanish and French languages among other Basques, especially in the French Basque Country. Regarding

23944-412: The temperatures are commonly higher than 20 °C (68 °F). Fires are often helped by this type of wind: one example is the fire that destroyed part of the city of Santander in the winter of 1941 . In these specific cases in the southern part of the mountain range the dry adiabatic gradient produces different conditions to the rest of the region: the wind there is fresher and more humid, and there

24108-539: The term "High Navarre" ( Nafarroa Garaia in Basque, Alta Navarra in Spanish) is also encountered as a way of referring to the territory of the present-day autonomous community. There are three other historic provinces parts of the Basque Country: Labourd , Lower Navarre and Soule ( Lapurdi, Nafarroa Beherea and Zuberoa in Basque; Labourd, Basse-Navarre and Soule in French), devoid of official status within France's present-day political and administrative territorial organization, and only minor political support to

24272-416: The term Cantabria referred to an expansive country bounded by the Cantabrian Sea (the Bay of Biscay ), the western side of the Sella valley in Asturias , the hillfort of Peña Amaya in Burgos , and along the Aguera River almost as far as Castro Urdiales . It thus included areas of Asturias , Santander , Biscay , and Guipuzcoa . Following the Roman conquest of Spain , however, it was restricted to

24436-433: The theft of work tools worth £500 from a van at the Sprucefield park and ride car park in Lisburn. A football team can be treated likewise: Arsenal have lost just one of 20 home Premier League matches against Manchester City. This tendency can be observed in texts produced already in the 19th century. For example, Jane Austen , a British author, writes in Chapter 4 of Pride and Prejudice , published in 1813: All

24600-441: The topic of some discussion. There are, broadly speaking, two views. According to one, Christianity arrived in the Basque Country during the 4th and 5th centuries but according to the other, it did not take place until the 12th and 13th centuries. The Encyclopaedia Britannica says that the Basques were not Christianized until the tenth century, however, and that their earlier animism survives in their folklore. The main issue lies in

24764-403: The traditional accent of Newcastle upon Tyne , 'out' will sound as 'oot', and in parts of Scotland and North-West England, 'my' will be pronounced as 'me'. Long vowels /iː/ and /uː/ are diphthongised to [ɪi] and [ʊu] respectively (or, more technically, [ʏʉ], with a raised tongue), so that ee and oo in feed and food are pronounced with a movement. The diphthong [oʊ] is also pronounced with

24928-431: The use of woods for forestry has increased in Cantabria, and is now almost 70% of all woods in the region. Along with these characteristics it would also be necessary to mention peculiarities of the comarca of Liébana , which has a microclimate very similar to the Mediterranean , allowing to grow cork oaks , vines and olives , and which is still very well conserved from human activity. The other remarkable comarca

25092-596: The valley", Etxeberria "the new house", and so on. In contrast to surrounding regions, ancient Basque inheritance patterns, recognised in the fueros , favoured survival of the unity of inherited land holdings. In a kind of primogeniture, these usually were inherited by the eldest male or female child. As in other cultures, the fate of other family members depended on the assets of a family: wealthy Basque families tended to provide for all children in some way, while less-affluent families may have had only one asset to provide to one child. However, this heir often provided for

25256-440: The villas, valleys and subscribed jurisdictions. They were, in addition to the Nine Valleys: Rivadedeva, Peñamellera, the province of Liébana, Peñarrubia, Lamasón, Rionansa, the Villa of San Vicente de la Barquera, Coto de Estrada, Valdáliga, the Villa of Santillana del Mar, Lugar de Viérnoles, the Villa of Cartes and environs, the Valley of Buelna, the Valley of Cieza, the Valley of Iguña with the Villas of San Vicente and Los Llares,

25420-398: The wet and temperate oceanic climate . The climate is strongly influenced by Atlantic Ocean winds trapped by the mountains; the average annual precipitation is about 1,200 mm (47 inches). Cantabria has archaeological sites from the Upper Paleolithic period, although the first signs of human occupation date from the Lower Paleolithic . The most significant site for cave paintings

25584-501: The world are good and agreeable in your eyes. However, in Chapter 16, the grammatical number is used. The world is blinded by his fortune and consequence. Some dialects of British English use negative concords, also known as double negatives . Rather than changing a word or using a positive, words like nobody, not, nothing, and never would be used in the same sentence. While this does not occur in Standard English, it does occur in non-standard dialects. The double negation follows

25748-406: The world's languages" may be misunderstood and lead to erroneous assumptions. Over the centuries, Basque has remained in continuous contact with neighboring western European languages with which it has come to share numerous lexical properties and typological features; it is therefore misleading to exaggerate the "outlandish" character of Basque. Basque is also a modern language, and is established as

25912-400: The younger generations, while the older ones are more religious. Catholicism is, by far, the largest religion in Basque Country . In 2019, the proportion of Basques that identify themselves as Roman Catholic was 60%, while it is one of the most secularized communities of Spain: 24.6% were non-religious and 12.3% of Basques were atheist . The Christianisation of the Basque Country has been

26076-467: Was notably limited . However, the degree of influence remains debated, and it has recently been argued that its grammatical influence accounts for the substantial innovations noted between English and the other West Germanic languages. Initially, Old English was a diverse group of dialects, reflecting the varied origins of the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England. One of these dialects, Late West Saxon , eventually came to dominate. The original Old English

26240-417: Was constituted on 28 July 1778 at Puente San Miguel, Reocín . The yearly Day of the Institutions holiday on 28 July celebrates this. The Organic Law of the Autonomy Statute of Cantabria , approved on 30 December 1981, gave the region its own institutions of self-government. Numerous authors, including Isidore of Seville , Julio Caro Baroja , Aureliano Fernández Guerra and Adolf Schulten , have explored

26404-422: Was in Aloña , or Supelegor , or Gorbea . One of her names, Mari Urraca possibly ties her to an historical Navarrese princess of the 11th and 12th century, with other legends giving her a brother or cousin who was a Roman Catholic priest. So far the discussions about whether the name Mari is original and just happened to coincide closely with the Christian name María or if Mari is an early Basque attempt to give

26568-402: Was inhabited by the Vascones . Some scholars have suggested a Celtic etymology based on bhar-s- , meaning "summit", "point" or "leaves", according to which barscunes may have meant "the mountain people ", "the tall ones" or "the proud ones", and others have posited a relationship to a Proto-Indo-European root *bar- meaning "border", "frontier", "march". In Basque, people call themselves

26732-422: Was never a truly mixed language in the strictest sense of the word; mixed languages arise from the cohabitation of speakers of different languages, who develop a hybrid tongue for basic communication). The more idiomatic, concrete and descriptive English is, the more it is from Anglo-Saxon origins. The more intellectual and abstract English is, the more it contains Latin and French influences, e.g. swine (like

26896-418: Was then influenced by two waves of invasion: the first was by speakers of the Scandinavian branch of the Germanic family, who settled in parts of Britain in the eighth and ninth centuries; the second was the Normans in the 11th century, who spoke Old Norman and ultimately developed an English variety of this called Anglo-Norman . These two invasions caused English to become "mixed" to some degree (though it

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