They discover “the oldest written testimony in the Basque language” in a bronze from the 1st century BC found in Navarra

by time news

Sorioneku‘, whose translation would be something like “good fortune”, “good luck” or “good luck to come”. That is the first of the five words that has been deciphered in the ‘hand of Irulegi‘, a bronze sheet from the first third of the 1st century BC found in Navarra that contains, according to experts, “the oldest and also the most extensive document written in the Basque language that is known to date”.

The hand was found in the excavations carried out by researchers from the Aranzadi Science Society in the town of too stupid, inhabited from the middle of the Bronze Age (15th to 11th centuries BC) until the end of the Iron Age (1st century BC). The archaeologists found it at the entrance of a house, where they believe it hung from its door, for the protection of home.

After completing the excavations in the medieval castle of Irulegi, the researchers’ next steps focused on the large esplanade that opened at the foot of the castle, on this 893-meter-high mountain that dominates the Pamplona basin and the steps that they unite the south of Navarre with the Pyrenean valleys. They knew from bibliography that a town from the Iron Age existed on these 3 hectares and with geophysical surveys and surveys they located part of a main road, 4 meters wide, and two houses of about 70 square meters.

In one of those houses, the team led by the archaeologist Mattin Aiestara was finding indications that had suffered a fire caused by an armed attack in which arrowheads of Roman typology were used. According to the dating carried out by the University of Uppsala, in Sweden, the remains corresponded to the last third of the 1st century BC, at the time of the sertorian wars (years 83-73 BC) fought between the Romans Quinto Sertorio and Lucio Cornelio Sulla, in which the autochthonous settlers took sides.

In the fire, the green roof of the house and the adobe walls fell on it, preserving its interior. “After lifting everything and verifying that it was a sealed house, we found the objects of daily life that its inhabitants left behind when they ran away,” explains archaeologist Juantxo Agirre, a member of the team and Aranzadi’s secretary.

Found in June 2021

Among these materials, whose analysis will be published by Aiestarán in 2024, on June 18, 2021, they found a hand-shaped metal piece that, like the rest of the objects, they took to the Restoration laboratory of the Government of Navarra, where they were deposited. She was the hired restorer Carmen Usua, who discovered the inscription on ‘Irulegi’s hand’ when began its cleaning and restoration.

I began to see that the piece had some kind of decoration and soon I realized that it was letters, it was an inscription. I didn’t know then that it was going to be so important,” he says.

Pulling the hand out of the ground

Aranzadi Science Society

Agirre recalls that for the archaeologists “it was a great emotion” to find out that this right hand made of a sheet of bronze with 53.19% tin, 40.87% copper and 2.16% lead, something common in old alloys, had five written words (40 signs) distributed in four lines.

Seeing that it was a pre-Roman script, they immediately contacted the Navarrese epigrapher Javier VelazaProfessor of Latin Philology at the University of Barcelona, ​​and later with Joaquín Gorrochateguian expert in paleolinguistics and professor of Indo-European Linguistics at the University of the Basque Country, to examine the characters inscribed on the 143.1-millimeter-high, 1.09-mm-thick, and 127.9-mm-wide piece whose weight reaches 35.9 grams.

The inscription followed a semi-syllabic system, like the Iberian one, but in it Velaza recognized a signa T, which does not exist in this one and which had already appeared before on two coins minted in Basque territory. “The Basques borrowed the Iberian writing system, adapting it to their characteristics“he points out.

The translation of the inscription into the Latin alphabet is as follows: sorioneku {n} / tenekebeekiŕateŕe[n] / oTiŕtan · eseakaŕi / eŕaukon ·

The first word, “sorioneku“was “very transparent” for Velaza and Gorrochategui, as it is very reminiscent of the current Basque term ‘zorioneko’, which means “of good fortune”, “of good fortune”.

The experts have not yet been able to decipher the rest of the writing, but they do not rule out that over time its meaning can be unraveled. For the other words there are various hypotheses and possibilities, although they have not found anything that in principle reminds of a person’s name or any divinity.

There are no parallels to this unique hand either. In Huesca an ancient lead hand is preserved, which surely had the same apotropaic function, but does not contain any text.

joseba larratxe

Irulegi’s hand “has extraordinary importance”, according to Velaza. “I have been lucky enough to be able to publish highly relevant inscriptions in 30 years, but none with the importance of this one, which shows that the Basques used writing, that they adopted the Iberian syllabary and adapted it”, he underlines.

In the opinion of the researchers, the inscription represents “the most extensive ancient text in the Basque language known to date.” Together with the testimonies of the coins minted in this area and other epigraphs, whose attribution is debated -the Andelos mosaicthe Aranguren bronze and one inscription on stone of Olite-, “comes to show the use of writing by the ancient Basques, in an episode of literacy which, from what is known up to now, seems to have been relatively modest, but which is attested by the piece by Irulegi” .

The testimony also supposes a singularity with regard to the typology and morphology of the support (a hand nailed down with the fingers downwards) and the inscription technique used (dotted after a sgraffito).

“In the hand of Irulegi two writing techniques have been used, which is practically unknown, not only in all the epigraphy of Hispania, but in all the ancient epigraphy of the Western world”, Javier Velaza points out. They have only found a very distant case in a Latin inscription from the imperial era.

The Navarrese president in the Góngora Palace, where the discovery was presented.

Navarre Government

The discovery was presented this Monday at the Palacio de Góngora by the president of Navarra, María Chivite, who has defined the discovery as “a historical milestone of the first order” since it supposes “a leap like few others in the knowledge that until now we had of our history and our culture”.

The immediate destination of the ‘hand of Irulegi’ will be a chamber for the conservation of metals in the premises of the Historical Heritage Service, where the research work will continue. In the future, it is expected to be able to exhibit it in the Museum of Navarra, which has the appropriate conservation and security measures for its exhibition.

Excavations inside the house in Irulegi

Mattin Aiestara

A fortified town before Pamplona

Irulegi is one of the most notable examples of fortified towns in the area, according to the Government of Navarra in a note. Its height and privileged geographical situation gave it an important defensive value.

The primitive enclave located at the base of the castle grew over the centuries until it reached some 14 hectares in the I BC, including spaces for agriculture and livestock, where it is estimated that more than a hundred people lived. The enclosure was surrounded by walls.

The fact that the inhabitants chose elevated areas to live is marked by a context of population growth and a worsening climate (wetter and somewhat cold), which made resources scarce and they had to compete for them. The answer was the appearance of stable, easily defendable and walled proto-cities, inhabited by farmers and shepherds, who, at the same time, were warriors.

Irulegi, together with two or three other enclaves, could be one of the settlements that articulated the settlement of the Pamplona Basin, before the arrival of Rome and the foundation of Pompelo, present-day Pamplona (years 74 or 75 BC).

Aerial photo of the castle of Irulegi, in the foreground, and further away the site of the Iron Age town.

SC aranzadi

After several centuries of neglect, a royal castle (belonging to the King) was built on the top of Irulegi in the mid-13th century and Martín García de Eusa was appointed its warden. The construction was carried out on previous defensive settlements, probably on a tower or fortification that already existed during the Muslim campaign of the year 924, according to Navarrese government sources.

Its strategic position gave it a very important role in the defense of the kingdom and especially of the capital Pamplona. It was destroyed in 1494 by order of the kings of Navarre to prevent it from being used by those close to the kingdom of Castile. At present, the base of the castle is still preserved.

The General Directorate of Culture-Príncipe de Viana Institution has processed the initiation of the declaration file of the Irulegi Complex (Valle de Araguren, Navarra), as Well of Cultural Interest with the category of Archaeological Zone.

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1 comment

Ruben November 23, 2022 - 4:36 pm

“in the town of too stupid”??!

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