All posts by buber

Basque Proverb of the Week: Proverb #22

Ardiak beeka egonik, ez du jaten belarrik. A bleating sheep eats no grass.

Basque Fact of the Week: The Industrial Town of Ermua

The three Basque cities I’ve spent the most time in are Donostia, Munitibar, and Ermua. My dad’s sister and her family settled in Ermua as that is where the job was – her husband worked for the knife company Aitor until he retired. Ermua maybe doesn’t have the charm of the coastal cities, but it […]

Martin Aguirre y Otegui, Basque “Righteous Among the Nations,” Celebrates His 100th Birthday

This article was written by Pedro Oiarzabal. Martin, born on July 4, 1925, in Las Arenas, Getxo (Bizkaia), was one of the thousands of children evacuated by the Basque government in June 1937 to escape the aerial bombardments perpetrated by General Francisco Franco’s Italian and German allies against the civilian population. Martin and two younger […]

Basque Proverb of the Week: Proverb #21

Ardi txikia, beti bildots. The small sheep, always a lamb.

Basque Fact of the Week: Pierre de Lancre, Basque Hunter of Basque Witches

It is seemingly part of human nature that we most vehemently attack that which is somehow a part of us. Pierre de Lancre was no different. One of the most infamous persecutors of Basque witches, he himself had Basque ancestry, an ancestry that his family seemed to deny. De Lancre felt that all aspects of […]

Basque Proverb of the Week: Proverb #20

Ardi galdua atzeman daiteke, aldi galdua berriz ez. One may recover a lost sheep, but not lost time.

Basque Fact of the Week: Basque Sculptor Eduardo Chillida

One of the aspects of Basque culture that has always fascinated me is the mix of tradition with the most cutting edge ideas. Growing up in the Basque communities of the American West, I was exposed more to the traditional aspects of the culture – the dancing, the singing – and less to the avant […]

Basque Proverb of the Week: Proverb #19

Apaizaren eltzea, txikia baina betea. The priest’s pot is small, but always full.

Basque Fact of the Week: Oldest Known Tools Made of Whale Bone Found in the Bay of Biscay

Basques have long been associated with whaling. Records as far back as 670 highlight the importance that whale hunting was to the Basque economy and their way of life. However, the people that inhabited the region we now know as the Basque Country used resources from whales even earlier, many millennia earlier. New research has […]