Tag Archives: junta general

Basque Fact of the Week, History

Basque Fact of the Week: The Prince of Wales Nearly Became the Lord of Bizkaia

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Looking back at the history of Europe, it is amazing how what we view today as solid political borders and national identities often grew out of random happenstance. If Joan of England had made it to Castile to wed Peter the Cruel, instead of succumbing to the Black Death at the age of fourteen, how […]

Basque Fact of the Week, History

Basque Fact of the Week: The War of the Bands

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It’s the late 1300s. The Castilian Civil War just ended and families in the Basque Country are jockeying for political power in the vacuum left behind. Old feuds that have simmered for centuries ignite. Families build towers to fortify their lands and their surroundings. The aide (or ahaide) nagusiak, the leading kinsmen, gather strength. War […]