Summary of Mark Kurlansky's The Basque History Of The World

Everest Media

Description

Please note: This is a companion version & not the original book.
Sample Book Insights:
#1 The game the rest of the world knows as jai alai was invented in the French Basque town of St. Pée-sur-Nivelle. The Basques, as they often did, went in a completely different direction than the French. They were the first Europeans to use a rubber ball, and the added bounce of wrapping rubber rather than string led them to play the ball off walls.
#2 The gâteau Basque, like the Basques themselves, has an uncertain origin. It appears to date from the eighteenth century and may have originally been called bistochak. Today, it is a cake filled with either cherry jam or pastry cream.
#3 The Basques are a mythical people, and their land, which is surrounded by France and Spain, is only 8,218 square miles. They have seven provinces that are defined by language.
#4 The Basques are a unique group that has many physical traits that set them apart from other Europeans. They have a high concentration of type O blood, which is rare in other Europeans.

Sujets

• Europe
• France

Informations

• Publié par: Everest Media LLC
• Date de parution: 13 mars 2022
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781669353300
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

Insights on Mark Kurlansky's The Basque History of the World
Contents Insights from Chapter 1 Insights from Chapter 2 Insights from Chapter 3
Insights from Chapter 1

#1

The game the rest of the world knows as jai alai was invented in the French Basque town of St. Pée-sur-Nivelle. The Basques, as they often did, went in a completely different direction than the French. They were the first Europeans to use a rubber ball, and the added bounce of wrapping rubber rather than string led them to play the ball off walls.

#2

The gâteau Basque, like the Basques themselves, has an uncertain origin. It appears to date from the eighteenth century and may have originally been called bistochak. Today, it is a cake filled with either cherry jam or pastry cream.

#3

The Basques are a mythical people, and their land, which is surrounded by France and Spain, is only 8,218 square miles. They have seven provinces that are defined by language.

#4

The Basques are a unique group that has many physical traits that set them apart from other Europeans. They have a high concentration of type O blood, which is rare in other Europeans.

#5

The most important artifact left behind by the ancient Basques is their language. Linguists have found that while the language has adopted foreign words, the grammar has proven resistant to change.

#6

Euskera is a difficult language, but it is not especially confusing. It is difficult to understand because it is so different from other languages. The language is phonetic with some minor pitfalls, such as a very soft b and an aspirated h as in English.

#7

The first book entirely in Euskera was not published until 1545. The Basques were not early enough to document their language, and so many have used their imagination to link Euskera to the origins of other languages.

#8

The theory that the Basques are Jews was made by a French clergyman in 1900. It states that the people of ancient Sparta were Jewish, and that the Spartans colonized northern Spain.

#9

The first Basques were observed acting like Basques, defending their land and culture. They made complex decisions about the degree of independence needed to preserve their way of life, while looking to the rest of the world for commercial opportunities.

#10

The Basques were said to be unconquerable because of their mountainous terrain, but it is also possible that few coveted this land. Many passed through, disproving the assumption that their mountains were impenetrable.

#11

The Basques were a people who were left to their own devices by the Romans. They were not ruled by a Roman code of law, but were allowed to govern themselves under their own tradition-based system of law.

#12

The Romans conquered the Ebro and fought with each other over it. In 82 B. C. , two Roman factions began a ten-year war for control of the Ebro. Sertorius, a battle-scarred warrior, seized the valley with some local support.

#13

The Romans were the most effective assimilators the Basques ever encountered. They easily passed the Basque ports of the Pyrenees, overran Pamplona, and took the Ebro. They then controlled most of Iberia without bothering with most of Vasconia.

#14

The Visigoths were a central European people who had moved west from the Danube Valley. In 415, they invaded Iberia and conquered all of it, except for the Basque mountains. The Basques fought them in campaign after campaign, swooping down from their mountains to attack the new rulers on the plains.

#15

The Basques were a small, independent group that wanted to be left alone, but they became Christians during the Reconquista, when they were forced to fight against the Muslims. They survived and kept their lands.

#16

The Battle of Roncesvalles was much more important than the Battle of Poitiers. It was the first time an army had faced off against a Muslim army, and it was in this battle that Charlemagne decided to return to France.

#17

The Battle of Roncesvalles was the only defeat Charlemagne’s army ever suffered. The Basques, who were outnumbered, waited in the pine woods and ambush the Franks, killing every trapped Frank. The Basques then simply dispersed, going home to their mountain villages.

#18

The Kingdom of Navarra, the only kingdom in all of Basque history, was formed in 818. It would last until 1512, its dynasties becoming defenders of Christianity and a great regional power of the Middle Ages.

#19

The cave with drawings of fish dating back to the Paleolithic Age was discovered in 1969 in Vizcaya. The fish appear to be sea bream. A sea bream drawing was also found in a cave in Guipúzcoa, and drawings of several other fish species have been discovered as well.

#20

The Basque idea of the sea, itsaso, is the Bay of Biscay, which is a relatively unfertile part of the ocean because while fish tend to cluster in the relatively shallow water over continental shelves, the Iberian shelf is short and drops off steeply close to shore.

#21

The Basque fishermen invented ways of cooking inexpensive local catch. Ttoro is a dish traditionally prepared by Labourdine fishermen based in towns at the mouth of the Nivelle: St. -Jean-de-Luz, Ciboure, and the village at the harbor entrance, Socoa.

#22

The first Basques were whale hunters, and they sold the leaner meat fresh or preserved in salt. They also sold the obsidian-black whalebone, which was valued for its durability.

#23

The Basques, who were whale hunters, built stone whale-spotting towers along the coast from Bilbao to Bayonne in the seventh century. The lookout would let out a prolonged yell, which was actually a code signal that told whalers the type of whale sighted and whether it was a single whale or in a group.

#24

The town of Bermeo, Spain, marked the seals of whales in the late thirteenth century. The eighteenth-century British are generally credited with having invented this sport on the Thames, but it may be the Basques who originated it.

#25

By the tenth century, Vikings were able to undertake longer voyages than other people of the time, because they provisioned their long journeys through the North Atlantic with cod that had been dried in arctic air.

#26

The Basques were the first merchants of whaling and cod products, and they became the leading shipbuilders, pilots, and navigators. They financed most of their shipbuilding through private venture capital.

#27

The Basques were skilled at building ships, and they were also skilled at navigating the seas. They built ships that traveled to North America, and it is believed that they were there before the Vikings.