Vascones

See also: vascones

Latin

Etymology

According to Antonio Tovar, the name could have been from an exonym of entirely Proto-Indo-European origin given to the Basques by earlier Indo-Europeans inhabiting Basque country, based on the name ba(r)scunes found inscribed on coins matching the territory and period. The name would have been comprised of:

• the root Proto-Indo-European *bʰers- (“tip, point, top”)
• the suffix *-kon-
• the consonant stem suffix *-es indicating the name as a nominative plural

Thus, the name would have meant something like "the high (proud) people."

Probably unrelated to the Basque endonym Euskara, despite the similarity.

Location of the Vascones in Hispania

Pronunciation

• (Classical) IPA^(key): /ˈu̯as.ko.neːs/, [ˈu̯äs̠kɔneːs̠]
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): /ˈvas.ko.nes/, [ˈväskones]

Proper noun

Vasconēs m pl (genitive Vasconum); third declension

1. A pre-Roman tribe who inhabited a region in the northeastern part of Hispania Tarraconensis, between the Iberus and the Pyrenees and stretching as far as the northern coast, in the present Navarre

Declension

Third-declension noun, plural only.

Case	Plural
Nominative	Vasconēs
Genitive	Vasconum
Dative	Vasconibus
Accusative	Vasconēs
Ablative	Vasconibus
Vocative	Vasconēs

Descendants

• Galician: Bascuas (place name)

References

• “Vascones”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• Vascones in Charles du Fresne du Cange’s Glossarium Mediæ et Infimæ Latinitatis (augmented edition with additions by D. P. Carpenterius, Adelungius and others, edited by Léopold Favre, 1883–1887)
• Vascones in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette.
• “Vascones”, in Harry Thurston Peck, editor (1898), Harper's Dictionary of Classical Antiquities, New York: Harper & Brothers
• “Vascones”, in William Smith, editor (1854, 1857), A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography, volume 1 & 2, London: Walton and Maberly