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The Basques ((バスク語:euskaldunak); (スペイン語:vascos); (フランス語:basques)) are an indigenous ethnic group〔Totoricagüena, G. ''Identity, Culture, and Politics in the Basque Diaspora'' (2003) p.59 University of Nevada Press〕 who primarily inhabit an area traditionally known as the Basque Country ((バスク語:Euskal Herria)), a region that is located around the western end of the Pyrenees on the coast of the Bay of Biscay and straddles parts of north-central Spain and south-western France. The Basques are known as: *''Euskaldunak'' in Basque (this ethnonym means "the speakers of the Basque language"; to refer to all the inhabitants of the Basque Country, the name ''euskal herritarrak'' is preferred) *''Vasco'' in Spanish *''Basque'' in French and English. *''Basco'' in Gascon and Portuguese. ==Etymology of the word ''Basque''== The English word ''Basque'' may be pronounced or and derives from the French ''Basque'' (pronounced (:bask)), which is derived from Gascon ''Basco'' (pronounced ), cognate with Spanish ''Vasco ''(pronounced ). These, in turn, come from Latin ''Vasco'' (pronounced ), plural ''Vascones'' (see History section below). The Latin labial-velar approximant /w/ generally evolved into the bilabials /b/ and /β̞/ in Gascon and Spanish, probably under the influence of Basque and Aquitanian, a language related to old Basque and spoken in Gascony in Antiquity (similarly the Latin /w/ evolved into /v/ in French, Italian and other languages). Several coins from the 1st and 2nd centuries BC found in the Basque Country bear the inscription ''barscunes''. The place where they were minted is not certain but is thought to be somewhere near Pamplona in the heartland of the area that historians believe was inhabited by the ''Vascones''. Some scholars have suggested a Celtic etymology based on ''bhar-s-'', meaning "summit", "point" or "leaves", according to which ''barscunes'' may have meant "the mountain people", "the tall ones" or "the proud ones", while others have posited a relationship to a proto-Indo-European root '' *bar-'' meaning "border", "frontier", "march". In Basque, the people call themselves the ''euskaldunak'', singular ''euskaldun'', formed from ''euskal-'' (i.e. "Basque (language)") and ''-dun'' (i.e. "one who has"); ''euskaldun'' literally means a Basque speaker. Not all Basques are Basque-speakers. Therefore, the neologism ''euskotar'', plural ''euskotarrak'', was coined in the 19th century to mean a culturally Basque person, whether Basque-speaking or not. Alfonso Irigoyen claimed that the word ''euskara'' comes from an ancient Basque verb ''enautsi'' "to say" (cf. modern Basque ''esan'') and the suffix ''-(k)ara'' ("way (of doing something)"). Thus ''euskara'' would literally mean "way of saying", "way of speaking". One item of evidence in favour of this hypothesis is found in the Spanish book ''Compendio Historial'', written in 1571 by the Basque writer Esteban de Garibay. He records the name of the Basque language as ''enusquera''. It may, however, be a writing mistake. In the 19th century, the Basque nationalist activist Sabino Arana posited an original root ''euzko'' which, he thought, came from ''eguzkiko'' ("of the sun," related to the assumption of an original solar religion). On the basis of this putative root, Arana proposed the name Euzkadi for an independent Basque nation, composed of seven Basque historical territories. Arana's neologism ''Euzkadi'' (in the regularized spelling Euskadi) is still widely used in both Basque and Spanish, since it is now the official name of the Autonomous Community of the Basque Country. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Basques」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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