Iceland is known for its Thermal waters, volcanoes, aurora borealis and glaciersall between coastal landscapes and villages worthy of the best postcards. Until not so long, however, it was not the best destination if the visitor came from a very specific region of the planet: the Basque Country. Although it sounds extemporaneous (which was) and crazy (idem) until a decade ago Scarce the island kept in force a seventeenth -century edict that gave white letter to its inhabitants to assault, steal and even kill Basque sailors. The law is interesting for its content, but also by its context, which connects with the past whale of the region and one of the most terrible episodes in Icelandic history, if not the one that most: the massacre Spánverjavígin. A peculiar diplomatic trip. In April 2015 Martin Garitano, then General Deputy of Guipúzcoa, starred in the one that may have been the most rocambolesco trip of his political career. Not so much for fate, Hólmavika people west of Iceland, as for what There it was done. As part of An institutional act With local authorities during which a commemorative plaque was discovered, they sang songs and recited a marine sentence, Jónas Guðmundsson, commissioner of the region of the region Western Fjords Icelanders, he revoked An edict of the seventeenth century. Why’s that? Very simple. Because the edict in question was probably one of the most rocambolesque, extemporaneous, delusional and cruel of international legislation. The norm He had his origins in 1615 and stressed that if an Icelandic was with a Basque sailor on the island, he could assault him, snatch everything he had on top and even, if necessary, kill him without mercy. Of course, in 2015 on the island, other laws that neutralized that old edict and prohibited the Icelanders from killing Basques just like the slaughter of any other neighbor’s son. But the truth, being felling, is that in 400 years nobody had bothered to repeal the decree of the seventeenth, so technically remained in force. When asked about it, Guðmundsson He joked: “At least now it will be safe for them (the Basques) come.” Of politics and economy. To understand the “Anti Vascos” edict of 1615 you have to know its context. From the outset, the Iceland of the early seventeenth was quite different from that of now. It was not an independent country (status that did not in fact achieve centuries later, In 1944) and his control was in the hands of regional governors protected by the king of Denmark, a position since 1588 exercised Cristián IV. With regard to the economy, at the time there was a lucrative business that especially interested the Danish crown: whale hunting in the North Atlantic. Of the huge cetaceans captured in the sea, meat, bones, sperm and even beards were used, highly appreciated for the elaboration of rods for umbrellas, umbrellas and corsets. If there was an appeal of the appreciated whales it was however its oil. Among other purposes, it was used to illuminate houses and the manufacture of soap, lubricans and drugs. So appreciated was the fat of the whales that There are those who match it To our oil. And what does it have to do with the Basques? Well, they stood out in that company, as Imanol Sánchez explains in detail in An essay Posted in Riev on the Basque whales in the Iceland of the XVII. Their sailors soon look at the possibilities of the Eubalaena glacialthe huge cetaceans that inhabited between Iceland and Mauritania and navigated the North Atlantic during their migrations. And that encouraged them to enter more and more in the ocean. It is known of incursions by the Basque coast to capture cetaceans already in the XI, between the XII and XIV the hunters expanded along the rest of the Cantabrian coast and around the 16th and seventeenth centuries, Sánchez recallsBasque whales were already looking for prey in the waters around Greenland and Iceland. There are evidence that places them there at least in 1604 and before they had already left a mark on Terranova and Labrador. A business played. The problem is that Basque sailors were not the only ones interested in whale oil, a very valuable appeal that also ambitioned the king of Denmark and Norway. And of course, friction emerged. “The Danes were sent by Christian IV to hunt whales to the seas in northern Norway and for the islands Spitzbergen In 1615, and his encounter with the Basque sailors created the first disputes “, He recounts The researcher of the UPV/EHU. In April of that same year, the sailors of Euskadi hunt whales in Aguas de Iceland was prohibited. And to make it clear that the Danish authorities were seriously issued the famous (and terrible) edict that gave a white letter to pursue, assault, steal and kill Basque navigators. Of course, Icelanders were also prohibited to get friendship or trade with the whales of Spain. A MAZAZO FOR RELATIONSHIPS. The belligerent posture that Denmark adopted in 1615 must have been a mazazo for the Icelandic rulers, to say what the Danish law said did allow the islanders to do business with the Basques … as long as the latter passed before box to pay the commissions to pay the commissions corresponding, of course. Sanchez recalls in fact that the relationship between the two peoples was “largely good” and was based on a “close commercial relationship.” His link was narrow and frequent enough to give rise to a Pidgina kind of mixed language, Basque and Icelandic mixture. In the fall of 1615, with the relations with the sailors of Euskadi tensada and Copenhagen especially belligerent, there was nevertheless an episode that would end up advising a severe hand about the relations between both peoples. Of paper … to the baskavígin massacre. The seventeenth century edict that allowed to hunt and kill Basque sailors in Iceland could have remained in a legal eccentricity without more if it were not because, … Read more
