Talk:Castile (historical region)
This is very concise and helpful, but I would love a map... probably not an easy request to make, but something showing where old/new Castile was would really help.
Section on "castilians"
Hope everyone agrees with my section... We can discuss it here. Someone should add the war of the comuneros in the history section.--Burgas00 11:35, 20 January 2006 (UTC)
Number of Castillians
What percentage of Spaniards is ethnic Castillian? Someone has the figures? --Burgas00 12:01, 18 January 2006 (UTC)
Depending on what definition of "Castillian" you use, something between 8% and 80%. The sad truth is that, in modern Spain, when someone says I'm castillian, no matter how 'proud' of it he claims to be, what he really means is I'm from a part of Spain for which there is no better name. Jotam 01:29, 20 January 2006 (UTC)
Surname Castell
Can an assumption be made that the Surname Castell is derived from a reside of Castile? Any other connections to the name would be helpful. Thanks america it may be worth mentioning of cristopher columbus here as i reckon is an importan fact in Castillian , spanish, european and world history
america
it may be worth mentioning of cristopher columbus here as i reckon is an importan fact in Castillian , spanish, european and world history
"Castell" is a Catalonian word meaning "Castle". Bay the way, the name "Castile" means "land of castles"... but the name "Catalonia" means the same!!
Exact Limits of Castile
The text on the article says that "The territory traditionally regarded as Castilian is now divided into the Spanish autonomous communities of Cantabria, Euskadi, Castile-Leon, Castile-La Mancha, Madrid and La Rioja", but I find this is a little incorrect since I believe that the traditional Castile includes some more territories.
In the map of Spain showing Castile in red, not even Euskadi (Basque Country) is shown as part of it.
If I could give my personal opinion, I would assert with much certainty the following:
1 - At the beginning, Castile was but a small county located where today is the confluence of the provinces of Burgos, Santander and Álava. It belonged to the Kingdom of León.
2 - It eventually expanded to occupy an area equivalent to the modern provinces of Burgos, Santander, Álava, Palencia, Valladolid and Logroño. Then it became an independent Kingdom, and expanded further to include the provinces of Biscay, Guipúzcoa, Soria, Segovia, and Ávila.
This is called "the Old Castile".
3 - Castile kept growing to the south, and added the territories of the modern provinces of Madrid, Guadalajara, Toledo, Cuenca and Ciudad Real. These five provinces are called "the New Castile".
4 - By that time Castile, who had once become independent from the Kingdom of León, was already greater in area, population and power to any other State of the Iberian Peninsula, including the Kingdom of León itself.
It was on that background that the Kingdoms of Castile and León became united (whether Castile annexed León or it was a union of both Kingdoms is a question I shall not deal with here - anyway, I believe the Court was established at Toledo, the greatest city of the Peninsula by that time).
Thus, one could consider that the eight provinces that conformed the Kingdom of León (León, Zamora, Salamanca, Oviedo, Corunna, Lugo, Orense and Pontevedra) might also be named as Castilian territories.
But the problem doesn't end here, because the United Kingdom of Castile and León kept growing southwards, conquering Extremadura, Albacete, Murcia and Andalusia. Can these annexations be considered Castilian?
Usually they are. Actually, in addition to "Catilla la Vieja" ("the Old Castile") and "Castilla la Nueva" ("the New Castile"), the realm of Andalusia is sometimes called "Castilla la Novísima" ("the Newest Castile").
5 - As the article says, the Canary Islands were added to the Crown of Castile (while the Balearic Islands belonged to the Crown of Aragón).
6 - After Queen Isabella of Castile's death, her husband King Ferdinand of Aragón conquered the realm of Navarre, but he annexed it to the Kingdom of Castile instead of his own. Some historians say this was in hommage to his beloved dead wife, others say this was because he considered Navarre more similar to Castile in traditions, laws... etc., so the Navarrese people would accept the conquest more easily if they became part of Castile, not Aragón.
CONCLUSION -
The exact limits of the territory named bay the word "Castile" are difficult to draw on a map. It depends on what you consider "Castile".
AT LEAST it includes the area occupied bay the modern Spanish provinces of:
-Burgos, Palencia, Valladolid, Soria, Segovia and Ávila (all of them part of the Community called "Castile-León")
-Santander (Community of Cantabria)
-Álava, Biscay and Guipúzcoa (the Basque Country)
-Madrid
-Toledo, Guadalajara, Cuenca and Ciudad Real (part of "Castile-La Mancha")
AT MOST it includes, in addition to the aforementioned lands:
-Albacete (part of "Castile-La Mancha")
-Murcia
-Cáceres and Badajoz (Community of Extremadura)
-Cordova, Seville, Huelva, Cádiz, Málaga, Granada, Almería and Jaén (Andalusia)
-Navarre
-León, Zamora and Salamanca (part of "Castile-León")
-Oviedo (Community of Asturias)
-Corunna, Lugo, Orense and Pontevedra (Galicia)
-Las Palmas de Gran Canaria and Santa Cruz de Tenerife (Canary Islands)
-The Northern African cities of Ceuta and Melilla, and their dependent territories.
If you add the lands of the former Kingdom of the United Crowns of Aragón and Catalonia (Aragón [Huesca, Zaragoza and Teruel], Catalonia [Barcelona, Tarragona, Lérida and Gerona], Valencia [Valencia, Castellón and Teruel] and the Balearic Islands) you will have all territories of current Spain!!
This is Rubbish... Territories acquired by Castille do not make them part of Castille. Especially if they retain a particular language, cultural heritage or identity... You can only be Spanish to be saying something so preposterous. Please do not write things like this on the English wikipedia,...It only confuses people who dont know our country. Actually it seems that you dont know our country, except the one you have created in your mind... Stick to extreme-right forums in the Spanish language...--Burgas00 09:24, 19 January 2006 (UTC)
Hello from Castile
Hi, I'm Castilian. Flag of the entry is of Castile-La Mancha (not of Castile).
On the other hand, one thing is Kingdom of Castile and other is Castilian Crown. It is not the same! Castilian Crown included the Kingdom of Castile and other kingdoms: Kingdom of León, Toledo, Sevilla, Jaén...
I think territory of Castile is as long as the Kingdom: Cantabria, La Rioja, Burgos, Segovia, Soria, Ávila, Madrid, Guadalajara and Cuenca, and pieces of Valladolid, Palencia, Albacete and Valencia. If someone thinks it is as long as the Crown, it must be included Galicia and Asturias (they were in the Kingdom of Leon), Canarias, America...
Another thing. It is not Castile-León. The real name is Castile and León. Leoner people angry a lot if they listen to Castile-León!
Anyway, I'm happy you include this entry. Sorry for my English.
Map of Castile
The definition of what territory actually constitutes Castile has been a subject of debate among historians and geographers. However, I recall two versions as dominant. One includes everything within the communities of Castile and Leon, La Rioja, Cantabria, Madrid, and Castile-La Mancha (except the province of Albacete). The other includes the same except that it takes away the three Leonese provinces of León, Salamanca, and Zamora. But this is the first time I've encountered a map that also exculdes Valladolid and Palencia.
Is this the actual, accurate map of what can objectively be defined as Castile? Are there any sources referencing and/or confirming this devision?
My take is that we should not attempt to define Castile by the present-day Spanish provincial system, which dates form the 19th century, when Castile as a political unit was already a distant memory. Instead we should seek a historical map of what really was the politically unified kingdom of Castile. -- Mankawabi 12:07, 19 January 2006 (UTC)
I think that the article needs a new map
And my reasons are the followings:
- At least eastern part of Salamanca, Zamora and Palencia, and practically all the province of Valladolid are more probably in Castilian "sphere" than Leonese.
- Historically, only the eastern lands of Albacete belonged to the Kingdom of Murcia. The remainder (including the city of Albacete) were located in the province of La Mancha, the direct ancestor of the province of Ciudad Real, except some territories in the north that belonged to the province of Cuenca. Both Ciudad Real and Cuenca are part of Castile.
- Requena-Utiel, a castilian-speaking region now situated in Valencia, were part of Cuenca until XIX century reforms.
- Molina de Aragón, a territory in the NE part of the province of Guadalajara, is in fact a historically separated region. It belonged to the Kingdom of Aragón until XIV century, when it be conquered by Pedro I of Castile, that takes the title of Señor de Molina and administrated the city and its zone as a new territory of the Castilian Crown. Even today, Juan Carlos I own this title along with King of Castile, King of Aragon and others.
Please, excuse my bad English.--Menah the Great 17:55, 14 February 2006 (UTC)
Format and content of the article
From my amateur vision on Wikipedia I would like to make some comments on this article and I would highly appreciate if more experience members could decide if the problems I see on the article are objective to put it under discussion or revision.
First of all, I think the format of the article about Castile is not correct to define the former kingdom of Castille or the historic region if Castille. I think that it should be ordered into sections about the history, geography and context of Castile, like it can be seen in the German version of this page or in the article about the crown of Aragon.
I don´t understand very well the section about Castilians as an ethnic group in the context. I think this section should be in a separate article (as the catalonians as an ethnic gruop is from Catalonia), or at least it should be moved to the end of the page. I think when someone searchs in Wikipedia Castile, the part of the ethniticity is not the main information they are looking for, but rather the history.
Appart from that, I believe the definition of Castilians should be made according to the definition of ethnic group in Wikipedia: "An ethnic group is a human population whose members identify with each other, usually on the basis of a common genealogy or ancestry (Smith 1986). Ethnic groups are also usually united by common cultural, behavioural, linguistic, or religious practices." I think the castilian ethnic group should be defined based on this terms. And I think it should be first fundamented if Castilians do form an ethnic group by themselves, with sources. From my point of view, the main purpose of the ethnic group section is exclusive, which means it tries to define who is not castilian, rather than define who is.
I think the information in the page may be a little subjective from someone who has some prejudices about Castilians. I don´t want to offend anybody and I say it with respect, but I understand in Spain the nacionalist sentiments are very strong and sometimes the information is biased with this sentiments. I base this on the poem which according to the author defines Castile and Castilians in Spanish history. Well, I think that is a personal view and many people won´t agree that poem defines Castile. In fact I think very few Castilians will have that opinion, and as is stated in the article, they make a big part of the Spanish population (impossible to say which part by the way, hehe, it seems a big controversy).
I think the castilians deserve an equal treatment as other nationalities in Spain do, and a review of the Catalonians or Vasqs people information will show how they are defined in a rather positive way, while Castilians are in a negative.
For all the above reasons, I think the content in this page should be discutted and considered the possibility of giving a more historical and factual view. The objectivity I think should be also under discussion. As I want to make a constructive comment, not just critisize, I would have no problem to contribute giving new contents to this page if other members agree with me (and always from my limited knowledge, since I am not a historian ...).
Sorry for possible grammar mistakes, Clara.