EMPEROR CHARLEMAGNE AND VASCONIA IN THE 8th CENTURY

Frankish sources refer to Vasconia as the territory between the Ebro and Garonne rivers (Wascones, qui trans Garonnam et circa Pirineum montem habitant), with Pamplona, Toulouse and Bordeaux being some of its most important places. In turn, Aquitania occupied the land between the Garonne and Loire rivers.

The history of Vasconia between the years 711 and 778 is one of a nation besieged by its neighbouring great powers.

710. The King of the Vascones, King Lupus Otsoa dies. Odo the Great inherits the kingdom that includes Vasconia and Aquitania, stretching from the Ebro River to the Loire River.

711. The Muslims conquer the Visigothic kingdom.

760-768. Eight-Year War in which Pepin the Short, King of the Franks, conquers Aquitania against the Vascones (Pippinus rex cumflictum habuit cum Wascones).

768 and 814. Reign of Charlemagne (son of Pepin the Short).

Emperor Charlemagne united the various Frankish kingdoms, turning them into an empire that included much of Western and Central Europe. In 800 Pope Leo III crowned him Imperator Augustus in Rome. Thus, through his conquests and internal reforms, Charlemagne laid the foundations of what would become Western Europe in the Middle Ages.

In one of his campaigns he entered the Iberian Peninsula for strategic purposes and launched a scorched-earth campaign against the Vascones in 778. In turn, at the end of the 8th century, the leader of the Pamplonese Vascones was Eneko (as recorded by the chroniclers Ibn Hayyan and Ibn Hazm). He died in the year 820. His son Eneko would be crowned in 824 and rule until the year 852. He was called Enneco Ennecones by Latin sources and Wannago ibn Wannago in the arabic chronicles. He would be nicknamed Eneko Aritza (the ‘oak’ or the ‘strong’), the first King of Pamplona.

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