Talk:Spain in the Roman era

Merging
The Hispania article focuses on the origin and later use of the word Hispania and details about the Roman provinces, but not much about history. I thought Roman Spain would be good as a separate, more historically oriented article, but I'm OK with a merger as long as Hispania gets a historical focus.--Bkwillwm 21:56, 20 July 2005 (UTC)


 * Its useful to have a Hispania article that covers the two (or three, depending on period) roman spanish provinces, just as it is usefu to have an article on Gaul to link to when the three Gaulish provinces are being  discussed together. So I hope the Hispania article stays, especially as it benefits from Spanish-language scholarship. The material from Roman Spain could perhaps be merged in.  --Nantonos 14:32, 25 July 2005 (UTC)


 * I agree with both of the above. And that's what a true "merger" would do. Everything now separate in each article would be combined in "Hispania." "Roman Spain" would then become a simple redirect to it. In fact, this is such a simple solution I see no need to wait. Anyone can easily do this with about a half-hour's work. -- Fred Edwords, August 14, 2005.


 * Yes, Roman Spain should be merged into Hispania, even if only for the reason that Hispania means the whole of the Iberian peninsula (modern Portugal, Spain, Gibraltar and Andorra), and not just the modern state of Spain. Sometimes, and I'm willing to admit it's not counscious, there is a spanish bias that tends to reduced or equated Hispania (or Iberia) as sinonimous with Spain. This is not true and particular care should be taken to avoid it. The Ogre 15:25, 17 August 2005 (UTC)


 * I agree wholy with the above.

This should obviously be merged. Roman Spain?! That's absurd! Surely "Spain" comes from "Hispania", but etymology isn't meaning for large decades now. Velho 02:32, 19 August 2005 (UTC)
 * the problem is that in English, Hispania is often read as Spain. And this is the source of problems. There was no Roman Spain there was a Roman Hispania. --Pedro 12:09, 19 August 2005 (UTC)

I agree with the merge. It's a terrible mistake to call Roman Spain as at the time there was NO Spain. Spain, the country, would be united somewhere near the XV century, and yet before there were Castille, Leon, Portugal, and other kingdoms. It's important to avoid this mistake (Spain/Hispania) as there are, even now, two countries on the Iberian Peninsula. Hispania was the name of the whole peninsula (not a province!) at the time, so this is the name to choose for a title. Nuno Tavares 16:08, 19 August 2005 (UTC)

I am very much in favor of merging this article into "Hispania" even though, yes, there is the risk that your average reader might equate "Hispania" with "Spain" --a clarificaion in the introductory paragraph can easily dispell this misnomer. For me at least, Hispania conotes the historical name (as it is used in English) of the Iberian province of the Roman Empire. This is really what the article is about and it should therefore be titled as such.

A clear analogy is "Germania," which refers not to modern-day Germany but to a region encompassing a number of other countries (Austria, Czech, Switzerland, Hungary to name a few) during the Roman era. Germania is an English word for sure--one that we inherited from the literary tradition of Tacitus and later historians--and one that is useful for a study and analysis of historical events, political intrigues and military conquests during a time when political boundries drawn on paper did not carry the same meaning they do today.

So much of what I read on discussion pages where there is a debate over terminology comes down to arguments over political neutrality. But whether it be an article about Israel or China or Native-American Indians we have to try to divorce modern-day politics from etymology. Give the reader credit. Everyone knows that many words do not carry the same connotation they did a hundred or more years ago. Along those lines: As much as Portuguese (or Andorrean?) nationalists today might loathe the fact that their country's territory was once called Hispania it does not mean we have to revise history to accomodate their uninformed objections. By the same token, Spanish nationalists should not make any inferences that Hispania refers to anything other than the historic Iberian province under the Roman Empire. --Fazdeconta 17:50, 19 August 2005 (UTC)


 * As you can see, I just went ahead yesterday and took my own advice, above, and merged the contents of this shorter and more limited article into the longer Hispania article, then turned this Roman Spain article into a simple redirect. -- Fred Edwords, August 24, 2005