The Pellendones, also designated Pelendones Celtiberorum [1] and Cerindones, [2] were an ancient pre-Roman Celtic people living on the Iberian Peninsula. From the early 4th century BC they inhabited the region near the source of the river Duero [3] in what today is north-central Spain, an area comprising the north of Soria, the southeast of Burgos and the southwest of La Rioja provinces.
Possibly of mixed Illyrian and Celtic origin, the Pellendones migrated to the Iberian Peninsula around the 4th Century BC. [4] [5] Their original native name might have been *Kellendones, [6] and is possible that they were related to the Gallic Belendi or Pelendi of the middle Sigmatis (today's Leyre) river valley (approximately today's Belin-Béliet territory) in Gallia (Gaul). [7] They spoke a 'Q-Celtic' language.
A predominantly stock-raising people that practiced transhumance in the grazing lowlands of the Ebro valley, the Pellendones are attributed to the Iron Age "Culture of the Soria hillforts" (Cultura de los castros sorianos) that flourished between the 6th and 4th centuries BC in the north of present-day Soria province.
Their capital was Visontium (Vinuesa – Soria), and are credited as being the original founders of Numantia (Muela de Garray – Soria) [8] and Savia (Soria?). [9] They also controlled the towns of Aregrada/Arekorata (Muro de Ágreda – Sória; Celtiberian mints: Areicoraticos/Arecorataz), Arenetum (Arnedo, near Inestrillas – La Rioja), Quelia/Quelium (Quel, near Arnedo – La Rioja; Celtiberian mint: Cueliocos) and Contrebia Leukade (Aguillar del Rio Alhama – La Rioja), although the location of Viscintium, Lutia (Cantalucia?), Olibia and Varia remains either incertain or unknown.
Closely related with both the Arevaci – to whom they were a dependant tribe, though regarded as a separated people [10] – and the Vettones, they threw off the Arevacian yoke possibly with Roman help in the late 2nd century BC, [11] receiving the town of Numantia and respective lands when the Romans partitioned the territory of the defeated Arevaci amongst their neighbours. [12] [13] However, they lost these lands to the Uraci after supporting the ill-fated early 1st Century BC anti-Roman uprisings in Celtiberia (the 4th Celtiberian War). [14] Later during the Sertorian Wars, they sided with Quintus Sertorius and provided unspecified troops to his army. [15] It remains unclear what role the Pellendones played during the period of unrest that rocked northern Celtiberia in 50-25 BC and in the subsequent Astur-Cantabrian Wars between 29-13 BC.
In the late 1st Century BC, the Pellendones were aggregated to the new Hispania Terraconensis province created by Emperor Augustus, who founded on the site of Arekorata the Roman colony of Augustobriga (Muro de Ágreda) in their territory. [16]
The Celtiberians were a group of Celts and Celticized peoples inhabiting an area in the central-northeastern Iberian Peninsula during the final centuries BC. They were explicitly mentioned as being Celts by several classic authors. These tribes spoke the Celtiberian language and wrote it by adapting the Iberian alphabet, in the form of the Celtiberian script. The numerous inscriptions that have been discovered, some of them extensive, have enabled scholars to classify the Celtiberian language as a Celtic language, one of the Hispano-Celtic languages that were spoken in pre-Roman and early Roman Iberia. Archaeologically, many elements link Celtiberians with Celts in Central Europe, but also show large differences with both the Hallstatt culture and La Tène culture.
Numantia is an ancient Celtiberian settlement, whose remains are located on a hill known as Cerro de la Muela in the current municipality of Garray (Soria), Spain.
The Vettones were an Iron Age pre-Roman people of the Iberian Peninsula.
The Vaccaei or Vaccei were a pre-Roman Celtic people of Spain, who inhabited the sedimentary plains of the central Duero valley, in the Meseta Central of northern Hispania.
The Lusones were an ancient Celtiberian (Pre-Roman) people of the Iberian Peninsula, who lived in the high Tajuña River valley, northeast of Guadalajara. They were eliminated by the Romans as a significant threat in the end of the 2nd century BC.
The Autrigones were a pre-Roman tribe that settled in the north of the Iberian Peninsula, in what today is the western Basque Country and northern Burgos and the East of Cantabria, Spain. Their territory limited with the Cantabri territory at west, the Caristii at east, the Berones at the southeast and the Turmodigi at the south. It is discussed whether the Autrigones were Celts, theory supported by the existence of toponyms of Celtic origin, such as Uxama Barca and other with -briga endings and that eventually underwent a Basquisation along with other neighboring tribes such as the Caristii and Varduli.
The Carpetani, also named Karpesioi by Polybius, were one of the Celtic peoples inhabiting the Iberian Peninsula prior to the Roman conquest. Their core domain was constituted by the lands between the Tagus and the Anas, in the southern Meseta. Agriculture is thought to have had a greater importance in the Carpetanian economy than other neighboring peoples'.
The Arevaci or Aravaci, were a Celtic people who settled in the central Meseta of northern Hispania and dominated most of Celtiberia from the 4th to late 2nd centuries BC. The Vaccaei were their allies.
The Lobetani, were a small pre-Roman Iberian people of ancient Spain mentioned only once by Ptolemy in the 2nd century AD, situated around the mountainous Albarracín area of the southwest Province of Teruel.
The Turboletae or Turboleti were an obscure pre-Roman people from ancient Spain, which lived in the northwest Teruel province since the early 3rd Century BC.
The Olcades were an ancient stock-raising pre-Roman people from Hispania, who lived to the west of the Turboletae in the southeastern fringe of the Iberian system mountains.
The Turmodigi were a pre-Roman ancient people, later mixed with the Celts people of northern Spain who occupied the area within the Arlanzón and Arlanza river valleys in the 2nd Iron Age.
The Germani were an obscure pre-Roman ancient people of the Iberian Peninsula which settled around the 4th century BC in western Oretania, an ancient region corresponding to the south of Ciudad Real and the eastern tip of Badajoz provinces.
The Berones were a pre-Roman Celtic people of ancient Spain, although they were not part of the Celtiberians. They lived north of the latter and close to the Cantabrian Conisci in the middle Ebro region between the Tirón and Alhama rivers.
The Titii or Tithii were a small and obscure Celtiberian people, whose lands were located along the middle Jalón and upper Tajuña valleys, somewhere between Alhama de Aragón in Zaragoza and Molina de Aragón in Guadalajara provinces.
The Belli, also designated Beli or Belaiscos, were an ancient pre-Roman Celtic Celtiberian people who lived in the modern Spanish province of Zaragoza from the 3rd Century BC.
The Uraci or Duraci were a little-known Celtic people of pre-Roman Iberia who dwelt to the east of the Vaccaei and the Carpetani, occupying the southern Soria, northern Guadalajara and western Zaragoza provinces since the 4th century BC.
The Cratistii were an ancient pre-Roman, stock-raising people whose lands were situated along the upper Tagus valley, in the elevated plateau region of the western Cuenca and northeast Province of Teruel.
The Allotriges or Allotrigones, were a small 'Celticized' mountain people mentioned alongside the Plentauri by Strabo, as inhabitants of the region roughly corresponding to present-day northwestern La Rioja, around the area of the Ebro sources.
The Celtiberian confederacy was a tribal federation formed around the mid-3rd century BC, by the Arevaci, Lusones, Belli and Titii, with the Arevacian city of Numantia as the federal capital.