Pellendones

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.

Origins

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.

Culture

A predominantly stock-raising people that practiced transhumance in the grazing lowlands of the Ebro valley, the Pellendones are attributed to the so-called Iron Age "Culture of the Soria hillforts" (Cultura de los castros sorianos).

Their capital was Visontium (Vinuesa – Soria), and are credited as being the original founders of Numantia (Muela de Garray – Soria)^[8] and Savia (Soria?). 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.

History

Closely related with both the Arevaci – to whom they were a dependant tribe, though regarded as a separated people^[9] – and the Vettones, they threw off the Arevacian yoke possibly with Roman help in the late 2nd century BC, receiving the town of Numantia and respective lands when the Romans partitioned the territory of the defeated Arevaci amongst their neighbours.^[10] 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).^[11] Later during the Sertorian Wars, they sided with Quintus Sertorius and provided unspecified troops to his army.^[12] 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.

Romanization

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.

Notes

^ Pliny the Elder, Historia Naturalis, III, 26.
^ Livy, Periochae, 91.
^ Pliny the Elder, Historia Naturalis, III, 26.
^ Pliny the Elder, Historia Naturalis, III, 29.
^ Strabo, Geographikon, III, 4, 12.
^ Curchin, The Romanization of Central Spain, p. 37.
^ Albertos, Mª L. (1976), "La antroponimia prerromana de la Península Ibérica".
^ Pliny the Elder, Historia Naturalis, III, 26.
^ Livy, Periochae, 18.
^ Appian, Iberiké, 99.
^ Motoza, Los Celtíberos, etnias y estados (1998, revised edition 2007), pp. 194-195.
^ Livy, Periochae, 91.

Bibliography

Ángel Montenegro et alii, Historia de España 2 - colonizaciones y formación de los pueblos prerromanos (1200-218 a.C), Editorial Gredos, Madrid (1989) ISBN 84-249-1386-8
Francisco Burillo Mozota, Los Celtíberos, etnias y estados, Crítica, Barcelona (1998, revised edition 2007) ISBN 84-7423-891-9
Leonard A Curchin (5 May 2004). The Romanization of Central Spain: Complexity, Diversity and Change in a Provincial Hinterland. Routledge. pp. 37–. ISBN 978-1-134-45112-8.

[1] Pliny the Elder, Historia Naturalis, III, 26.

[2] Livy, Periochae, 91.

[3] Pliny the Elder, Historia Naturalis, III, 26.

[4] Pliny the Elder, Historia Naturalis, III, 29.

[5] Strabo, Geographikon, III, 4, 12.

[6] Curchin, The Romanization of Central Spain, p. 37.

[7] Albertos, Mª L. (1976), "La antroponimia prerromana de la Península Ibérica".

[8] Pliny the Elder, Historia Naturalis, III, 26.

[9] Livy, Periochae, 18.

[10] Appian, Iberiké, 99.

[11] Motoza, Los Celtíberos, etnias y estados (1998, revised edition 2007), pp. 194-195.

[12] Livy, Periochae, 91.

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