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SPANISH HISTORY

EXPLAINED: Why is Spain called Spain?

You may have never stopped to think about it, but where does Spain - or España - get its name from? 

Published: 11 October 2021 11:20 CEST
Updated: 15 October 2023 08:22 CEST
EXPLAINED: Why is Spain called Spain?
Ancient words for Hyrax, metal forging and snakes are just three of the origin theories behind the name "España" (Spain). Photos: JOHANNA LEGUERRE/AFP, Alex MITA/AFP, Felix Reimann/Wikipedia

Ah, España, Spain, Espagne, Spanien, Xībānyá (Chinese). 

Each language has its own individual way of saying “Spain” but the monikers all clearly share a common root and pronunciation. 

So what does the name Spain mean? Is it ‘land of the sun’ or ‘country of swarthy people’? Does it have anything to do with spas or spanners?

All those suggestions may seem unlikely but as things stand, there are several theories as to where Spain got its name from, none of which you may expect. 

Land of gold forging for the Phoenicians?

Many historians and linguists say the origins of the name España are Phoenician, claiming that around the fifth century BC the Middle Eastern civilization referred to the Iberian Peninsula as “I-span-ya”.

What did these ancient words mean? Some linguists say it referred to Spain as “land to the north”, as seen from the African coast, believing “spn” (sphan in Hebrew and Aramaic) meant “north” in Phoenician. 

Phoenician merchants traded throughout much of Spain's eastern and southern coastline, founding Cádiz in the process. Image: Wikimedia
Phoenician merchants traded throughout much of Spain’s eastern and southern coastline, founding the city of Cádiz in the process. Image: Wikimedia

However, the most widely accepted theory suggests that “I-span-ya” translates to earth where metals are forged , since “spy” in Phoenician (the root of the word “span”) meant to forge metals. 

A recent study by Semitic philology experts Jesús Luis Cunchillos and José Ángel Zamora from Spain’s National Research Council determined that the name has its origin in the Iberian Peninsula’s reputation for having gold mines. 

 

The Rod of Asclepius is a serpent-entwined rod wielded by the Greek god Asclepius, a symbol of health and medicine to this day. Photo: Wikipedia

Land of snakes for the Greeks?

Initially, the Greeks referred to the Iberian Peninsula as “Ophioússa Peninsula”, which means “land of snakes”. 

Whether Spain had a bigger snake population than it does now we simply don’t know, but representations of serpents were common in paintings, sculptures and mythology from Ancient Greece, indicating that they gave a lot of importance to them. 

Later on in history, Ancient Greeks reportedly changed the name to “Iberia”, which refers to the Ebro River that runs from the north of the mainland to the Eastern coast. 

Some claim “iber” simply meant “river” and as Greek explorers heard locals as far down as Andalusia frequently use the word, they ended up adopting it to refer to this part of the world. 

Land of rabbits for the Romans?

If we go back to the word “I-span-ya” that the Phoenicians and Carthaginians are supposed to have used to refer to Spain, others claim that Spain’s moniker was rather established by the Romans, and that the root of the name was “span”, meaning rabbits or hyrax, leading to the name “Hispania”. 

Some historians believe that at the time Spain either had an abundant hyrax population, small buck-toothed mammals about the size of rabbits, or that it was just a mistake when translating the semitic root “spn” which refers to forging metals. 

Rock hyraxes are present throughout many parts of Africa to this day, so there’s every likelihood they populated parts of Spain in antiquity.

 

The border for the Basques?

There is also a claim that “Hispania” derives from the Basque word “Ezpanna” meaning “edge” or “border” in Euskera, a reference to the fact that the Iberian Peninsula constitutes the southwestern corner of the European continent as well as the Mediterranean.

Despite all the etymological research and the fascinating theories, the origins of the name “España” are still uncertain, but all of them seem to share a common thread in that the associations made with Spain in ancient times – whether gold, rabbits or snakes – are very different to what springs to mind when we think about the country today.

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SPAIN EXPLAINED

Why does Spain have no nuclear weapons?

Despite a top secret project to build them during the dictatorship, Spaniards have never been keen on the idea of nuclear weapons, especially since the US accidentally dropped four nuclear bombs on Almería.

Published: 15 April 2024 16:36 CEST
Why does Spain have no nuclear weapons?

Spain isn’t part of the reduced group of nations that have nuclear weapons, which includes European neighbours the UK and France.

It has never tested nuclear weapons, does not manufacture them, nor has it bought them from nuclear allies who make them.

Spain is still a NATO member and doesn’t shy away from involving itself in foreign policy debates, often taking positions against the mainstream.

But it has still never joined the nuclear club nor have Spaniards ever really wanted to, even though former dictator Francisco Franco had different ideas (more on that below).

In fact, Spaniards seem to have an indifferent if not abnormally negative view of nukes, largely stemming from an accident by an American air force on Spanish soil in the 1960s.

READ ALSO: How important is nuclear power to Spain?

A 2018 study on state attitudes towards nuclear weapons concluded that Spain had “little to no interest in nuclear weapons.” Yet Spain still benefits from NATO’s so-called ‘nuclear umbrella’ defence and has nearby neighbours, including France and the United Kingdom, that are nuclear powers. It is also home to several American military bases.

In that sense, Spain balances a somewhat unique position of being pro-nuclear for other countries and as a broader defence deterrence at the global level, but not on Spanish territory because it knows that would not sit well with Spaniards.

But why is this? Why doesn’t Spain have nuclear weapons?

Anti-nuclear sentiment among Spaniards

According to an article for Institut Montaigne by Clara Portela, Professor of Political Science at the University of Valencia, the Spanish people are “sensitised on nuclear weapons, if not negatively disposed towards them.”

Much of it comes down to history and, in particular, an accident involving nuclear weapons on Spanish soil. As part of post-war defence and security agreements Spain made with the U.S, American nuclear weapons were kept on Spanish soil.

Spaniards weren’t keen on the idea. Portela notes that “their presence at the Torrejón base near Madrid was a controversial issue” among the public, but it was an accident in 1966 that really soured Spaniards to nuclear weapons after an American aircraft carrying a hydrogen bomb crashed and dropped the device in the waters near the town of Palomares off the coast of Almería.

READ ALSO: Ten of the best documentaries about Spain

The incident caused “one of the bombs to fall to the seabed and leak radioactivity” into the surrounding area, Portela states, something that would have no doubt hardened many Spaniard’s perceptions towards nuclear weapons, especially as the American bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki was still in living memory for many.

A NATO-nuclear referendum

This scepticism towards nuclear arms was solidified twenty years later in a referendum on NATO membership. Though the government of the day campaigned for continued membership of the military alliance, it made it conditional on Spain also continuing as a non-nuclear power. A clause in the referendum consultation outlined this condition: “The prohibition to install, store or introduce nuclear weapons on Spanish soil will be maintained.”

Spaniards backed their continued, non-nuclear NATO membership by 13 percent.

A year later, in 1987, Spain formally signed the Treaty on Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT), further cementing its non-nuclear stance.

And that was it — with this and the result of the referendum, Portela suggests that “the issue of nuclear weapons was all but archived. It hardly re-surfaced in public debates for decades.”

An atomic bomb of the type nicknamed “Little Boy” that was dropped by a US Army Air Force B-29 bomber in 1945 over Hiroshima, Japan. (Photo by LOS ALAMOS SCIENTIFIC LABORATORY / AFP)

The nuclear dictator?

Despite the Spanish public’s distrust of nuclear weapons, there was one Spaniard in particular who was quite keen on the idea: Franco.

In what may be one of the most terrifying historical ‘what ifs’ ever, the fascist dictator wanted to equip Spain with a nuclear arsenal, started a project to do so, and came very close to achieving it.

The ‘Islero Project’, as it was known, was top secret and lasted for several decades of scientific research until it was finally abandoned in the 1980s after his death.

Firstly, a brief consideration of the geopolitics of the time is worthwhile here, and it concerns the Americans again. When the Second World War ended in 1945, Spain immediately became isolated on the international stage owing to its support for Nazi Germany and fascist Spain. It was excluded from the UN and shunned as a real player in international relations.

As the Cold War and threat of nuclear annihilation grew throughout the 1950s, Franco’s fierce anti-communism combined with the strategic geographical positioning of Spain led the U.S. to form closer ties with the dictatorship, promising financial aid and image rehabilitation in return for allowing American military bases in Spain.

READ ALSO: Where are the US’s military bases in Spain and why are they there?

The Junta de Energía Nuclear was created in 1951, undertaking research and atomic energy development more broadly, and it sent promising researchers to study in the U.S. When they returned, the Islero project continued in secret.

Rather bizarrely, it was the accident at Palomares years later that actually gave the scientists the key to designing an atomic bomb. Unconvinced by the American’s explanations for the debacle, the Spaniards working on plans discovered the Ulam-Teller method, which was fundamental to the development of the thermonuclear bomb or H-bomb.

However, the project was then frozen by Franco himself because he feared the United States would discover that Spain was trying to develop its own atomic bomb and impose economic sanctions.

After Franco’s death in 1975, Spanish scientists secretly restarted the project, but in 1982 the new Socialist government discovered the plans and disbanded the project. By 1987 the González government announced Spain’s accession to the Non-Proliferation Treaty NPT and the issue has rarely even come up as an issue since then.

And despite that, Spain is a NATO member, regularly attends the G20, and often plays a leading role on the global stage. Certain elements of the dictatorship had eyes on building a nuclear arsenal, but it never happened. Franco ultimately worried about the economic repercussions of being discovered, and Spaniards were themselves sceptical about the idea based on the experience in Palomares.

In terms of nuclear weapons, Spain is what Portela describes as a ‘de-proliferation’ state – in other words, a country that aspired to have nuclear bombs but reversed it.

It doesn’t look like changing anytime soon either. A survey in 2021 showed that Spain had the highest level of support for the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons, with a massive 89 percent majority.

READ ALSO: Why is Spain not in the G20 (but is always invited)?

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