Map of the Roman Empire - Tarraconensis
Tarraconensis
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Ancient Tarraconensis - Originally colonized by the Greeks, Phoenicians, and Carthaginians, under Rome it became one of the three provinces of Spain, and Tarraconensis was larger than the other two put together.
Tarraconensis, the name given by Augustus to Hispania Citerior, from Tarraco, its capital; separated from Bsetica by a line from Portus Magnus to Ilucia, on the Anas, and from Lusitania by the Durius, and a line from Sarabris on that r., N., to Ilucia, s. - Classical Gazetteer
History of Tarraconensis. The Phoenicians and Carthaginians colonized the Mediterranean coast in the 8th to 6th centuries BC. The Romans arrived in the 2nd century BC. The Greeks also had established colonies along the coast. Hispania Tarraconensis was one of three Roman provinces in Hispania. It encompassed much of the Mediterranean coast of Spain along with the central plateau. Southern Spain, the region now called Andalucia, was the province of Hispania Baetica. On the Atlantic west lay the province of Lusitania. The Imperial Roman province called Tarraconensis, supplanted Hispania Citerior, which had been ruled by a consul under the late Republic, in Augustus's reorganization of 27 BC. Its capital was at Tarraco (modern Tarragona, Catalonia). The Cantabrian Wars (29–19 BC) brought all of Iberia under Roman domination, within the Tarraconensis. The Cantabri in the northwest corner of Iberia (Cantabria) were the last people to be pacified. Tarraconensis was an Imperial province and separate from the two other Iberian provinces — Lusitania (corresponding to modern Portugal plus Spanish Extremadura) and the Senatorial province Baetica, corresponding to the southern part of Spain, or Andalusia. Servius Sulpicius Galba, who served as Emperor briefly in 68–69, governed the province since 61. Pliny the Elder served as procurator in Tarraconensis (73). He makes interesting comments of his observation of mining gold in Spain by hydraulic mining methods. - Wikipedia
Hispania Tarraconensis. The peninsula was then divided into Hispania Citerior and Hispania Ulterior. Hispania Citerior was also called Tarraconensis, from Tarraco, its capital, and extended from the foot of the Pyrenees to the mouth of the Durius (Douro), on the Atlantic shore; comprehending all the north of Spain, together with the south as far as a line drawn below Carthago Nova (Carthagena), and continued in an oblique direction to Salamantica (Salamanca), on the Durius. Hispania Ulterior was divided into two provinces, Baetica, on the south of Spain, between the Anas (Guadiana) and Citerior, and above it Lusitania, corresponding in a great degree, though not entirely, to Portugal. In the age of Diocletian and Constantine, Tarraconensis was subdivided into a province towards the limits of Baetica, and adjacent to the Mediterranean, called Carthaginiensis, from its chief city Carthago Nova, and another, north of Lusitania, called Gallaecia from the Callaici. The province of Lusitania was partly peopled by the Cynetes or Cynesii. The Celtici possessed the land between the Anas and the Tagus. The Lusitani, a nation of freebooters, were settled in the middle of Estremadura. The part of Baetica near the Mediterranean was peopled by the Bastuli Poeni. The Turduli inhabited the shores of the ocean, near the mouth of the Baetis. The Baeturi dwelt on the Montes Mariani, and the Turdetani inhabited the southern slope of the Sierra de Aracena. The last people, more enlightened than any other in Baetica, were skilled in different kinds of industry long before their neighbours. When the Phśnicians arrived on their coasts, silver was so common among them that their ordinary utensils were made of it. The people in Gallaecia, a subdivision of Tarraconensis, were the Artabri, who derived their name from the promontory of Artabrum, now Cape Finisterre; the Bracari, whose chief town was Bracara, the present Braga; and lastly the Lucenses, the capital of whose country was Lucus Augusti, now Lugo. These tribes and some others formed the nation of the Callaici or Callaeci. The Astures, now the Asturians, inhabited the banks of the Asturis, or the country on the east of the Gallaecian mountains. - Harry Thurston Peck. Harpers Dictionary of Classical Antiquities. New York. Harper and Brothers.
Tarraconensis
TARRACONENSIS PROVINCIA (called by the Greeks Ταρρακωνησία, Ptol. 2.6, 8.4.5,
&c.; and Ἰβηρία ἡ περὶ Ταρράκωνα, D. C. 53.3), at first constituted, as already
remarked [Vol. I. p. 1081], the province of Hispania Citerior. It obtained its
new appellation in the time of Augustus from its chief city Tarraco, where the
Romans had established themselves, and erected the tribunal of a praetor. The
Tarraconensis was larger than the other two provinces put together. Its
boundaries were, on the E. the Mare Internum; on the N. the Pyrenees, which
separated it from Gallia, and further westward the Mare Cantabricum; on the W.,
as far southward as the Durius, the Atlantic ocean, and below that point the
province of Lusitania; and on the S. the province of Lusitania and the province
of Baetica, the boundaries of which have been already laid down. (Mela, 2.6;
comp. Strab. iii. p.166; Plin. Nat. 4.21. s. 35; Marcian, p. 34.) Thus it
embraced the modern provinces of Murcia, Valencia, Catalonia, Arragon, Navarre,
Biscay, Asturias, Gallicia, the N. part of Portugal as far down as the Douro,
the N. part of Leon, nearly all the Castiles, and part of Andalusia. The nature
of its climate and productions may be gathered from what has been already said
[HISPANIA Vol. I. p. 1086.] A summary of the different tribes, according to the
various authorities that have treated upon the subject, has also been given in
the same article [p. 1083], as well as the particulars respecting its government
and administration [p. 1081.]
- Dictionary of Greek and Roman
Geography (1854) William Smith, LLD, Ed.