The Kingdom of Navarre ( nə-VAR), originally the Kingdom of Pamplona, was a historical Iberian polity which occupied lands on both sides of the western Pyrenees, with its northernmost areas originally reaching the Atlantic Ocean (Bay of Biscay), between present-day Spain and France.
The medieval state took form around the city of Pamplona during the first centuries of the Iberian Reconquista. The kingdom had its origins in the conflict in the buffer region between the Carolingian Empire and the Umayyad Emirate of Córdoba that controlled most of the Iberian Peninsula. The city of Pamplona (Latin: Pompaelo; Basque: Iruña), had been the main city of the indigenous Vasconic population and was located in a predominantly Basque-speaking area.
In an event traditionally dated to 824, Íñigo Arista was elected or declared ruler of the area around Pamplona in opposition to Frankish expansion into the region, originally as vassal to the Córdoba emirate. This polity evolved into the Kingdom of Pamplona. A series of partitions and dynastic changes led to a diminution of its territory and to periods of rule by the kings of Aragon (1054–1134) and France (1285–1328).
In the 15th century, another dynastic dispute over control by the king of Aragon led to internal divisions and the eventual conquest of the southern part of the kingdom by Ferdinand II of Aragon in 1512 (permanently annexed in 1524). It was annexed by the Courts of Castile to the Crown of Castile in 1515 as a separate kingdom with its own Courts and judiciary until 1841.
The remaining northern part of the kingdom was once again joined with France by personal union in 1589 when King Henry III of Navarre inherited the French throne as Henry IV of France, and in 1620 it was merged into the Kingdom of France. The monarchs of this unified state took the title "King of France and Navarre" until its fall in the French Revolution, and again during the Bourbon Restoration from 1814 until 1830 (with a brief interregnum in 1815).
The ancient Kingdom of Navarre covered, at its greatest extent, approximately the modern-day Spanish autonomous communities of Navarre, Basque Country and La Rioja and the French territory of Lower Navarre in Pyrénées-Atlantiques.
Similar earlier toponyms exist but the first documentation of Latin navarros appears in Eginhard's chronicle of the feats of Charles the Great. Other Royal Frankish Annals give nabarros. Several Frankish sources mention the nabarri/navarri and the Hispani wascones, and also pampilonensi.
Two etymologies have been proposed for the name of Navarra/Nafarroa/Naparroa:
Basque nabar (declined absolutive singular nabarra): "brownish", "multicolor", which would be a contrast with the green mountain lands north of the original County of Navarre.
Basque naba, Castilian nava ("valley", "plain", present across Spain) + Basque herri ("people", "land").
The linguist Joan Coromines considers naba as not clearly Basque in origin but as part of a wider pre-Roman substrate.
The kingdom originated in the southern side of the western Pyrenees, in the flatlands around the city of Pamplona. According to Roman geographers such as Pliny the Elder and Livy, these regions were inhabited by the Vascones and other related Vasconic-Aquitanian tribes, a pre-Indo-European group of peoples who inhabited the southern slopes of the western Pyrenees and part of the shore of the Bay of Biscay. These tribes spoke an archaic version of the Basque language, usually known by linguistics as Proto-Basque, as well as some other related languages, such as the Aquitanian language. The Romans took full control of the area by 74 BC, but unlike their northern neighbors, the Aquitanians, and other tribes from the Iberian Peninsula, the Vascones negotiated their status within the Roman Empire. The region first was part of the Roman province of Hispania Citerior, then of the Hispania Tarraconensis. It would be under the jurisdiction of the conventus iuridicus of Caesaraugusta (modern Zaragoza).
The Roman Empire influenced the area in urbanization, language, infrastructure, commerce, and industry. During the Sertorian War, Pompey would command the foundation of a city in Vasconic territory, giving origin to Pompaelo, modern-day Pamplona, founded on a previously existent Vasconic town. Romanization of the Vascones led to their eventual adoption of forms of Latin that would evolve into the Navarro-Aragonese language, though the Basque language would remain widely spoken, especially in rural and mountainous areas.
After the decline of the Western Roman Empire, the Vascones were slow to be incorporated into the Visigothic Kingdom, which was in a civil war that provided the opportunity for the Umayyad conquest of Hispania. The Basque leadership most likely joined the Umayyad caliphate in the hope of stability brought by the Muslim conquerors. By 718, Pamplona had formed a pact that allowed a wide degree of autonomy in exchange for military and political subjugation, along with the payment of tribute to Córdoba. Burial ornamentation shows strong contacts with the Merovingian France and the Gascons of Aquitaine, but also items with Islamic inscriptions, while a Muslim cemetery in Pamplona, the use of which spanned several generations, suggests the presence of a Muslim garrison in the decades following the Arab invasion.
The origin and foundation of the Kingdom of Pamplona is intrinsically related to the southern expansion of the Frankish kingdom under the Merovingians and their successors, the Carolingians. About 601, the Duchy of Vasconia (Latin: Wasconiae) was established by the Merovingians, based around Roman Novempopulania and extending from the southern branch of the River Garonne to the northern side of the Pyrenees. The first documented Duke of Vasconia was Genial, who would hold that position until 627.
The Duchy of Vasconia then became a frontier territory with varying levels of autonomy granted by the Merovingian monarchs. The suppression of the Duchy of Vasconia as well as the Duchy of Aquitaine by the Carolingians would lead to a rebellion, led by Lupo II of Gascony. Pepin the Short launched a punitive War in Aquitaine (760–768) that put down the uprising and resulted in the division of the duchy into several counties, ruled from Toulouse. Similarly, across the eastern Pyrenees the Marca Hispánica was established next to the Marca Gothica, a Frankish attempt at creating buffer states between the Carolingian Empire and the Emirate of Córdoba.
The Franks under Charlemagne extended their influence and control southward, occupying several regions of the north and east of the Iberian Peninsula. It is unclear how solidly the Franks exercised control over Pamplona. In 778, Charlemagne was invited by rebellious Muslim lords on the Upper March of Al-Andalus to lead an expedition south with the intention of taking the city of Zaragoza from the Emirate of Córdoba. However, the expedition was a failure, and the Frankish army was forced to withdraw. During their retreat, they destroyed the city walls of Pamplona to weaken the city and avoid a possible rebellion, reminiscent of the approach the Carolingians had used elsewhere against Christian cities that seemed content to live under Córdoban control.
However, while moving through the Pyrenees on 15 August 778, the rearguard of the Frankish army, led by Roland was attacked by the Basque tribes in a confrontation that came to be known as the Battle of Roncevaux Pass. Roland was killed and the rearguard scattered. As a response to the attempted Frankish seizure of Zaragoza, the Córdoban emir retook the city of Pamplona and its surrounding lands. In 781 two local Basque lords, Ibn Balask ("son of Velasco"), and Mothmin al-Akra ("Jimeno the Strong") were defeated and forced to submit. The next mention of Pamplona is in 799, when Mutarrif ibn Musa, thought to have been a governor of the city and a member of the muwallad Banu Qasi family, was killed there by a pro-Frankish faction.