IBERIANS, an ancient people inhabiting parts of the Spanish peninsula. The name was applied by the earlier Greek navigators to the peoples who inhabited the eastern coast of Spain; originally those who dwelt by the river Iberus (mod. Ebro). The river's name itself may represent the Basque phrase ibay-erri, "the country of the river." In older Greek usage the term Iberia embraced the country as far east as the Rhone and by the time of Strabo it was the common Greek name for the Spanish peninsula. Iberians thus meant sometimes the population of the peninsula in general and sometimes one element in that population. In Spain, when this element first became known to the Greeks and Romans, there existed many separate and variously civilized tribes connect ed by at least apparent identity of race, and by similarity (but not identity) of language, and sufficiently distinguished by their general characteristics from Phoenicians, Romans and Celts.
I. Numismatic.—Knowledge of ancient Iberian language and history is mainly derived from a variety of coins, found widely distributed in the peninsula, and also in the neighbourhood of Narbonne. (For the prehistoric civilization of the peninsula as a whole see SPAIN.) They are inscribed in an alphabet which has many points of similarity with the western Greek alphabets, and some with the Punic alphabet, but retains a few characters from an older script. The same Iberian alphabet is found also rarely in inscriptions. The coinage began before the Roman conquest was completed; the monetary system resembles that of the Roman republic, with values analogous to denarii and quinarii. The coin inscriptions usually give only the name of the town; e.g., Plplis (Bilbilis), Klaqriqs (Calagurris), Seqbrics (Segobriga), Tmaniav (Dumania). The types show late Greek and perhaps also late Punic influence, but approximate later to Roman models. The commonest reverse type, a charging horseman, reappears on the Roman coins of Bilbilis, Osca, Segobriga and other places. An other common type is one man leading two horses or brandishing a sword or a bow. The obverse has usually a male head, sometimes inscribed with what appears to be a native name.
2. Linguistic.—The survival of the Basque language (q.v.) around the west Pyrenees suggested the attempt to interpret by its means a large class of similar-sounding place names of ancient Spain, some of which are authenticated by their occurrence on the inscribed coins, and to link it with other traces of non-Aryan speech round the shores of the western Mediterranean and on the Atlantic seaboard of Europe. K. W. von Humboldt contended that there existed once a single great Iberian people, speaking a distinct language of their own ; that an essentially "Iberian" population was to be found in Sicily, Sardinia and Corsica, in southern France, and even in the British Isles; and that the Basques of the present day were remnants of this race, which had elsewhere been expelled or absorbed. He adduced explanations of a vast number of the ancient topographical names of Spain, and of other asserted Iberian districts, by the forms and signifi cations of Basque.
3. Anthropological.—This "Iberian theory" depended partly on the widespread similarity of physical type among the popula tion of south-western Europe. Anthropological researches have proved the existence in Europe, from Neolithic times, of a race, small of stature, with long or oval skulls, who buried their dead in tombs. Their remains have been found in Belgium and France, in Britain, Germany and Denmark, as well as in Spain ; and they bear a close resemblance to a type common among the Basques and all over the Iberian peninsula. This Neolithic race has conse quently been nicknamed "Iberians," and the racial characteristics of "Iberians," have been identified in the "small swarthy Welsh man," the "small dark Highlander," and the "Black Celts to the west of the Shannon," as well as in the typical inhabitants of Aquitania and Brittany. Thus a race with fairly uniform char acteristics was at one time in possession of the south of France (or at least of Aquitania), the whole of Spain from the Pyrenees to the straits, the Canary Islands (the Guanches) a part of northern Africa and Corsica. Whether this type is more conveniently desig nated by the word Iberian, or by some other name ("Eur-African," "Mediterranean," etc.) is a matter of comparative indifference, provided that there is no misunderstanding as to the steps by which the term Iberian attained its meaning in modern anthro pology.