Iberians

The Iberians (Latin: Hibērī, from Greek: Ἴβηρες, Iberes) were an ancient people settled in the eastern and southern coasts of the Iberian Peninsula, at least from the 6th century BCE. They are described in Greek and Roman sources (among others, by Hecataeus of Miletus, Avienius, Herodotus and Strabo). Roman sources also use the term Hispani to refer to the Iberians.

The term Iberian, as used by the ancient authors, had two distinct meanings. One, more general, referred to all the populations of the Iberian peninsula without regard to ethnic differences (Pre-Indo-European, Celts and non-Celtic Indo-Europeans). The other, more restricted ethnic sense and the one dealt with in this article, refers to the people living in the eastern and southern coasts of the Iberian Peninsula, which by the 6th century BCE had absorbed cultural influences from the Phoenicians and the Greeks.^[1] This pre-Indo-European cultural group spoke the Iberian language from the 7th to at least the 1st century BCE. The rest of the peninsula, in the northern, central, and northwestern areas, was inhabited by Vascones, Celts or Celtiberians groups and the possibly Pre-Celtic or Proto-Celtic Indo-European Lusitanians, Vettones, and Turdetani.

Starting in the 5th century BCE, Iberian soldiers were frequently deployed in battles in Italy, Greece and especially Sicily due to their military qualities.