Federico Krutwig

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Federico Krutwig Sagredo (1921–1998) was a Basque anarchist, best known as author of several books. Along with Felix Likiniano, he tried to create some Anarchist resistance to the Francoist regime after the Spanish Civil War. The thought of both authors, melting Basque nationalism and Anarchism gave birth to a minor political current known as Anarkoabertzalism (Anarcho-nationalism), eventually merged within the hybrid of Marxism and Anarchism known as Autonomism.

He was born in 15 May 1921 in Getxo, the son of a bourgeois family of German origin. He learnt Basque by himself.

His main writings are:

Vasconia ("The Basque Country", 1963) published initially under the pseudonym of Fernando Sarrailh de Ihartza, where he describes an ideal Greater Basqueland comprising all historical territories, from the Garonne to the Ebro rivers. It is inspired by the Algerian independentism and anti-colonialism and proposes armed combat against Spain and France, taking Basque nationalism beyond the traditional views of Sabino Arana. This book was clandestinely published with a limited circulation. The Francoist police took it as inspirational of ETA, which was not the case, but the police questions stirred the interest of many members and sympathizers of the armed group, giving some fame to Krutwig. The intellectual and former ETA member Jon Juaristi narrates that, during reminiscences, fellow Juan Mari Bandrés once realized "So you are the one who actually read it!".
La Nueva Europa ("The New Europe", 1976). In this essay he extends his ideas on Greater Vasconia to Western Europe, claiming and hoping an internal decolonization of the continent and proposing what could be grossly taken as the Europe of the Regions.
La Nueva Vasconia ("The New Vasconia", 1979), a substantially enlarged re-edition of Vasconia, after the death of Franco.
Garaldea: Sobre el origen de los vascos ("Garaldea: On the origin of Basques", 1978). In this, maybe his most scientific and serious essay, he studies the origins of the Basques and explores a hypothetical Garaldea (land of "we are" or land of the flame), extending at some time in the past through all Western Europe and the Mediterranean basin. In the annexes, he analyzes transcriptions of Guanche (native Canarian) and Pictish inscriptions, concluding that their two extinct languages are not just related to Basque but that they are the very same tongue. This daring claim has not been corroborated by anyone so far.

He was accepted as member of the Basque-Language Academy in 1943, where he favoured the standardisation of Basque around the Labourdine dialect of the first printed books in Basque, and with an etymological orthography. However, the Academy preferred the Guipuscoan dialect as the basis of Batua Basque. Krutwig's proposal was not applied beyond the members of the Jakintza Baitha ("House of Knowledge") Hellenophile society.

He spoke and read several ancient and modern languages.