In the 3rd century AD, the area was the
site of a Roman castrum called Lapurdum, which was a military site, but not a
port. In 840 the Vikings appeared before Lapurdum; in 842, Viking chieftain
Björn Ironside and his troops launched a large-scale inland offensive and
settled outside the city on the river bank. Lapurdum was an oppidum and they
needed a port. Bayonne (from Basque ibai, "river") became a key place
on the route between the Adour and Ebro rivers, which served as a kind of link
between the Atlantic Ocean and the Mediterranean Sea. This commercial route was
the main goal of Danish
