Lusitania Lusitania Lusitania (; ; ) or Hispania Lusitana was an ancient Iberian Roman province located where modern Portugal (south of the Douro river) and part of western Spain (the present autonomous community of Extremadura and a part of the province of Salamanca) lie. It was named after the Lusitani or Lusitanian people (an Indo-European people). Its capital was "Emerita Augusta" (currently Mérida, Spain), and it was initially part of the Roman Republic province of Hispania Ulterior, before becoming a province of its own in the Roman Empire. Romans first came to the territory around the mid-2nd century BC. A war
Claudius, Duke of Lusitania the Franks and routed them, killing 5,000 and capturing 2,000, as well as their camp. According to Isidore of Seville, "nulla umquam in Hispaniis Gothorum uictoria uel maior in bello vel similis extitit": "No victory of the Goths in Spain was ever greater or even equal to it." The chronicler John of Biclarum, with even more excitement, exaggerated his figures to make Claudius, the next Gideon, defeat 60,000 Franks (the evil Midianites in the biblical metaphor) with merely 300 men. Claudius, Duke of Lusitania Claudius was a Hispano-Roman Catholic "dux" (duke) of Lusitania (or "dux Emeretensis civitatis") in the late