The first mention of Basque whaling was made in 1059, when it was said to have been practiced at the
The first mention of Basque whaling was made in 1059, when it was said to have been practiced at the Basque town of Bayonne. The fishery spread to what is now the Spanish Basque Country in 1150, when King Sancho the Wise of Navarre granted petitions for the warehousing of such commodities as whalebone (baleen). At first, they only hunted the whale they called sarda, or the North Atlantic Right Whale, using watchtowers (known as vigias) to look for their distinctive twin vapour spouts. By the 14th century they were making “seasonal trips” to the English Channel and southern Ireland. image: Right whale by Michelle -- source link
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