2. Who were the Celts?

2.1. Historical Background

The word Celt is derived from the Greek word keltoi and is pronounced
with a hard [k] sound. It designates a member of an ancient race of people, who
formerly inhabited a great part of Central and Western Europe, and whose
descendents at the present day occupy Ireland, Wales, the Highlands of Scotland
and the northern shores of France. The Greeks would call keltoi the barbarian
peoples of Central Europe. The Celts were never an empire ruled by one
government. They were a broad cultural-linguistic group.
(http://www.joellessacredgrove.com/Celtic/history.html)
The Celts as a people first appeared on the scene of history around the year
800 BC. The Greek historian Herodotus mentioned that around the year 500 BC
they had already spread over the entire Alpine Europe, in areas immediately to the
north, in central France and in parts of Spain. During the 4th century BC, in a band
of territory stretching across Europe from Eastern France through Germany,
Austria and into Bohemia, new groups arose, characterized by, among other things,
warrior graves and a new kind of art. Archaeologists call this the La Tène culture,
the physical remains of groups who, around 400 BC, suddenly erupted into Italy
and began to settle the Po Valley. These were the Ancient Celts, otherwise known
as Gauls. No longer a distant scholarly curiosity, the Celts were suddenly the most
fearsome barbarian danger (Drîmba: 1998, p.24). Around 390 BC, the Gallic
Senones1 plundered Rome, but they were driven back to the Po Valley which
became Gallia Cisalpina (the Gaul this side of the Alps).
Migrating Celtic groups invaded the Balkans and, in 279 BC, attacked
Delphi, the greatest shrine in Greece. Beaten back with terrible losses, some
crossed into Anatolia (now Turkey) and established themselves as a kind of
robber-kingdom around modern Ankara. Known by the Greek equivalent of the
Roman name Gauls, these Galatae gave their name to the land, Galatia, and so to
the Galatians of the New Testament. It has also long been assumed that there were
waves of Celts moving Westwards and North-West from the Central European
homeland, to match these historically-attested Mediterranean migrations - even
though there were no literate observers in these areas to record such invasions.
Nonetheless, the Romans found people called Celtiberians in Spain, and there are
traces of Celtic dialects in various parts of the peninsula. This has been explained
as a result of early, unrecorded Celtic invasions. Likewise, it has long been
believed that there were Celtic invasions of the British Isles. Caesar recorded that
Gauls, especially Belgae, had settled in Britain. Identical tribal names are found
on the continent and in Britain (e.g. Atrebates, Parisi). Modern linguistics has
shown that the indigenous tongues of the British and the Irish were closely

1
The Senones were a Celtic people of Gallia Celtica, who in the time of Julius Caesar inhabited the
district which now includes the departments of Seine-et-Marne, Loiret and Yonne.

13
 Annex No. 1

Fig.No.1. The Celtic Tribes of Britain

Fig.No.3. Iceni
Silver
Coin (AD
61)
Fig.No.2. The Celtic Trade Links

14
 with Europe

related to those of the continental Gauls, and were all members of the Celtic family
of languages. Then as archaeology developed, the artifacts of Iron Age Britain and
Ireland began to be identified, and in important ways showed links with the world
of the Continental Celtic Gauls; all three groupings produced the same kind of
characteristic Celtic art, of swirling lines, suggesting vegetation, and perhaps
stylized faces of people and animals. There seemed to be a common emphasis on
weapons, strongholds, and warfare, and historical documents suggested institutions
in common too, not least in religion; Druids, for example, are attested amongst all
three groups. The Ancient British and Irish, then, came to be seen as Celts like the
Gauls and related continental peoples, from Spain to Turkey.
(http://www.ares.u-net.com/convent.htm)
During the last three centuries BC, the expanding Roman empire gradually
subjugated all of the Continental Celtic world, except for areas North of the Rhine
and Danube, which were soon overrun by a new barbarian grouping, the early
Germans. Many of the wholly or partly Celtic areas, such as the Three Gauls
(roughly modern France and the Rhineland) and Hispania (Spain and Portugal)
became prosperous Roman provinces, but Celtic language and lifestyle did not
survive the process of Romanization. All these lands came to speak Latin dialects,
ancestral to the Romance languages of today (Spanish, French, Portuguese,
Catalan, etc.). Rome extinguished Celticity on the European mainland. In Britain,
Roman occupation of the lands which would one day be known as England and
Wales led to a similar loss of Celtic language and culture in the East of the island.
Yet there was continuity of independence among the barbarians of Caledonia
(Northern Scotland), while Ireland was never invaded by Rome at all. (The
recently announced discovery of an alleged Roman military base at Drumanagh in
Ireland was almost certainly a trading centre).
(http://www.ares.u-net.com/convent.htm)
As the Empire began to decay in the 3rd and 4th century, the remnants of the
free Celts moved onto the offensive. In Caledonia, a new confederation, the Picts,
appeared. The Pictish tribes threatened the Roman frontier, while Irish sea-raiders,
known as Scotti, raided the Western coasts, even as Germanic Angles and Saxons
were raiding the East. In the fifth century AD, Roman Britain collapsed, and the
Anglo-Saxons invaded and settled the East, eventually to establish Germanic-
speaking England. They pressed the native British groups, whom they called
Welsh, ever westwards, into the land which would become Wales, and Cornwall.
From the West, some Britons crossed to Armorica, the western extremity of Gaul,
even as that land was being renamed France after its new Germanic overlords, the
Franks. The British migrants were not so much refugees from Anglo-Saxon
invasion as invaders themselves; conquest and migration was the name of the game
at the time, and the Britons took this opportunity for some expansion of their own.
Henceforth, the island of Britain was distinguished as Great Britain to avoid

15
confusion with this new little Britain (Brittany). (http://www.ares.u-
net.com/convent.htm)

The Irish, too, joined in the military, slave-raiding their fellow Celts in
Britain. They also settled in Britain, most importantly on the West coast of
Scotland, which was to take its name from these settlers in Argyll; the land of these
Scotti became Scotia. Eventually, wars with the Picts and other lesser kingdoms
led to union into the historic kingdom of Scotland, in AD 843. Ireland itself
became a Christian land as a result of the work of St Patrick in the fifth century,
and became one of the greatest centers of piety and learning in Europe during the
7th and 8th centuries AD, its clerics and artists having a profound influence in
Britain (not least among the English) and on the Continent.
Brittany, an independent kingdom in the 9th century, became one of the
many almost-independent duchies which made up medieval France. As central
Royal power grew in the 15th century, so its independence dwindled, and it was
politically absorbed by France in 1532. Wales remained a separate principality, but
it has been under increasing English dominance from the 10th century. In 1485 the
Welsh Henry Tudor became King of England, but his totally Anglicized son Henry
VIII united Wales politically to England. Scotland was divided, roughly, between
the Gaelic speaking (Irish Celtic) Highlands and the Scots-speaking (Germanic
dialect, close to English) Lowlands. The warlike clans and chieftains of the
Highlands were often in conflict with their Lowland neighbours, who thought them
cattle-thieving barbarians. This formed the background to their eventual brutal
suppression after their support for Catholic Bonnie Prince Charlie's attempt to
seize back the British throne for the Ancient Scottish royal house of Stuart from
the Protestant Hanoverians in 1745-46. Since the Vikings began to raid in 795.
Ireland was permanently occupied, wholly or partly, by foreigners. The Danes
were followed by the Anglo-Normans in the 12th century. During the 16th century
the English imperial grip tightened, and relations were further embittered by the
Reformation. Protestant England kept Catholic Ireland under subjection,
sometimes incredibly brutal, until after the First World War. (http://www.ares.u-
net.com/convent.htm)
All these lands saw substantial or massive migrations, especially from the
th
18 century onwards, partly lured away from often terrible conditions and
starvation on the land to equally squalid, but more reliably paid, employment in the
industrial cities of Britain, or to the promise of land and liberty in the New World
and Australasia. Many of the migrants, especially in Ireland and Scotland, were
unwilling, but driven away by lairds and landlords who put their own profit above
the welfare of their own people. The 18th century saw the beginnings of
nationalism in Ireland and elsewhere, and the rediscovery of a common Celtic
heritage. Linguistics, and the beginnings of archaeology, laid the foundation for
more detailed understanding of the histories of these peoples, and contributed to
growing national self-consciousness, exhibited in politics and in cultural forms, not
least art and literature. Perhaps this process reached maturity with the
establishment of an independent Irish state in 1921. (Mansuelli: 1978, pp.282-283)

16
 2.2. The Celts in Britain

The Celts arrived in the British islands around the 6th century BC. They
came in successive waves, hostile to each other and each speaking its own dialect,
though of the same culture. They came from the Danube and upper Rhinelands and
were skilful at working metal.
The Gaelic or Goidelic Celts were the first Celtic invaders in Britain. They
settled in Ireland and the Isle of Man. Their language can still be heard in Ireland
(Gaelic is the national language of Ireland) and Scotland (Erse is spoken in the
Highlands an islands of Scotland). Manx, spoken only in the Isle of Man, is now
extinct. The Brithonic Celts (or simply the Britons) settled about two centuries
later on the territories of what we call now England and Wales. Their language still
survives in Wales and is called Welsh. Cornish, which was spoken in Cornwall
and became extinct at the end of the 18th century, has been revived to become a
spoken language again. Finally, the Belgic Celts settled in the south-east of Britain
around 100 BC. It is believed that the very name Britain comes from the word
Pretani, the name given by the Greeks to the Celtic inhabitants of Britain,
pronounced Britannia by the Romans. The Celtic inheritance for the British
people is not a rich one, in what vocabulary is concerned. Place names such as
York, Kent or London and river names such as Avon or Thames seem to be Celtic
in origin. Also, some common English words such as cradle, brat, mattock etc.
come directly from Celtic. (Gavriliu, p. 21)

2.3. Celtic Life

The Iron Age was also the age of the Celts in Britain. The use of iron
changed trade, which was essential in the Bronze Age (not every area was
naturally endowed with the necessary ores to make bronze). On the other hand,
iron was cheap and available almost everywhere. The Celts were the first to
introduce the iron plough. They also made house hold items out of iron and, of
course, weapons of war. (Drîmba: 1998, p.38)
The basic unit of Celtic life was the clan, a sort of extended family. Clans
were bound together very loosely with other clans into tribes, each of which had its
own social structure (chiefs, nobles, freemen, and slaves) and customs, and
possibly its own local gods.
The Celts lived in huts of arched timber with walls of wicker and roofs of
thatch. The huts were generally gathered in loose hamlets. In several places each
tribe had its own coinage system. Each homestead might have consisted of such
structures as the main house or hall, a bread oven, a cheese house, drying racks for
grain, a husking / winnowing area, a smithy or woodshop, livestock pens, and a
granary or storage area – perhaps underground. Furnishings were sparse. Beds
were simple pallets of furs, perhaps a thin mattress stuffed with grass or moss,

17
arranged on ledges or benches which hugged the perimeter of the hall. The Celts
did not use chairs and squatted or sat on cushions and furs on the floor with a few
low tables scattered about.
The Celts were a neat and clean people. They took great pride in
themselves and their physical appearance. They were larger in stature than the
Romans and generally had gold or red blonde hair and ruddy complexions. The
dominance of light colored hair could be at least partially attributed to the
bleaching effect of the lime they used as hair dressing. The men commonly wore
beards and/or trailing mustaches and long flowing hair which was stiffened with
lime for battle. The women also wore their hair long, generally in one, two, or
three braids which were sometimes decorated with beads. Women warriors may
have worn their hair loose into battle. They were fond of personal decoration and
wore a lot of jewelry (neck-rings, girdles of chain, arm rings, finger rings, ankle
rings, and belt daggers). They were fond of bright colors and wore colorful
clothing, often in plaids or stripes and frequently edged with fringes. Tunics were
worn by both men and women, generally floor length for the women and shorter,
to the knee, for men. (Drîmba: 1998, p.31)
The Celts were farmers when they weren't fighting. One of the interesting
innovations that they brought to Britain was the iron plough. Earlier ploughs had
been awkward constructions, basically made of a stick with a pointed end
harnessed behind two oxen. They were suitable only for ploughing the light upland
soils. The heavier iron ploughs constituted an agricultural revolution, for they
made it possible for the first time to cultivate the rich valley and lowland soils.
They came with a price, though. It generally required a team of eight oxen to pull
the plough, so to avoid the difficulty of turning that large a team, Celtic fields
tended to be long and narrow, a pattern that can still be seen in some parts of the
country today. (Drîmba: 1998, p.38)
Celtic lands were owned communally, and wealth seems to have been
based largely on the size of the cattle herd owned (Drîmba: 1998, p.36). Women
were technically equal to men and could choose their own husbands. They could
also be war leaders, as the story of Queen Boadicca 1of the Iceni2 proves.

2.4. Celtic Culture

There was a written Celtic language, but it developed well into Christian
times, so for much of Celtic history they relied on oral transmission of culture,
primarily through the efforts of bards and poets. These arts were tremendously
important to the Celts, and much of what we know of their traditions comes to us
1
Boudicca, widow of Prasutagus, became queen of the Iceni. After she and her two daughters were subjected to
grave humiliations by the Romans, she led a revolt of the Iceni and several other tribes, which lasted for several
months in 60-61. The Boudiccan forces burned and destoyed the three major towns of Londinium (London),
Verulamium (St. Albans), and Camulodunum (Colchester), killing many thousands of citizens. The revolt was
eventually suppressed in AD 61 by the Roman military governor, Suetonius Paullinus. The story is told in the
Annals of Tacitus, written about AD 110-120. (Delaney: 1989, pp. 41-44)
2
The Iceni were a Celtic tribe living in Norfolk and Suffolk in eastern Britain.

18
today through the old tales and poems that were handed down for generations
before eventually being written down. The early Celts are supposed to have

Annex No. 2

The Ogham Alphabet, with variant names of the letters,

and names of the associated plants

This table includes names common in modern references.

THE TREES

Ogham
Standard name English name Scientific name
Letters

Beith birch Betula pendula

Luis rowan Sorbus aucuparia

Fern alder Alnus glutinosa

Sail willow Salix alba

Nion ash Fraxinus excelsior

Uath hawthorn Crataegus spp.

Dair oak Quercus robur

Tinne holly Ilex aquifolium

Coll hazel Corylus avellana

Ceirt apple Malus sylvestris

Muin vine 19 Vitis vinifera

Gort ivy Hedera helix

nGéadal reed Phragmites australis

Straif blackthorn Prunus spinosa

Ruis elder Sambucus nigra

Ailm white fir Abies alba

Onn gorse Ulex europaeus

Úr heather Calluna vulgaris

Eadhadh poplar Populus tremula

Iodhadh yew Taxus baccata

Éabhadh

Ór

Uilleann

Ifín

Eamhancholl

Eite feather or arrow

Spás space

20
developed a system of writing or signed communication called Ogham. It seemed
to have been the result of the contact with Roman numerals. Ogham has also been
called the Celtic Tree Alphabet. The symbols found in Ogham were named after
various trees and plants. This alphabet dated from the 4th century AD and could
easily be carved into stone or cut into wood. The only surviving texts are the ones
carved into stone. The Ogham alphabet seems to have evolved only in Ireland.
The Druids were an important part of the Celtic society. They were a
super-class of priests, political advisors, teachers, healers, and arbitrators. They had
their own universities, where traditional knowledge was passed on by rote. Druids
had the right to speak ahead of the king in council, and may have held more
authority than the king. They acted as ambassadors in time of war; they composed
verse and upheld the law. (Delaney: 1989, p. 91-92)
The Celts were great at war. They arrayed themselves as fiercely as
possible, sometimes charging into battle fully naked, dyed blue from head to toe,
and screaming like banshees to terrify their enemies. They took tremendous pride
in their appearance in battle, if we can judge by the elaborately embellished
weapons and accessories they used. Golden shields and breastplates shared pride of
place with ornamented helmets and trumpets (they are known to have used a
particular style of war trumpet, an instrument which curved upward from the
mouthpiece and terminated several feet above the user's head; the harsh sounds
issued from the mouth of a grotesque animal head design fixed at the top). The
Celts were users of light chariots in warfare. From these chariots, drawn by two
horses, they would throw spears at enemies before dismounting to finish them with
heavy slashing swords. They also had a habit of dragging families and baggage
along to their battles, forming a great milling mass of encumbrances, which
sometimes cost them a victory. As mentioned, they beheaded their opponents in
battle and it was considered a sign of prowess and social standing to have a goodly
number of heads to display. (Drîmba: 1998, pp.32-36)
The main problem with the Celts was that they couldn't stop fighting
among themselves long enough to put up a unified front. Each tribe was out for
itself, and in time this cost them control of Britain.
The Roman witnesses recount that the Celts held many of their religious
ceremonies in woodland groves and near sacred water, such as wells and springs.
The Romans speak of human sacrifice as being a part of Celtic religion. One thing
we do know, the Celts revered human heads. Celtic warriors would cut off the
heads of their enemies in battle and display them as trophies. They mounted heads
in doorposts and hung them from their belts. This might seem barbaric to us, but to
the Celt the seat of spiritual power was the head, so by taking the head of a
vanquished foe they were appropriating that power for themselves. It was a kind of
bloody religious observance. (Drîmba: 1998, p.34)

2.4. Celtic Traditions and Rituals

21
 The Celts had numerous festivals or celebrations, involving many complex
and interesting rituals. They had a close communion with nature and worshiped
most of its elements. Celtic societies were generally agrarian, though by no means
docile; therefore, the year was divided by seasons pertaining to the harvest cycle.
The Celtic calendar had eight major festivals: the four primary seasonal/
agricultural festivals, called the True Quarters, and the Crooked Quarters, which
celebrated the four major solar events of the solstices and equinoxes. The focus of
the True Quarters festivals was on fire, fire rituals, symbols of fire and fire deities.
The solar festivals of the Winter Solstice, Vernal Equinox, Summer Solstice
(Midsummer), and Autumnal Equinox each marked the midpoints of the seasons,
as well as the midpoints between the fire festivals. Traditionally, just as today,
celebration of all of these festivals would begin at sundown the night before the
festival and continue into the next day. Feasts and celebrations were the highlights
of the Celtic year. They were usually rowdy, often extravagant affairs at which the
Celts could indulge their love of eating and drinking. At large feasts the whole
tribe could meet together to display their unity and loyalty to their chieftain.
Imbolg, the 1st spring festival, was dedicated to the goddess Brighde. It was
celebrated between the Winter Solstice and the Vernal Equinox. Imbolg or oi-
melg means ewe's-milk which is indicative of the lambing season, when the sheep
are born, and is also the traditional beginning of spring. It is then obvious that
celebrations of animal fertility, of the flocks and herds as well as of humans would
take place at this time. Milk was associated with this celebration and time of year
as well. Ostara, the 2nd spring festival, coincided with the Spring Equinox. It
celebrated rebirth and was the time for the first crops to be planted. Ostara is
believed to have evolved in the modern Easter holiday. Bealtaine, or the May Eve
festival, was the 3rd spring festival and it was dedicated to fire. It was celebrated
around April the 30th. On Bealtaine night, the cattle were driven between two
bonfires to protect them from disease. Couples wishing to have offspring would
also jump over fire on this night. It was a custom for people to tear branches from a
Hawthorn tree to decorate the outsides of their homes for protection. Lammas
(Lughnassadh), held on August 1st, was the festival of the First Fruits and the day
of the first harvest (there were three harvests). It also marked the change of the
Threefold Goddess energies from that of Mother to that of Crone (the goddess
Macha, in Irish mythology, was forced to race against the King of Ulster’s horses,
while pregnant; she won the race and cursed the men of Ulster with the pain of
labor which lasted for three days starting a certain date). The gathering of
bilberries was a common practice on this day. If the bilberries were bountiful, it
was believed that there will be a plentiful harvest. Samhain, the Celtic New Year
festival, dedicated to the memory of the dead, was held on the eve of November
the 1st (Halloween derives from it); during the celebration, bonfires were lit to
encourage the sun’s return. Yule, the shortest day of the year, was celebrated on
the Winter Solstice as the victory of the Oak King (rebirth) over the Holly King
(death). The Yule festival was also linked to fire (Delaney: 1989, pp. 84-85). Other
types of rituals were not in connection with the seasons. Such were the
transmigration rituals, like name giving ceremonies or the initiation rites necessary

22
for one to be accepted into a warrior band. Very important were the initiations for
kingship, the death rituals and the divinatory rituals (often accompanied by
sacrifice). (http://www.paralumun.com/celticfestival.htm)
The ancient Celts made offerings towards their deities, consisting in coins,
personal jewelry (bracelets, ring, brooches, earrings etc.), weapons and war
accessories etc. The custom of throwing offerings in wells was very popular.
Perhaps the most important offering was the human sacrifice, often represented by
head hunting. Animals were also sacrificed to gain the favors of gods. Water was
part of many Celtic rituals and beliefs. As part of the Beltane festival, the Druids
had to gather May dew to use in rituals. The Celts believed that every river, lake or
well was inhabited by supernatural creatures, especially beings similar to nymphs.
Also, in order to go to the Otherworld after death, one had to cross a body of water.
(http://www.paralumun.com/celticwater.htm)
Another element of nature worshiped by the Celts was the tree, especially
the oak. Every tree was believed to have its own spirit. In the times of the Druids,
the dead were often buried in a hollowed out oak. Other trees considered holly
were the elder, the rowan, the birch, and the hazel.
(http://www.paralumun.com/celtictree.htm)
The animals were also of great importance to the Celts. Druids or believed
to have the ability to talk to animals. In the Irish tradition, when a king died, an ox
had to be sacrificed. The animal that was mostly associated with the Celts was the
horse (horses were represented on many artifacts and coins). The horse provided a
means of transport; it was also of great help in farming and other activities and it
was often used in sports. Some deities were associated with the horse and even
took its shape (Epona was such a deity). The horses, the cattle and the pigs were
symbols of fertility. Another revered animal was the deer, often appearing as an
otherworldly messenger. The wisest animal in the Celtic tradition was considered
to be the salmon. Other animals, such as crows and ravens, were associated with
war (the goddess Morrigan took the shape of a raven). The snakes and dragons
symbolized trouble, strife and infertility, while birds represented prophetic
knowledge, bloodshed and skill.
The Celts believed in a world of the spirit. This meant, among other
things, that the Celts believed that spirits could exist in this world by inhabiting the
bodies of people, animals, plants, trees and even manifest themselves as the spirits
of places (wells, boroughs, caves, stones, rivers, ponds, and fields). The belief in
spiritual migration and transmigration did not rule out the Celt's most common
spiritual belief, the belief in life after death.
(http://www.paralumun.com/celticanimal.htm)
The Celts thought that the Otherworld existed alongside with the mortal
world and that mortals were able to stumble into the Otherworld. When returning
to their own world, after a few hours, mortals would find that in the real life they
had been gone for years. On a person’s death, all windows and doors were opened
to ensure the soul a physically clear path to the Otherworld. The bravest and most
respected warriors were buried with weapons and chariots. Life and death were in

23
the hands of gods, as the Celts believed in their ultimate power. (Drîmba: 1998,
p.63)

24