Modern and Ancient Celts

Event

2002-03-22

01:23:34

This is a lecture by Michael Linkletter titled “Modern and Ancient Celts”, where he discusses locations named after Celtic origins, Gallish inscriptions, linguistic, archaeological and documentary evidence. The lecture also includes talk of cloth and tartans, languages and their dying out and being revived, and other historical facts relating to the Celts.

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Held by Benevolent Irish Society

The speaker begins by noting the word Celtic originated in the 16th or 17th centuries. References to Celts are found in the writings of Greeks and Romans, in place names like Lyons and Paris and in Celtic stone and bronze inscriptions. The Celts lived in scattered petty kingdoms and were not politically connected. Evidence for Celts is linguistic, archeological and documentary.
The speaker uses the 90 AD Lazach Tablet as linguistic evidence of the Celts’ presence. The speaker reads the Tablet's Gaulish inscription and states it was found at a woman’s gravesite.
The speaker continues by pointing out that prepositional pronouns and initial consonant mutations exist in all Gaelic languages. The speaker explains each linguistic feature. The speaker also notes that the Gaelic language Cornish died out in the late 17th century.
The speaker explains that Greeks’ and Romans' histories and ethnologies are the main source of documentary evidence of ancient Celts. Archeological materials extrapolate information using documentary evidence. The speaker notes the documentary evidence includes the writings of Julius Caesar and Diodorus Sciulus. The speaker quotes Sciulus’s description of the Celts' dress and war customs.
The speaker shows a representation of a Celtic warrior based on linguistic and archeological evidence. It includes a warrior’s shield, sword and chainmail coat. He explains the hair is white and standing up because the Celts washed their hair in lime water. Archeological evidence shows where the Celts lived. It is best when the three types of evidence substantiate each other.
The speaker states that evidence of the earliest Celts is from the classical authors who wrote about Celts as early as 400 BC. However, there is archaeological evidence without writing that occurred before the classical writers.
The speaker shows the Battersea Shield found in the Thames River as archeological evidence of Celts. The shield depicts the La Tene art form that began about 450 BC proving the ancient Celts existed then. Other archeological evidence is votive offerings that Celts deposited in water. The La Tene art moved with the Celts and was found during Ireland’s Viking period and is still in use.
The speaker describes early Celtic society as heroic, based on warfare and honour, basically oral, tribal but occasionally united as happened under Vercingetorix. Late in the Iron Age there were approximately 2-3 million Celts in Britain and 6-8 million in Gaul. The speaker describes the physical appearance and dress of Celtic men. He also describes torcs and their significance to the Celts.
The speaker describes the physical appearance, responsibilities and dress of Celtic women. In general there is less information about Celtic women from the classical writer. The speaker urges caution when making generalities using only archeological evidence.
The speaker notes that in the 3rd century Celts experienced a period of expansion and migration on the continent and were at the zenith of their power and territory. Using a map, the speaker shows La Tene as the heartland of the Celts and the area from which they spread. By the 4th century the Celts were in northern Italy and in 390 BC the Celts sacked Rome and were bribed to leave by the Romans.
The speaker describes how the Celts and Gauls spread into Macedonia by 281 BC. About this time the Gauls broke into two groups with one group going south to raid the Oracle of Delphi in 279 BC. This raid may or may not have been successful.
The speaker explains that the other group went to Turkey and established Galatia. Around 230 BC the Pergaminans defeated the Galatians and created a monument to the dying warriors. In 150 BC when the Romans controlled Galatia, they copied parts of the monument. Since the Romans called one aspect of the monument “The Dying Gauls”, the Romans considered the Galatians related to France’s Gauls.
The speaker points out that “The Dying Gaul” is a Celtic warrior as evidenced by the hair, torc, shield, moustache, sword, trumpet and being naked. The Galatians became Romanized as seen in St Paul’s writings of the 1st century AD. The Galatian language still existed in the 4th century AD when St Jerome noted the Galatians’ language was similar to the language of France’s Gauls.
Tape break. The speaker reviews the evolution of the various Celtic languages in the British Isles and France. He notes with examples that with the arrival of christianity in the Gaelic world, monasteries became centres of learning and art. The speaker reviews the evidence for the oldest Irish writing, the status of the 6 Celtic languages today in the British Isles, France and the New World.
Q and A session.