Celtica. The Story Of Us 2.0

Celtica, the story of us, 2.0

(sorry, for some reason some of the words are dark and i dont know why)

History has always appealed to me, even at a young age, I always wanted to know the beginnings of the different peoples, I wanted to know where we came from, I wanted to know where I came from.

Fortunately for me I had a mother who pointed me in the right direction, the Bible, the ultimate book of history, I will tell you all right now that I Believe what the Bible says word for word, I believe that the Bible is infallible, foolproof, unfailing, and unerring in every way.

I have heard all the arguments about errors in the Bible and have listened to them, even read them and have found faults with all of them, so do not try to convince me in any way that there are errors in the Bible because their are none.

And if any of you become self-important I will not listen to you, if you become abusive I will not return your comments, nor will I respond to TROLLS, now that I have had a little rant and layed down the rules, let us continue with the true subject of this Blog, History.

I will say up front that all the information in this blog is of my opinion of all the stuff I have read so far, the content of this blog come from many different sources and I will try my best reference them, if you want the source of particular content let me know and I will try and find it for you.

If you think you see a mistake of any kind in my work tell me about it and I will compare it with my sources, the sources used in the building of this unconventional, non mainstream, original history are as follows.(most dates I this blog are general and not exact, unless specified)

the Bible N/A

the book of Jasher(the book of the upright, righteous)4,000 BC-1800 BC

the book of Jubilees?

the book of Enoch(Hebrew version with a large grain of salt) 4,000 BC-1,800 BC

Jewish Legends?

the ancient stories of the Celts(aka the Celtic histories or Celtic Legends) 2,500 BC- 1,000 BC

Lébor Gabála Érinn(the book of the taking of Ireland) 2,800 BC- 2,000 BC

Chronicles of the Picts and Scots

Chronicum Scotorum

Scotti Chronicon

Auraicept na nÉces

Oidheadh Cloinne Tuireann

the writings of Ephirus 300-289 BC

the writings of Josephus 50 AD- 80 AD

the writings of Pliny the elder 100 BC

the writings of Livy(with a large grain of salt) 300 BC

the writings of Bede 700 AD

the writings of Nennius, History of Britain 600 AD

Ceaser’s Commentary

Ceaser’s Gallic Wars

To start us off, let us look at Genesis 10:2-5.

v2 the sons of Japheth. Gomer Magog Madai Javan Tubal Meshech and Tiras.

v3 the sons of Gomer. Ashkenaz Riphath Togarmah.

v4 the sons of Javan. Elishah Tarshish Kittim Rodanim.

v5 from these the people of the Gentiles were separated into their lands, everyone according to his Language, according to there Clans, into there own Nations.

The 4 words underlined are the important one in these 4 verses, Japheth is the father of all of Europe, Gomer is the father of Ashkenaz/Ashkuzzay(a spreading fire) who is the father of the Germanic Peoples, the Scythians, the Picts, and the Pritanii.

I use peoples instead of Races because the Bible says we are all of one flesh, one blood, and that Adam was our father, no races, I am brother to the Africans as well as the Asians, that being said let us continue.

Gomer is also the father of Togarmah(bone breaker), who was the father of the Turkish Peoples, the Alanni, the Magyar, the Avar and possibly the Sarmations, I say possibly because there is some discrepancies about them being Russian.

And lastly Gomer(aka Golamh) is the father of Riphath(spoken), in old Hebrew and Celtic Genealogies he bares the name ”Riphath Scot(hord or great family) Ben(son) Gomer”, when I saw the name “Scot” I immediately became interested(i am proud of my Scottish Heritage you know) and so I began digging.

Just so you know up front Riphath is the father of the Celtic peoples and Clans (family/descendant), I will be getting into the specifics of how this is true in just a moment, the original name for the Celts was Celtáe{sell-tay}(ardent warrior), not said Kelt, that's Latin, the Greek name for the Celts was Keltoi, both Kelt and Keltoi mean “Foreigner”, like my mother says ”I before E accept after C” so it is said SEL-TAY or just SELT, its the proper way to say it, lets continue.

In verse 4 the word “Clans” are highlighted, to my knowledge so far there are few peoples and or nations that use the term “Clan or Clann” those peoples and or nations are relegated to the Celtáe, to the Hebrews and also to the Ninja Clans of Japan.

The word “Clann” means children or descendants, at least in Celtic that is, the term “Clann” is usually in reference to a large group of people who are related to a common ancestor and or bare the name of said ancestor, aka a large family.

The term “Tribe”(i do not have the meaning for Tribe at this point) is almost always in reference to a large group of families that are not necessarily related to one another or share a common ancestor, a perfect example of this is the Germanic Tribes(not picking on Germans or any other Germanic peoples), Germanic Tribes were constantly mixing with on another making it difficult to share a common ancestor, more like common ancestors(there is nothing wrong with this unless you are trying to track down a specific ancestor).

Israel is different in this because they incorporate both tribes and clans, there are the 12 tribes of Israel and every tribe has multiple clans within them, if anyone knows of other examples of clans being used I other peoples or nations then please comment.

Now on to the Heart, Juice, and or Pulp of the matter at hand, tracing Celtic ancestry back to Riphath, or visa versa.

To begin with let us look at Riphath’s son, now I must admit that I have had some trouble with this one, when searching for Riphath I have found all sorts of names pertaining to him from both Hebrew and Celtic Genealogies, Riphath Scot Ben Gomer, Ben Riphath Scot, or just Riphath Scot seems to be the more common one.

Now that we have established that the Bible started the first 3 Generations(Japheth,Gomer and Riphath) let us look farther afield for the rest of his decedents, to go farther than Riphath Scot we need to look at the Genealogies of both Jasher and Lébor Gabála Érinn.

In Jasher Riphath’s decendents are the Bartonim People(Britain?), in Lébor Gabála Érinn he is the father of the Celtáe, Scythians, Picts, and Pritani, some Bible Encyclopedias say that Riphath is the father of the Ŕhíbii people( according to someone called Knobel, if you know who this is please comment).

The Ŕhíbii are supposedly connected to the Rhipaean Mountains, which Knobel (Volkert. p. 44) identifies etymologically and geographically with the Carpathian range in the northeast of Dacia, and the river Rhebas, in Bithynia (Bochart don't know who he is); the Rhibii, a people living eastward of the Caspian Sea (Schulthess, I don't know who he is ether).

This latter bit actually dose fit with the account in Lébor Gabála Érinn accept that the Ŕhíbii are not mentioned, in fact the decedents of Riphath are not given a name until Mil, son of Íth, after him they are called “Milesians”.

The Lébor Gabála Érinn is very long, wordy, and hard to read with its grammar, about 70 Pages(not as long as some books but still hard to read), beneath is my attempt at tracking the Genealogy within the Lébor Gabála Érinn, I say it is hard because some of the people within have multiple names(some times up to 3).

From what I can make out from Lébor Gabála Érinn the Scottish were the first humans to settle in Ireland(no offense to my Irish brothers and sisters....... well, cousins I guess), I don't consider the Gaileoin, Fir-Domnann, Fir-Bolg(Fomorians), or the De-Danann to be humans, I suspect that they are of the Nephilim(earth bound), offspring of the fallen Angels after the flood.

(if you do not agree with my thinking in this area then go listen to Parry Stone on the Nephilim, if you still don't agree with me, tough Noogies........PS, I might get into the Nephilim in another blog)

The Lébor Gabála Érinn talks about the Scotic Language from which the Gaelic languages came from, now there were 2 Mils in the Lébor Gabála Érinn, Mil son of Íth, and Mil son of Bíle, from what I can tell the latter Mil was the father of the Gallic Clans, and the Brythionic Clans who came to Britain in 400 BC.

In the Declaration of Arbroath the Scottish nobles talked about how they came out of Scythia and through Spain before coming to Britain, this also matches what was said in the Lébor Gabála Érinn, now from what I have read it seems that the Celtáe were Mercenaries that kept bouncing between Scythia and Egypt before they finally settling in Ireland and Scotland.

I must also point out that there are many people(myself included) who have seen a lot of similarities between the Celtáe and the Hebrews, the most obvious on is language structure, the grammar systems between the two look as though they both come from the same school, and the Celtic language is not even Semitic in any way.

As far as grammar goes Celtic and Hebrew are similar in VSO(verb, subject, object), Inflected Preposition in Possession and Obligation, Resumptive Pronouns in Relitive Clauses, Definite Articles but no Indefinite Articles, Construct State Genitive, Possessive Genitive, Subordinate Clauses and so on.

So why the similarities, my guess is that when the Celtáe traveled between Scythia and Egypt they traveled through Israel, in the book of Jasher chapter 24 verse 8 it tells a little bit more about the 3 witnesses to the land that Abraham bought from Ephron, one of them is mentioned as a Gomerite, a Gomerite.

I know its very little to go on, but if you remember, Gomer had 3 sons, Ashkenaz(Ashkuzzay= a spreading fire) Riphath Scot Ben Gomer, and Togormah, I have a one in three chance of being right, and it is the best theory I have right now, if any one has more information on the subject please comment.

Here is the map of the travels of the Celtáe.

I will not tell of Mil’s battle with the Nephilim tribes of Britain, you can read about that in the Lébor Gabála Érinn or wait until I write about it in another blog, this one is about beginings, the Genesis of the Celtáe so let us begin.

The Celtáe

The Celtáe were a family group of clan societies in Iron Age Europe. Proto-Celtic culture formed in the Early Iron Age (1200 BC-400 AD) in Central Europe (Hallstatt period, named for the site in present-day Austria). By the later Iron Age (La Tène period), this Celtic culture had expanded over a wide range of lands, whether by diffusion or migration: to the British Isles (Insular Celts), the Iberian Peninsula (Celtiberians), much of Central Europe, (Gauls) and following the Gallic invasion of the Balkans (Dacians)in 279 BC as far east as central Anatolia (Galatians), in 1,552 B.C. the Celts came over the Alps to plunder and raid.

The Danube-Rhine river acted as a nateral berrier, stoping the Scythians advance. The Celts were a brake off from the Scythians, during 1800 B.C. the Balkins under went a power strugle between the Celts and the Scythians.

The Tartessian language, along with the Island Alphabet Ogham, may be the earliest directly arrested Celtic language, the Tartessian written script used in the inscriptions based on a version of a Phoenician script in use around 825 BC.

The next directly attested examples of a Celtic language are the Lepontic inscriptions, beginning from the 6th century BC. Continental Celtic languages are attested only in inscriptions and place-names.

Insular Celtic is attested from about the 11th century BC in Ogham inscriptions, although it is clearly much earlier. Literary tradition begins with Old Irish from about the 8th century BC. Coherent texts of Early Irish literature, such as the Táin Bó Cúailnge (The Cattle Raid of Cooley), survive in 12th-century recensions.

By the early 1st millennium AD, following the expansion of the Roman Empire and the Great Migrations (Migration Period) of Germanic peoples, Celtic culture had become restricted to the British Isles (Insular Celtic), and the Continental Celtic languages ceased to be widely used by the 6th century AD.

Insular Celtic culture diversified into that of the Gaels, the Welsh and the Bretons of the medieval and modern periods. A modern "Celtic identity" was constructed in the context of the Romanticist Celtic Revival, mostly in Great Britain and Ireland.

Names of the Celts

The origin of the various names used since classical and Biblical times for the peoples known today as the Celts or Celtáe is obscure and has been controversial. The Latin name Celtus (pl. Celti ) seems to have been borrowed from Greek (; Greek Keltai or Keltoi), itself taken from a native Celtic tribal name of Celtáe (ardent or passionate warriors).

In Greek, the first literary reference to the Celtic people, as Keltai(Keltoi), is by the Greek historian Hecataeus of Miletus in 517 BC; he says that the town of Massilia (Marseille) is near the Celts and also mentions a Celtic town of Nyrex (possibly Noreia in Austria).

To this day the Celtic language is the oldest Vernacular Language in all of Europe, in 222 BC Rehea-Slilvia, chieftain of the Insúbres Clann attacked the roman town of Telamon and then was beaten back, one of the prisoners captured was Caecilius-Statius, he became a slave for a few years and after learning the Latin Language he became a Comic Dramatist, after finding out that the romans did not have an Alphabet or Writing System of their own he created one for them, he wrote down 42 Plays that are still in use to this day, the 1^st ones ever recorded in history, later he became one of the Prominent Roman Writers in the Classical World.

Herodotus seems to locate the Keltoi at the source of the Danube and/or in Iberia, but the passage is unclear. The English word Celt is modern, attested from 1707 in the writings of Edward Lhuyd whose work, along with that of other late 17th-century scholars, brought academic attention to the languages and history of these early inhabitants of Great Britain.

Latin Gallus might originally be from a Celtic Clann name, perhaps borrowed into Latin during the Celtic expansions into Italy of the early 5th century BC.

Its root may be the Common Celtic *galno, meaning "power" or "strength". The Greek Galatai seems to be based on the same root, borrowed directly from the same Celtic source which gave us Galli (the suffix -atai is simply an ethnic name indicator). (see Galatia in Anatolia) The English form Gaul (first recorded in the 17th century) and Gaulish come from the French Gaule and Gaulois, which translate Latin Gallia and Gallus, -icus respectively. In Old French, the words gualeis, galois, walois (NF phonetics keeping /w/) had different meanings : Welsh or the Langue d'oïl, etc.

On the other hand, the word Waulle (NF phonetics keeping /w/) is recorded for the first time in the 13th century to translate the Latin word Gallia and then, gaulois is recorded for the first time in the 15th century and the scholars use it to translate the Latin words Gallus / Gallicus. The word comes from Germanic *Walha-. (see Gaul: Name).

The English word 'Welsh' originates from the word wælisc, the Anglo-Saxon form of walhiska-, the Germanic word for "foreign" or "Celt" (South. German Welsch(e) 'Celtic speaker', 'French speaker', ' Italian speaker'; Old Norse valskr, pl. valir 'Gaulish', 'French'), that is supposed to be derived of the Celtic tribe's name Volcae, that lived first in the South of Germany and emigrated then to Gaul.

Celticity' generally refers to the cultural commonalities of these peoples, based on similarities in language, material artifacts, social organisation Family Lineage and mythological factors,t this indicated a common racial origin but more recent theories are reflective of culture and language rather than race.

Celtic cultures seem to have had numerous diverse characteristics but the commonality used language between these diverse peoples was the use of a main Celtic language. 'Celtic' is a descriptor of a family of languages and, more generally, means 'of the Celts,' 'in the style of the Celts' and related to the Celts.

It has also been used to refer to several archaeological cultures defined by unique sets of artifacts. The link between language and artifact is aided by the presence of inscriptions. (see Celtic (disambiguation) for other applications of the term).

Today, the term 'Celtic' is generally used to describe the languages and respective cultures of Ireland, Scotland, Wales, Cornwall, the Isle of Man and Brittany Gaelica Asturas and Cantibria, also known as the Nine Celtic Nations.

These are the regions where four Celtic languages are still spoken to some extent as mother tongues: Irish Gaelic, Scottish Gaelic, Welsh, and Breton plus two recent revivals, Cornish (one of the Brythonic languages) and Manx (one of the Goidelic languages).Sadly the Iberian languages( Gaelica Asturas and Cantibria) are all but extinct due to the Inqusition.

There are also attempts to reconstruct the Cumbric language (a Brythonic language from Northwest England and Southwest Scotland). 'Celtic' is also sometimes used to describe regions of Continental Europe that have Celtic heritage, but where no Celtic language has survived; these areas include the western Iberian Peninsula, i.e. Portugal, and north-central Spain (Galicia, Asturias, Cantabria, Castile and León, Extremadura), and to a lesser degree, France.

'Continental Celts' refers to the Celtic-speaking people of mainland Europe. 'Insular Celts' refers to the Celtic-speaking people of the British Isles and their descendants. The Celts of Brittany derive their language from migrating insular Celts from west Britain and so are grouped accordingly.

Overview of the Hallstatt and La Tène cultures.

The territories of some major Celtic clans of the late La Tène period are labeled as such.The Celtic languages form a branch seprat from the Indo-European family. By the time speakers of Celtic languages enter history around 1112 BC (Celtic attack on Delphi in 700 BC), they were already split into several language groups, and spread over most of Europe, most of the Iberian peninsula,and all of Ireland and Britain.

Some scholars think that the Urnfield culture of northern Germany and the Netherlands represents an origin for one branch of the Celtic family(not Germans). This culture was preeminent in central Europe during the late Bronze Age, from 900 BC until 700 BC, The Urnfield period saw a dramatic increase in population in the region, probably due to innovations in technology and agricultural practices.

The Greek historian Ephoros of Cyme in Asia Minor, writing in the 4th century BC, believed that the Celts came from the Scythians off the mouth of the Rhine who were "driven from their homes by the frequency of wars with the Scythians.

The spread of iron-working led to the development of the Hallstatt culture directly from the Urnfield (. 700 to 500 BC). Proto-Celtic, the latest common ancestor of all known Celtic languages, is considered by this school of thought to have been spoken at the time of the late Urnfield or early Hallstatt cultures, in the early 1st millennium BC.

The spread of the Celtic languages from Iberia to Ireland and Britain would have occurred during the first half of the 8^th century BC, the earliest chariot burials in Britain dating to 700 BC.

Over the centuries these languages developed into the Celtáe languages that separated into Celtiberian, Goidelic and Brythonic languages. The Hallstatt culture was succeeded by the La Tène culture of central Europe, and during the final stages of the Iron Age gradually transformed into the explicitly Celtic culture of early historical times.

Celtic river-names are found in great numbers around the upper reaches of the Danube and Rhine, which led many Celtic scholars to place the ethnogenesis of the Celts in this area. Diodorus Siculus and Strabo both suggest that the Celtic heartland was west of the Balkins. The former says that the Celts were to the south of the Balkins.

Before the discoveries at Hallstatt and La Tene, it was generally considered that the Celtic heartland was west of the Balkins, see Encyclopædia Britannica for 1813. Martín Almagro Gorbea proposed the origins of the Celts could be traced back to the 3rd millennium BC, seeking the initial roots in the Scythian culture, thus offering the wide dispersion of the Celts throughout western Europe, as well as the variability of the different Celtic Clanns, and the existence of ancestral traditions and ancient perspective.

The rivers Danube, Rhine, and Rhone all can trace their names back to Celtáe roots, Danube comes from the Celtic name Danuvius=Divine Waters, the name Rhine comes from the name Rhenus=Sea Way, and lastly the Rhone comes from Rhodanus=Great Divine Waters, Rho or Rh means “Great”

Genetics suggests the Celts were descendants of people who originated in southwest Asia(Scythia) between 2.000 and 1.830 BC. Celtic origin legends recorded in Medieval Scotland and Ireland suggest a possible beginning in the Crimea and then to Iberia via Egypt.

It has been noted that the distribution of the genetics for lactase persistence apparently originating near the Caspian Sea between 2.000 and 1.830 indicates a spread from there to both the British Isles and to Iberia.

This is somewhat corroborated by the book of Jasher and by the Lébor Gabála Érinn, the general idea is that the Scythians are Cousins to the Celtáe in someway, also for about 800 or so years the Celtáe bounced between Scythia and Egypt as Mercenaries selling their swords to the highest bidder.

In this time they were said to fight against the Tuscans, the Langobardi, the Barchu, the Princedom of the Scythians, and the Egyptians

Proto-Celtic language

The Proto-Celtic language is usually dated to the early European Iron Age. The earliest records of a Celtic language are the Lepontic inscriptions of Cisalpine Gaul, the oldest of which still predate the La Tène period. Other early inscriptions are Gaulish, appearing from the early La Tène period in inscriptions in the area of Massilia, in the Greek alphabet.

Celtiberian inscriptions appear comparatively late, after about 600 BC. Evidence of Insular Celtic is available only from about 700 BC, in the form of Primitive Celtic Ogham inscriptions. Besides epigraphical evidence, an important source of information on early Celtic is toponymy.

As I mentioned earlier on, there are Many similarities between Celtic and Hebrew, judging by the account in the Lébor Gabála Érinn the Celtáe traveled between Scythia and Egypt, by land they would have to pass through the land known today as Israel.

Abraham lived around 2052-1877 BC, well within the time the Celtáe were traveling back and fourth, the reason I mention Abraham is because of what the book of Jasher says.

“.......and he(Abraham) brought all the children of the earth to the service of Elohim and he taught them the ways of Yahweh and caused them to know Yahweh.

And he(Abraham) formed a grove and he planted a vineyard therein, and he had always prepared in his tent meat and drink to those that passed through the land, that they might satisfy themselves in his house..........”

both Shem and his son Eber are described in similar fashion so it is possible that the Celts visited these 3 men and learned to write in in similar pattern of grammar, it is possible that ether Nel, Gaedil-Glas, or Esru Maq Rifad were the leaders of the Celts at that time

Iron Age Europe The Hallstatt Culture

In various academic disciplines the Celts were considered a Central European Iron Age phenomenon, through the cultures of Hallstatt and La Tène. However, archaeological finds from the Hallstatt and La Tène cultures were rare in the Iberian Peninsula, and did provide enough evidence for a cultural scenario comparable to that of Central Europe.

It is considered equally easy to maintain that the origin of the Peninsular Celts can be linked to the preceding Urnfield culture, leading to a more recent approach that introduces a 'proto-Celtic' substratum and a process of Celticization having its initial roots in the Bronze Age Scythian culture.

The Iron Age Hallstatt (c. 800-475 BC) and La Tène (c. 500-50 BC) cultures are typically associated with Proto-Celtic and Celtic culture. The La Tène culture developed and flourished during the late Iron Age (from 550 BC to the Roman conquest in the 1st century BC) in eastern France, Switzerland, Austria, southwest Germany, the Czech Republic, Slovakia and Hungary.

It developed out of the Hallstatt culture without any definite cultural break, under the impetus of considerable Mediterranean influence from Greek, and later Etruscan civilizations. A shift of settlement centres took place in the 4th century. The western La Tène culture corresponds to historical Celtic.

This means that the whole of La Tène culture can be attributed to a unified Celtic people is easy to assess; archaeologists have repeatedly concluded that language, material culture, and political affiliation run parallel.

Frey notes that in the 5th century, "burial customs in the Celtic world were not uniform; rather, localised groups had their own beliefs, which, in consequence, also gave rise to distinct artistic expressions". Thus, while the La Tène culture is certainly associated with the Celts, the presence of La Tène artefacts may be due to cultural contact and implys the permanent presence of Celtic speakers.

Hallstatt & La Tene cultures

Polybius published a history of Rome about 150 BC in which he describes the Gauls of Italy and their conflict with Rome. Pausanias in the 2nd century BC says that the Gauls "originally called Celts live on the remotest region of Europe on the coast of an enormous tidal sea".

Posidonius described the southern Gauls about 100 BC. Though his original work is lost it was used by later writers such as Strabo. The latter, writing in the early 1st century AD, deals with Britain and Gaul as well as Hispania, Italy and Galatia.

Caesar wrote extensively about his Gallic Wars in 58-51 BC. Diodorus Siculus wrote about the Celts of Gaul and Britain in his 1st-century history.

Continental Celts of Gaul ca. 54 BC

Gauls At the dawn of history in Europe, the Celts then living in what is now France were known as Gauls to the Romans. The territory of these peoples probably included the low countries, the Alps and what is now northern Italy. Their descendants were described by Julius Caesar in his Gallic Wars. Eastern Gaul was the center of the western La Tène culture.

In later Iron Age Gaul, the social organization was similar to that of the Romans, with large towns. From the 3rd century BC the Gauls adopted coinage, and texts with Greek characters are known in southern Gaul from the 2nd century.

Greek traders founded Massalia in about 600 BC, with exchange up the Rhone valley, but trade was disrupted soon after 500 BC and re-oriented over the Alps to the Po valley in Italy. The Romans arrived in the Rhone valley in the 2nd century BC and encountered a Gaul that was mostly Celtic-speaking but could converse in Greek as well.

Rome needed land communications with its Iberian provinces and fought a major battle with the Saluvii at Entremont in 124-123 BC. Gradually Roman control extended, and the Roman Province of Gallia Transalpina was formed along the Mediterranean coast. The remainder was known as Gallia Comata - "Hairy Gaul".

In 58 BC, the Helvetii planned to migrate westward but were forced back by Julius Caesar. He then became involved in fighting the various clans in Gaul, and by 55 BC, most of Gaul had been overrun.

In 52 BC, Vercingetorix led a revolt against the Roman occupation and won a major battle at Gergovia but was defeated at the siege of Alesia and surrendered. Following the Gallic Wars of 58-51 BC, the Celticia clan formed the main part of Roman Gaul. Place name analysis shows that Celtic was used around the Garonne river, the Seine, and the Marne.

Celtiberians.

(The peoples of the Iberian Peninsula, Prehistoric Iberia, Hispania, Lusitania, Gallaecia, and Celtici)

Until the end of the 19th century, traditional scholarship dealing with the Celts acknowledged their presence in the Iberian Peninsula as a material culture relatable to the Hallstatt and La Tène cultures.

Since according to the definition of the Iron Age in the 19th century Celtic populations were rare in Iberia and did not provide a cultural scenario that could easily be linked to that of Central Europe.

Three divisions of the Celts of the Iberian Peninsula were assumed to have existed: the Celtiberians in the mountains near the center of the peninsula, the Celtici in the southwest, and the Lusitanian Celts in the northwest.

Modern scholarship, however, has clearly proven that Celtic presence and influences were most substantial in Iberia (with perhaps the highest settlement saturation in Western Europe), particularly in the western and northern regions. The Celts in Iberia were divided into tree main archaeological and cultural groups, even though that division is not very clear.

One group was spread out along Galicia and the Iberian Atlantic shores. They were made up of the Lusitanians (in Portugal) and the Celtic region that Strabo called Celtica in the southwestern Iberian peninsula, including the Algarve, which was inhabited by the Celtici, the Vettones and Vacceani peoples (of central-western Spain and Portugal), and the Gallaecian, Astures and Cantabrian peoples of the Castro culture of northern and northwestern Spain and Portugal.

The Celtiberian group of central Spain and the upper Ebro valley originated when Celts migrated from Scythia and settled in Spain. The origins of the Celtiberians might provide a key to understanding culture. The process of celticization of the southwestern area of the peninsula by the Keltoi and of the northwestern area is, however, not a simple celtiberian question.

Recent investigations about the Callaici and Bracari in northwestern Portugal are providing new approaches to understanding Celtic culture (language, art and religion) in western Iberia.

Alps and Po Valley

(History of the Alps and Lepontii)

It had been known for some time that there was an early, although apparently somewhat limited, Celtic (Lepontic, sometimes called Cisalpine Celtic) presence in Northern Italy since inscriptions dated to the 6th century BC have been found there.

The site of Golasecca, where the Ticino exits from Lake Maggiore, was particularly suitable for long-distance exchanges, in which Golaseccans acted as intermediaries between Etruscans and the Halstatt culture of Austria, supported on the all-important trade in salt.

In 391 BC Celts "who had their homes beyond the Alps streamed through the passes in great strength and seized the territory that lay between the Appennine mountains and the Alps" according to Diodorus Siculus. The Po Valley and the rest of northern Italy (known to the Romans as Cisalpine Gaul) was inhabited by Celts who founded cities such as Milan.

Later the Roman army was routed at the battle of Allia and Rome was sacked in 390 BC by the Senones under Brennus. At the battle of Telamon in 225 BC a large Celtic army was trapped between two Roman forces and crushed.

The defeat of the combined Samnite, Celtic and Etruscan alliance by the Romans in the Third Samnite War sounded the beginning of the end of the Celtic domination in mainland Europe, but it was not until 192 BC that the Roman armies conquered the last remaining independent Celtic kingdoms in Italy.

The Celts had some scattered settlement further south of the Po River than some maps show. Remnants in the town of Doccia, in the province of Emilia-Romagna, showcase Celtic houses in very good condition dating from about the 4th century BC.

Gallic invasion of the Balkans

by the 1st century BC The Celts also expanded down the Danube river and its tributaries. One of the most influential clans, the Scordisci, had established their capital at Singidunum in 3rd century BC, which is present-day Belgrade, Serbia.

The concentration of hill-forts and cemeteries shows a density of population in the Tisza valley of modern-day Vojvodina, Serbia, Hungary and into Romania. Expansion into Russia was however blocked by the Scythians.

The cousins of the Celts as were the Cambrii, progenitors of the Picts who were subjigated by the Scythians. Further south, Celts settled in Thrace (Bulgaria), which they ruled for over a century, and Anatolia, where they settled as the Galatians (see also: Gallic Invasion of Greece).

Despite their geographical isolation from the rest of the Celtic world, the Galatians maintained their Celtic language for at least seven hundred years. St Jerome, who visited Ancyra (modern-day Ankara) in 373 AD, likened their language to that of the Treveri of northern Gaul.

The Boii clan gave their name to Bohemia, Bologna and possibly Bavaria, and Celtic artefacts and cemeteries have been discovered further east in what is now Poland and Slovakia. A celtic coin (Biatec) from Bratislava's mint is displayed on today's Slovak 5 crown coin.

As there is archaeological evidence for large scale invasions in some of the other areas, The current school of thought holds that Celtic language and culture spread to those areas by invasion. The Celtic invasions of Italy and the expedition in Greece and western Anatolia, are well documented in Greek and Latin history.

There are records of Celtic mercenaries in Egypt serving the Ptolemies. Thousands were employed in 283-246 BC and they were also in service around 186 BC. They attempted to overthrow Ptolemy II.c nvas

Insular Celts

Iron Age Britain, Gaels, Britons (historic), and Genetic history of the British Isles Principal sites in Roman Britain, with indication of the Celtic clan. Clans of Wales at the time of the Roman invasion. Exact boundaries are conjectural. Some Celtic daggers and a lot Celtic longswords were found in Britain France and Spain. .A large portion of the populations of Britain and Ireland today are descended from the ancient Celts that have long inhabited these lands, long before the coming of Rome and later Saxons and Vikings, language and culture.

A lot is known of their Ancestry, but remnants of the latter may remain in the names of some geographical features, such as the rivers Clyde, Tamar and Thames, whose etymology is unclear but possibly from a Celtic presence (Gelling).

By the Roman period, however, all of the inhabitants of the isles of Ireland and Britain were speaking Goidelic or Brythonic languages, close counterparts to the Celtic languages spoken on the European mainland.

Historians explained this as the result of successive invasions from the European continent by diverse Celtic clans over the course of several centuries, though this is now generally seen as only the elite.

The Book of Leinster, written in the 12th century, but drawing on a much earlier Irish oral tradition, states that the first Celts to arrive in Ireland were from Iberia. In 1946 the Celtic scholar T. F. O'Rahilly published his extremely influential model of the early history of Ireland which postulated four separate waves of Celtic invaders.

It is still not known what spacific languages were spoken by the peoples of Ireland and Britain before the arrival of the Romans. Later research indicated that the culture may have developed gradually and continuously between the Romans and the Celtic peoples of Britain and Spain.

Similarly in Britain archaeological evidence was found for large intrusive groups of Celtic immigrants, suggesting to archaeologists such as Colin Renfrew that the native late Bronze Age Celts gradually absorbed Roman influences and language.

Julius Caesar wrote of people in Britain who came from Belgium (the Belgae), Archaeological evidence which was interpreted in the 1930s as confirming this. The archaeological evidence is of substantial cultural continuity through the first millennium BC, although with a significant overlay of selectively-adopted elements of La Tène culture.

There are claims of continental-style states appearing in southern England close to the end of the period, possibly reflecting in part immigration by élites from various Celtic states such as those of the Belgae. This immigration would account for the origins of other Celtic languages.

It is possible that Stonehenge was built by one of the four Nephilim tribes in Britain before the coming of the Celtáe, some Archaeologists say there was a people in Britain called the Beaker-people because of numerous clay beakers that look as if they were baked with yarn around the outside.

To me this dose not make sense, the beakers are human size so it could not have been any of the Nephilim tribes, genetics say there ar no other peopes mixed with the Celts in this case, so who are they, my guess is that these Beaker-People are just early Celts, if you are always on the move you will not have time to develop art, that's just Common-Sense.

Genetic studies have supported the prevalence of native populations, ruling out any model of post-Bronze Age cultural and language intrusion that ignore a very high degree of genetic absorption.

A study by Christian Capelli, David Goldstein and others at University College, London showed that genetic markers associated with Gaelic names in Ireland and Scotland are also common in certain parts of Wales and England (in most cases, The Southeast of England with the lowest counts of these markers) are similar to the genetic markers of the Celtic people, who speak a non-Indo-European language.

This similarity supported earlier findings in suggesting a large Celtic genetic ancestry, likely going back to the Paleolithic(post-Tower of Babel). They suggest that Celtic culture and the Celtic language may have been imported to Britain by invasions around 600 BC.

Some recent studies have suggested that, contrary to long-standing beliefs, the Germanic tribes (Saxons) did not wipe out the Romano-British of England but rather, over the course of six centuries, conquered the native Brythonic people of what is now England and south-east Scotland and imposed their culture and language upon them, as much as the Gaelics may have spread over Northern Britain.

This view is supported by the Celtic, or at least non-Germanic, names of some prominent early members of a number of"Saxon" dynasties, such as Cerdic of Wessex and Penda of Mercia.

The Pennines remained a stronghold for Brythonic culture in England, the Cumbric language survived until the 12th century, whereas in isolated areas of East Anglia, a Brythonic language was only recorded as late as the Saxon period.

Parts of the Brythonic culture still survives in the form of the Northumbrian smallpipes and Wrestling (Lancashire and Cumbrian wrestling). Still, others maintain that the picture is mixed and that in some places the indigenous population was indeed wiped out while in others it was assimilated.

According to this school of thought the populations of Yorkshire, East Anglia, Northumberland and the Orkney and Shetland Islands are those populations with the fewest traces of ancient (Celtic) British continuation, probably because these are eastern areas which were exposed to invasion from the East by Saxons and Vikings.

The Celtic invasion of the British Isles is difficult to document genetically. Two published books - The Blood of the Isles by Bryan Sykes and The Origins of the British: a Genetic Detective Story by Stephen Oppenheimer - are based upon recent genetic studies, and show that the vast majority of Britons have ancestors from the Iberian Peninsula, as a result of a series of migrations that took place during the Mesolithic and, to a lesser extent, the Neolithic eras.

Sykes sees little genetic evidence relating to people from the heartland of the Hallstatt and La Tene cultures. On the paternal side he finds that the "Oisin" (R1b) clan is in the majority which has strong affinities to Iberia, with no evidence of a large scale arrival from Central Europe.

He considers that the genetic structure of Britain and Ireland is "Celtic, if by that he means descent from people who were here before the Romans and who spoke the Celtic languages."

But this language was the result of migration, and the vast majority of the inhabitants of the British Isles, whether they consider themselves to be" Saxon"or "Celt" , are descended from the original Mesolithic(also post-Tower of Babel) hunter-gatherers(I consider this term derogatory) who migrated north from Iberia approximately 4.300 years ago at the end of the last ice age.

Evidence for Celts in England can be found in place names, such as those including the Old English element, 'wealh', meaning 'foreigner' or 'stranger'. A smattering of villages around the Fenland town of Wisbech hint at this.

West Walton, Walsoken, and the Walpoles indicate the continued presence of an indigenous population, and Wisbech, King's Lynn and Chatteris retain proto-Celtic topographical elements.

Villages which exhibit Tydd in their name, e.g. Tydd St. Giles may obtain that element from the Brythonic word for "small holding". Compare the Welsh "tyddyn". Saxon Etheldreda's 'Liber Eliensis' documents the Fenland tribe of the Girvii (Gywre), who are cited elsewhere as being an independent people with dark hair and their own (Brythonic?) language.

It is entirely possible that the Girvii were formed in part by migrating Britons, displaced by Saxon settlers after the legions left the Isles.

Romanisation Under Caesar the Romans conquered Celtic Gaul, and from Claudius onward the Roman empire absorbed parts of Britain. Roman local government of these regions closely mirrored pre-Roman 'tribal' boundaries, and archaeological finds suggest native involvement in local government.

Latin was the official language of these regions after the conquests. The native peoples under Roman rule became Romanized and keen to adopt Roman ways. Celtic art had already incorporated classical influences, and surviving Gallo-Roman pieces interpret classical subjects or keep faith with old traditions despite a Roman overlay.

The Roman occupation of Gaul, and to a lesser extent of Britain, led to Roman-Celtic syncretism (see Roman Gaul, Roman Britain). In the case of the continental Celts, this eventually resulted in a language shift to Vulgar Latin (see also Gallo-Roman culture), while the Insular Celts retained their language.

However, the Celts were master horsemen, which so impressed the Romans that they adopted Epona, the Celtic horse goddess, into their pantheon. During and after the fall of the Roman Empire many parts of France threw out their Roman administrators.

Society To the extent that sources are available, they depict a pre-Christian Celtic social structure based formally on class and kingship. Relationships similar to those of Roman society are also described by Caesar and others in the Gaul of the 1st century BC.

In the main, the evidence is of tribes(made up of multiple Clanns) being led by kings, although some argue that there is evidence of oligarchical republican forms of government eventually emerging in areas in close contact with Rome.

Most descriptions of Celtic societies describe them as being divided into three groups: a warrior aristocracy; an intellectual group including professions such as druid, poet, and jurist; and everyone else.

There are instances recorded where man and women participated both in warfare and in kingship, They were not in the minority as first thought. In historical times, the offices of high and low kings and queens in Ireland and Scotland were filled by election under the system of tanistry, which eventually came into conflict with the feudal principle of primogeniture where the succession goes to the first born son.

Early records show that everyone in the Early-Clans could wield a sword, the chieftain was not so high that he did not tend his own flocks and grow his own gardens, he was one of the clan, but he was elected by the clan to lead them, that was the only difference, even the chieftain’s sons and daughters worked the fields.

This Old-System of the clans was left behind with the coming of the Feudalism

The popular stereotype of non-urbanised societies settled in hillforts and duns, drawn from Britain and Ireland (there are about 3,000 hill forts known in Britain) contrasts with the urban settlements present in the core Hallstatt and La Tene areas, with the many significant oppida of Gaul late in the first millennium BC, and with the towns of Gallia Cisalpina.

Slavery as practiced by the Celts was not likely similar to the better documented practice in ancient Greece and Rome. Slaves were acquired from war, raids, penal and debt servitude, however you were not allowed to mistreat a slave because it was thought that the slave’s predicament was just misfortune, to mistreat a slave was to bring dishonor upon you and your family for generations, honor was at the core of Celtic Society.

Slavery was not hereditary, although manumission was practiced. The Old Irish word for slave, cacht, and the Welsh term caeth are likely derived from the Latin captus, captive, suggesting that slave trade was an early venue of contact between Latin and Celtic societies.

In the Middle Ages, slavery was especially prevalent in the Celtic countries. Manumissions were discouraged by law and the word for "female slave", cumal, was used as a general unit of value in Ireland.

There is archaeological evidence to suggest that the pre-Roman Celtic societies were linked to the network of overland trade routes that spanned Eurasia. Large prehistoric trackways crossing bogs in Ireland and Germany have been found by archaeologists.

They are believed to have been created for wheeled transport as part of an extensive roadway system that facilitated trade, because of their substantial nature. The territory held by the Celts contained tin, lead, iron, silver and gold.

Celtic smiths and metalworkers were the best at creating weapons and jewelry for international trade(particularly swords 37 inches long), particularly with the Romans. The myth that the Celtic monetary system consisted of wholly barter is a common one, but is in part false.

The monetary system was complex and is still not understood (much like the late Roman coinages), and due to the absence of large numbers of these coin items it is assumed that "proto-money" was used, which is the collective name given to the bronze items made from the early La Tene period onwards, and were often in the shape of axeheads, rings and bells.

Due to the large number of these present in some burials it is thought they had a relatively high monetary value, and could be used for "day to day" purchases.

Low value coinages of potin, a bronze alloy with high tin content, but also were minted in gold, silver and bronze of higher value, suitable for use in trade, were minted in most Celtic areas of the continent, and in South-East Britain prior to the Roman conquest of these areas.

Gold coinage was much more common than silver coinage, despite being worth substantially more, as there were around 100 mines in Southern Britain and Central France, but silver was more rarely mined, partly due to the comparative sparcity of mines and the amount of effort needed for extraction compared to the profit gained.

Silver and bronze coinage became more common with the rise of the Roman civilization, due to trade with them, and this coincided with a major increase in gold production in the Celtic world to meet the Roman demand, made by the high value Romans put on it. The large number of gold mines in France is thought to be a major reason why Caesar invaded.

There are limited records from pre-Christian times written in Celtic languages. These are sometimes inscriptions in the Roman, and sometimes Greek, alphabets.

The Ogham script, a Proto-Celtic alphabet was mostly used in early Christian times in Ireland and Scotland (but also in Wales and England), and was used for ceremonial purposes such as inscriptions on gravestones, but there is also evidence of inscriptions in wood from other writings of the time.

The available evidence is of a strong oral tradition, such as that preserved by bards in Ireland, and eventually recorded by monasteries. The oldest recorded rhyming poetry in the world is of Irish origin and is a transcription of a much older epic poem, leading some scholars to claim that the Celts invented Rhyme.

They were highly skilled in visual arts and Celtic art produced a great deal of intricate and beautiful metalwork, examples of which have been preserved by their distinctive burial rites. No other culture in the world has anything similar to the knot-work and Chi-Rho of the Celts.

In some regards the Atlantic Celts were conservative, for example they still used chariots in combat long after they had been reduced to ceremonial roles by the Greeks and Romans, though when faced with the Romans in Britain, their chariot tactics defeated the invasion attempted by Julius Caesar.

The Celts are small of body only coming to 5 feet with rippling muscles and white of skin and their hair is blond-red, and not only naturally so for they also make it their practice by artificial means to increase the distinguishing color which nature has given it.

Before the Celts are always washing their hair in limewater and they pull it back from the forehead to the nape of the neck, with the result that their appearance is like that of Satyrs and Pans since the treatment of their hair makes it so heavy and coarse that it differs in no respect from the mane of horses. They shave the beard but others let it grow a little; and they shave their cheeks but they let the moustache grow until it covers the mouth.

-Diodorus Siculus- Clothing During the later Iron Age the Celts generally wore Checked long-sleeved shirts or tunics, Checked long trousers or kilts (called braccae) by the Romans. Clothes were made of wool or linen, with some silk being used by the rich. Cloaks were worn in winter. Brooches and armlets were used but the most famous item of jewellery was the torc, the Celtic crown, made from twisted Gold, Silver, and Copper.

The role of women According to Aristotle, most "belligerent nations" are strongly influenced by their women, but the Celts were unusual because of openly professing there love (Politics II 1269b). H. D. Rankin in Celts and the Classical World notes that "Athenaeus echoes this comment (603a) and so does Ammianus (30.9). It seems to be the general opinion of antiquity."

In book VIII of his Deipnosophists, the Roman Greek rhetorician and grammarian Athenaeus, repeating assertions made by Diodorus Siculus in the 1st century BC, wrote that Celtic women were beautiful and fought beside there men (Diod 5:32).

Rankin argues that there were even Druidesses among the Druid priesthood. Under Brehon Law, which was written down in early Medieval Ireland after conversion to Christianity, a woman had the right to divorce her husband and gain his property if he was unable to perform his maritial duties due to impotence, obesity, homosexual inclination or preference for other women.

Homosexualaty was forbidden by the early Celts, In one instance two Centurions were found in the act, killed, and then hung in a tree by thear endtrails, this caused a small war between the Celts and the romans.

The Queens of the Celts were very differant from there Roman and Greek counterparts participating in warfare and raiding. The Romans were apauled by this, even Caeser was greatly troubled this says Livy

-Cassius Dio- Many reliable sources exist regarding Celtic views towards gender divisions, though some archaeological evidence does suggest that their views towards gender roles may have been different from those of their contemporary classical counterparts.

There are instances recorded where women participated both in warfare and in kingship. Plutarch reports Celtic women acting as ambassadors to avoid a war among Celtic chiefdoms in the Po valley during the 4th century BC.

There are some general indications coming from Iron Age burial sites in the Champagne and Bourgogne regions of Northeastern France suggesting that women have had roles in combat during the earlier portions of the La Tène period up to the wars of Scotland.

Examples of individuals buried with both torcs (generally associated as being female grave goods), and weaponry have been identified, and there are some questions regarding the sexing of some skeletons that were buried with warrior assemblages.

Among the insular Celts, there is a greater amount of historic documentation to suggest warrior roles for women however. In addition to commentary by Tacitus about Boudicca(bow-dee-see-ah) (victory), there are indications from earlier and later period histories that also suggest a more substantial role for "women as warriors" in symbolic if not actual roles.

Posidonius and Strabo described an island of women where men could not venture to for fear of death and the women ripped each other apart. Other writers, such as Ammianus Marcellinus and Tacitus, mentioned Celtic women inciting, participating, and leading battles.

Poseidonius' anthropological comments on the Celts had common themes, primarily primitivism, extreme ferocity, cruel sacrificial practices(these did not include anyone under 20 years of age fore it was assumed that by that time an individual had been married and had children, to the Celts this was a full life well lived), and the strength and courage of their men and women.

Celtic warfare and Celtic swords.

Clan warfare appears to have been a regular feature of Celtic societies. While epic literature depicts this as more of a sport focused on raids and hunting rather than organised territorial conquest, the historical record is more of clans using warfare to exert political control and harass rivals, for economic advantage, and in some instances to conquer territory.

The Celts were described by classical writers such as Strabo, Livy, Pausanias, and Florus as fighting like "wild beasts", and as warbands. Dionysius said that their "manner of fighting, being in large measure that of wild beasts and frenzied, was an erratic procedure, quite lacking in military science.

Thus, at one moment they would raise their swords aloft and smite after the manner of wild boars, throwing the whole weight of their bodies into the blow like hewers of wood or men digging with mattocks, and again they would deliver crosswise blows aimed at no target, as if they intended to cut to pieces the entire bodies of their adversaries,

protective armour and all", then on sudden impulse would make peace and go raiding ether Greece or Rome, and if wile they were gone and others arrived at ungarded towns would ask where the warriors have gone, the clan tells them where and the new arrivals would tell othere clans and they would go raiding as well.

Such descriptions have been challenged by contemporary historians. Druids were constantly seen giving a powder to the naked Berserker warriors.

Polybius (2.33) indicates that the principal Celtic weapon was a long bladed sword which was used for hacking edgewise rather than stabbing. Celtic warriors are described by Polybius and Plutarch as frequently having to cease fighting in order to straighten their sword blades.

This claim has been questioned by some archaeologists, who note that Celtic Nordic steel, steel produced in Celtic Noricum, was famous in the Roman Empire period and was used to equip the Roman military because of its strength.

Radomir Pleiner, in The Celtic Sword (1993) argues that "the metallographic evidence shows that Polybius was wrong, as around one third of surviving swords from the period might not have behaved as he describes. Polybius also asserts that some Celts typically fought naked, "The appearance of these naked warriors was a terrifying spectacle, for they were all men and women of splendid physique and in the prime of life.

According to Livy this was also true of the Celts of Asia Minor. The bow wich the celts used was the Celtic war bow not to be confused with the western longbow of the Romans or the English Longbow.

This bow ( Celtic Longbow ) was feared by the Romans becase its range far exceeds every other bow in all Europe , but it was only used by the celts of Britan and Ierland. This bow was to become the Welsh Longbow in later generations and would be a nusince to the English.

Head hunting

Celts had a reputation as head hunters. According to Paul Jacobsthal, "Amongst the Celts the human head was venerated above all else, since the head was to the Celt the soul, center of the emotions as well as of life itself, a symbol of divinity and of the powers of the other-world.

Arguments for a Celtic cult of the severed head include the many sculptured representations of severed heads in La Tène carvings, and the surviving Celtic mythology, which is full of stories of the severed heads of heroes and the saints who carry their decapitated heads, right down to Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, where the Green Knight picks up his own severed head after Gawain has struck it off, just as St. Denis carried his head to the top of Montmartre.

A further example of this regeneration after beheading lies in the tales of Connemara's St. Feichin, who after being beheaded by Viking pirates carried his head to the Holy Well on Omey Island and on dipping the head into the well placed it back upon his neck and was restored to full health.

Diodorus Siculus, in his 1st century History had this to say about Celtic head-hunting: They cut off the heads of enemies slain in battle and attach them to the necks of their horses. The blood-stained spoils they hand over to their attendants and striking up a paean and singing a song of victory; and they nail up these first fruits upon their houses, just as do those who lay low wild animals in certain kinds of hunting. They embalm in cedar oil the heads of the most distinguished enemies, and preserve them carefully in a chest, and display them with pride to strangers, saying that for this head one of their ancestors, or his father, or the man himself, refused the offer of a large sum of money.

They say that some of them boast that they refused the weight of the head in gold In Gods and Fighting Men, Lady Gregory's Celtic Revival translation of Irish mythology, heads of men killed in battle are described in the beginning of the story The Fight With The Fir Bolgs as pleasing to Macha, one aspect of the war goddess Morrigu.

However, some suggest that the practice for head-hunting started with 2 warriors who were boasting about all the adversaries they had killed, one would say he killed this many and the other would say that he killed that many, in the end one of the warriors placed all the heads of his adversaries upon the table as proof that he had killed the men he claimed he had, and the other on had nothing to show for all his boasting.

Celtic polytheism

The Celts had an indigenous polytheistic religion and culture. Many Celtic gods are known from texts and inscriptions from the Roman period, such as Aquae Sulis, while others have been inferred from place names such as Lugdunum (stronghold of Lug).

Rites and sacrifices were carried out by priests, known as Druids and Druidesses. The Celts did not see their gods as having a human shape until late in the Iron Age. Celtic shrines were situated in remote areas such as hilltops, groves, and lakes.

Celtic religious patterns were regionally variable; however, some patterns of deity forms, and ways of worshiping these deities, appear over a wide geographical and temporal range. The Celts worshipped both gods and goddesses.

In general, the gods were deities of particular skills, such as the many-skilled Lugh and Dagda, and the goddesses were associated with natural features, particularly rivers (such as Boann, goddess of the River Boyne).

This was not universal, however, as goddesses such as Brighid and The Morrígan were associated with both natural features (holy wells and the River Unius) and skills such as blacksmithing and healing.

Triplicity is a common theme in Celtic cosmology, and a number of deities were seen as threefold. The Three Mothers was a group of goddesses worshiped by many Celtic clans (with regional variations) that exhibited this trait.

The Celts had literally hundreds of deities, some unknown outside of a single family or clan, while others were popular enough to have a following that crossed boundaries of language and culture.

For instance, the Irish god Lugh, associated with storms, lightning, and culture, is seen in similar forms as Lugos in Gaul and Lleu in Wales. Similar patterns are also seen with the continental Celtic horse goddess Epona, and what may well be her Irish and Welsh counterparts, Macha and Rhiannon, respectively. Roman reports of the druids mention ceremonies being held in sacred groves.

La Tène Celts built temples of varying size and shape, though they also maintained shrines at sacred trees and votive pools. Druids fulfilled a variety of roles in Celtic religion, as priests and religious officiants, but also as judges, sacrificers, teachers, and lore-keepers.

Druids organized and ran the religious ceremonies, and they memorized and taught the calendar. Other classes of druids performed ceremonial sacrifices of crops and animals for the perceived benefit of the community.

The most horrable part of the Celtic religion were the Wickermen sacrifices, huge men made of wicker were built and then stuffed with drugged adults who knew not what they were doing, after which the Wickermen were set alight, those inside were burned alive.

It is safe to say that outside influences may have led to the oddities of the Celtic religion, for if you look at the Lébor Gabála Érinn you will find that the God of the Bible is mentioned as their God, this was all before the taking of Britain.

The Coligny calendar,

The Coligny calendar, which was found in 1897 in Coligny, the calendar was engraved on a bronze tablet, preserved in 73 fragments, that originally was 1.48 m wide and 0.9 m high (Lambert p. 111).

Based on the style of lettering and the accompanying objects, it probably dates to the end of the 2nd century. It is written in Latin inscriptional capitals, and is in the Gallic language.

The restored tablet contains sixteen vertical columns, with sixty-two months distributed over five years. The French archaeologist J. Monard speculated that it was recorded by druids wishing to preserve their tradition of timekeeping in a time when the Julian calendar was imposed throughout the Roman Empire.

However, the general form of the calendar suggests the public peg calendars (or parapegmata) found throughout the Greek and Roman world. There were four major festivals in the Gallic Calendar:

"Imbolc" on 1 February, possibly linked to the lactation of the ewes and sacred to the Irish Goddess Brigid.

"Beltaine" on 1 May, connected to fertility and warmth, possibly linked to the Sun God Belenos.

" Lúnasa" on 1 August, connected with the harvest and associated with the God Lugh. And finally

"Samhain" on 1 November, possibly the start of the year.

Two of these festivals, Beltaine and Lúnasa are shown on the Coligny Calendar by sigils, and it is not too much of a stretch of the imagination to match the first month on the Calendar (Samonios) to Samhain. Imbolc does not seem to be shown at all however.

Gallo-Roman culture

The Roman invasion of Gaul brought a great deal of Celtic peoples into the Roman Empire. Roman culture had a profound effect on the Celtic clans which came under the empire's control. Roman influence led to many changes in Celtic religion, the most noticeable of which was the weakening of the Druid class, especially religiously.

The Druids were to eventually disappear altogether. Romano-Celtic deities also began to appear: these deities often had both Roman and Celtic attributes and combined the names of Roman and Celtic deities.

Other changes included the adaptation of the Jupiter Pole, a sacred pole which was used throughout Celtic regions of the empire, primarily in the north.

Another major change in religious practice was the use of stone monuments to represent gods and goddesses. The Celts had only created wooden idols (including monuments carved into trees, which were known as sacred poles) previously to Roman conquest.

Celtic Christianity A Celtic cross.

While the regions under Roman rule adopted Christianity along with the rest of the Roman empire, unconquered areas of Ireland and Scotland moved from Celtic polytheism to Celtic Christianity in the 5th century AD.

Ireland was converted under missionaries from Britain, such as Patrick. Later missionaries from Ireland were a major source of missionary work in Scotland, Saxon parts of Britain, and central Europe (see Hiberno-Scottish mission).

The development of Christianity in Ireland and Britain brought an early medieval renaissance of Celtic art between 390 and 1200 AD, developing many of the styles now thought of as typically Celtic, and found throughout much of Ireland and Britain, including the northeast and far north of Scotland, Orkney and Shetland.

This Celtic renaissance was ended by the Norman Conquest of Ireland in the late 12th century. Notable works produced during this period include the Book of Kells and the Ardagh Chalice. Antiquarian interest from the 17th century led to the term Celt being extended, and rising nationalism brought Celtic revivals from the 19th century.

Celtic Christianity gave Love and kindness to all equally, were as the Catholic religion gave Law and demanded absolute and unquestioning obedience, this is why the Celts disliked the Roman church so much.

The Catholic church tried to control the Celtic church and finally succeeded in crushing the Celtic church in 1343. Sadly there was no one left to revive it.

Cleanliness

There are few instances of cleanliness among the Celts but in britan a lard soap block(8 feet by 5 feet)was found in the grave of a queen dating to 430 B.C. Livy says one of these blocks would serve the whole clan for months. the Celts also limed their hair to protect against mites, but all this did in the end was cause baldness to set in.

other Tidbits of Celtáe history

sources used in the building of this unconventional, non mainstream, original history

the Bible N/A

the book of Jasher(the book of the upright, righteous)3,800 BC-3,000 BC

the book of Jubilees?

the book of Enoch(Hebrew version with a large grain of salt) 3,800 BC-3,000 BC

Jewish Legends?

the ancient stories of the Celts(aka the Celtic histories or Celtic Legends) 3,000 BC- 1,000 BC

Lébor Gabála Érinn(the book of the taking of Ireland) 3,800BC- 3,400 BC

Chronicles of the Picts and Scots

Chronicum Scotorum

Scotti Chronicon

Auraicept na nÉces

Oidheadh Cloinne Tuireann

the writings of Ephirus 300-289 BC

the writings of Josephus 50 AD- 80 AD

the writings of Pliny the elder 100 BC

the writings of Livy(with a large grain of salt) 300 BC

the writings of Bede 700 AD

the writings of Nennius, History of Britain 600 AD

Ceaser’s Commentary

Ceaser’s Gallic Wars

~*~

Noah and wife Naamah are mentioned in the Celtic histories, they are called Dwyvan and Dwyvach or Noe and Coba.

the Hebrew name Eber(one who crosses over/ a nomad/ a traveler) appears 9 times in Celtic Genealogies.

Eber Scot(hord/ great family){ born before Scota 2nd, Princess of Egypt}

Eber Boamain

Eber Agnomain

Eber Glunfhind

Febri(Eber) Glas

Ercha(Eber)

Eber Dub

Eber Glas

Eber

Erech(Eber) Febria(Eber)

Eber Finn(white/ fair/ pure)

Eber Donn(brown/ mud)

in Hebrew and Celtic legends Gomer is said to have lived to be 1,000 years old.

Ógmá is said to have created the writing system Ogham for the Celts.

The first in the line of Celts was Riphath Scot Ben Gomer, there are several Scots and Scota mentioned in the Genealogies of the Celts.

Riphath Scot(2nd of the 3 sons of Gomer, son of Japheth, one of 72 Lords of Nations, one of 6 or 8 principle chieftains).

Scota the 1^st, princess of Egypt, wife to Finn Gaedil, mother of Gaedil Glas(in the old legends it says she was called Scota by the Rhibii people= early Celts, aka Beaker People).

Eber Scot(great grandfather of Tat who was father of Agnomain who contested kingship in scythia, grandfather of Eber Dub)

Scota the 2^nd, princess of Egypt, wife to Sur(Rá?)

Scota the 3^rd, Egyptian Noblewoman, wife of Mil

Gaedil, started a school of languages after the tower of Babel to learn all72 languages.

Feinus Farsaid, one of 16 learned men at the tower of Babel, learned all 72 languages, the Language of Riphath Scot was called the Scotic language.

Gaedil glas was fostered under Feinus Farsaid, king of Scythia.

Agnomain, son of Paim, son of Tat.

The Celts beleaved that the age of maturity was between the ages 13 and 17, under Celtic law no one could be sacrificed if they were 20 years and under, this was the reason why the Celts were always at war with the Romans, it was because Rome practiced child sacrifice, in the Celtic world the word for “Children” was Sawn-úw(saw-noo), the literal translation for this word is “gift, treasure or happiness, or the Gift of Treasured Happiness”, for that is what children were seen as, the essence of happiness.

3 is the number of purity.

In pre roman times the chieftains of the Celtic clans owned and worked their own land along with their sons and daughters.

The name Scotland comes from the Celtic word Scota which means”land of hords or great families, huge clans”

The name Alba comes from the word Banba, which means “end of the world or Land ends”.

The name Ireland comes from the word Eriu which means “land of abundance”.

Pictland’s original name was Folta which comes from the word Fohla which means”stone of sovereignty”.

The Celts had names for God as well such as Dia(bright or white one/ God), Ollathair(the all Father) and Ánon(God).

Lucifer also has a name as well, he is called “Torpen”

The Tree of the Knowledge of good an evil also had a name among the Celts, they called it Dhanvantari or Din-Cecht(both mean the tree of knowledge).

Ireland also bore the ancient name “Inisfail”(island of destiny).

Britain also had an old name as well, she was called Ynys Prydein(island of the mighty), possaly in reference to the tribes of giants that inhabited the islands, formost among them the Fomorians(under sea dwellers), the De-Danaan (ever living ones), and the Domnu(children of Darkness and evil).

The name Skye comes from the word ‘Scathach’(shadowy ones).

The name Islay comes fro the ancient Gaelic name “Ilé”(island/queen/queen of the islands).

The name “Ieithoedd” means “one who knows all languages”.

The Celts developed the very first Threshing Machine in 750 BC.

To this day the Celtic language is the oldest Vernacular Language in all of Europe, in 222 BC Rehea-Slilvia, chieftain of the Insúbres Clann attacked the roman town of Telamon and then was beaten back, one of the prisoners captured was Caecilius-Statius, he became a slave for a few years and after learning the Latin Language he became a Comic Dramatist, after finding out that the romans did not have an Alphabet or Writing System of their own he created one for them, he wrote down 42 Plays that are still in use to this day, the 1^st ones ever recorded in history, later he became one of the Prominent Roman Writers in the Classical World.

Of the 300+ legions lost in the roman Empire, 53 were lost in Celtic territories.

In the Celtic world colors have meaning behind them.

Green is the color of Love, Loyalty, Honor, and family.

Yellow is the color of Joy, Happiness, and Cheerfulness.

Red is the color of Righteous Anger and Strength.

Blue is the color of New Beginnings.

Purple is the color of True Nobility.

Brown is the color of Stubbornness, Steadfastness, Ardent.

Gray is the color of Seeking Truth.

Black is the color of Defiance and Resolute.

White is the color of Purity and First Beginnings.

the Celts also had an advanced Calendar that also served as a Calculator, it had 24 months of 14-15 days apiece, if a month was short a day they could move day from one month to another.

Of the 56 signers of the Declaration Of Independence, 9 were Scottish, 8 were Irish, 16 were Welsh, 10 were Manx, and the last 13 were made up of English and Dutch.

The Celts of Galatia were possibly the first non Jews to accept Christianity.

The daughter of Angus Óg was called Maga(blood relation), she was the wife of Ross the Red.

The Celts also had words for Heaven and Hell, Heaven was Á-Valon(land of the dead/ land where the dead go/ Paradise), and Hell was Annẃn(abyss/chaos).