The ethnic names of this List of ancient Celtic peoples and tribes are stated or implied by the ancient authors to have belonged to an overall ethnic identity called by them generally Celts. Some of the main authors, such as Julius Caesar, explicitly state that Celtic, the adjective, implies the use of a distinctive Celtic language. If a tribe did not speak Celtic, it was not called Celtic. This implication is sufficiently widespread for modern linguists to conclude that if a tribe was called Celtic, it spoke Celtic.
From widespread evidence in literature, inscriptions, and names, modern linguists are able to conclude to a group of closely related languages termed Celtic languages. Linguistic classification of languages by the Tree Method, or Genetic Method, which establishes degree of similarity of vocabulary and syntax between languages, can be used to assign a relationship of one language to another. Closely similar languages are closely related by definition. This relationship is termed ethnolinguistic.
An ethnolinguistic relationship has nothing to do with biological genetic relationships. Two populations may be close ethnolinguistically but totally different genetically, as when one population learns the language of another. Similarly the customs of two populations apart from language have nothing to do with either the people or the language. Among such customs are the archaeologies. The archaeological finds and culture names have nothing to do with the langage, except for inscriptions found. This article attempts to arrange Celtic languages by ethnolinguistic similarity. Nothing is impled concerning the origins of the peoples or their material culture.
In Classical antiquity, Celts were in large number and were a significant part of the population in many regions of Western Europe, Southern Central Europe, the British Isles, parts of the Balkans, and also Central Asia Minor or Anatolia.
Modern people and their languages are excluded from this list. A few Celtic languages are still extant. They are not of interest here.
In the Tree Model of language development, languages develop historically (or diachronically, "through time") by splitting. At a point T1 in time a population of P speaks a common language L. Over the range of P two different groups, P1 and P2, within P begin to speak L differently, so that at T2 there are now L1 and L2 where before was only L. L1 and L2 are sister languages, while L is variously called the common, proto-, or parent language.
It is clear that in the Tree Model of language development, groups of sister languages, L1, L2, ..., Ln, exist, and every group must come from a proto-language. The very assertion that any languages are related implies the former existence of one, and only one, proto-language as ancestor. Thus to refer at all to a group of languages termed Celtic implies the sometime existence of Proto-Celtic. The population P of this L is often referenced as the Proto-Celts. Such a term implies that they spoke the language. There is no other definition of Proto-Celtic. They cannot logically have not spoken it, or have spoken anything else as a primary language.
There is only one Proto-Celtic. From it descend all the Celtic languages without exception. Proto-Celtic is the ancestor of the Celtic languages. The linguistic possibilty that a language might belong to more than one tree and thus have more than one ancestor is not of concern here but is considered in the lists below. Such a case might happen when two populations combine and develop a combined language. There is, however, only one Celtic ancestor of any Celtic language, regardless of what else it might be. If any of its languages are considered out of the group, then it is not Proto-Celtic. If Proto-Celtic is considered not to have existed, then none of the supposed Celtic languages are that. There is a theory that Celtic languages and therefore Celts did not exist as such. Such a view linguistically would require linguists to discard all their dictionaries and start over, an unlikely event.
Merging into the Tree Model is the Genetic Model. In the latter, an ancestor with all its descendants is termed a clade, and is called monophyletic. As languages do not suddenly appear from nowhere, the Celtic clade must have had a mother language as well. It undoubtedly had sister languages to Proto-Celtic. Proto-Celtic and its ancestor alone are called paraphyletic, meaning that some of the sister languages of Proto-Celtic are not considered. One of the problems of historical linguistics is to determine what sister groups are clades and what not.
Asit turns out, Proto-Celtic and all its sister languages are in a virtual clade called Indo-European. The term virtual refers to the possibility of other Indo-European languages being discovered. As this possibility is always open, then neither Indo-European nor any of its descendant groups can ever be a clade. For the time being, however, based on what is known, they are generally considered clades.
Corresponding to this conception there must have been a Proto-Indo-European language spoken by a population that linguists may call Proto-Indo-Europeans. This is a linguistic exonym. The speakers did not imagine themselves such or know of their far-ranging linguistic alliances. Analysis of tribal names suggests they may have called themselves by some sort of family name, such as "the people" or "our people." There is no evidence of an Indo-European race, as anyone could come into contact with the Indo-Europeans and learn Indo-European.
Proto-Indo-European, though the mother of Proto-Celtic was not a Celtic language, nor a Greek language, nor an Anatolian language, nor any of the others. The proto-language has a number of characteristics that, passed on to the descendant languages, are termed in linguistics shared retentions. No daughter language can ever be defined on shared retentions, as there is no way it can differ from the parent. What makes a language distinctive is the shared innovations, characteristics that are not in Proto-Indo-European. It can get these from anywhere as long as it is non-Indo-European. The term shared applies to different subjects in each case. The innovations will be shared by daughter languages of the daughter.
Map 2 depicts the current state of the virtual clades of Indo-European in the view of D.W. Anthony. Credibility requires a fundamental assumption that archaeological cultures can represent language groups. For example, perhaps there is something about the archaeology of London that tags it as English-speaking rather than French-speaking, etc.
The pre-WWII scholars had adopted this view with reservations; for example, Heinrich Schlieman had applied the term Minyan Ware to a Middle Helladic pottery type found over much of Greece, especially at Orchomenus (Boeotia). At that location the legendary king Minyas (mythology) was said to have ruled. Schlieman assigned the pottery to an ethnic identity, which he created from the myth, the Minyans. The traditional archaeologists of the WWII period, such as Carl Blegen, and his students and successors, went Schlieman one better, so to speak, in daring hypotheses by supposing Minyans to have been Proto-Greeks. This supposition was abruptly opposed on the grounds that it was too far out of the evidence to be justitifed. One had to invent Minyans and then invent a Proto-Greek for them without a shred of evidence about the language.
Archaeologists of the times were daring. Eurasian cultures were fair game for anthropological archaeologists such as V. Gordon Childe, who became the British mentor of archaeology. He was sorting through dozens of new cultures without really knowing what to do with them, as there was no way to date them. He threw them all into the thousand years around 2000 BC, and developed some very imaginative links betweem them, influenced, as they all were by the rising Nazi racial standards. James Henry Breasted provided a benchmark with his concept of the Great White Races, as opposed to the Mongoloids and Negroids, who didn't fare so well. He was only a notable example of a general line of thought.
A catastophe was about to fall on the archaeology of the 1950's and before. The field of atomic research concomitant with the development of the atomic bomb discovered a method of dating organic material by estimating time of radioactive decay ( Radiocarbon dating). Streams of new dates for the Eurasian cultures fell upon the works and estimates of the WWII scholars. Although Childe's success in some areas stood, for the most part his sequences lost meaning. The dates were quite different from previously expected. The whole thing needed to be redone. Childe's Aryan Race, for example, vanished away. Aged and ill from cancer, Childe jumped off a cliff.
Continental Celts were the Celtic peoples that inhabited mainland Europe. In the 3rd and 2nd centuries BC, Celts inhabited a large part of mainland Western Europe and large parts of Western Southern Europe ( Iberian peninsula), southern Central Europe and some regions of the Balkans and Anatolia. They were most of the population in Gallia, today's France, Switzerland, possibly Belgica – far Northern France, Belgium and far Southern Netherlands, large parts of Hispania, i.e. Iberian Peninsula – Spain and Portugal, in the northern, central and western regions; southern Central Europe – upper Danube basin and neighbouring regions, large parts of the middle Danube basin and the inland region of Central Asia Minor or Anatolia. They lived in these many regions forming a large arc stretching across from Iberia in the west to the Balkans and Anatolia in the east. Many of the populations from these regions were called Celts by ancient authors. They are thought to have spoken Gaulish ( P-Celtic type), Lepontic ( P-Celtic type), Hispano-Celtic ( Celtiberian and Western Hispano-Celtic or Gallaecian) ( Q-Celtic type), Eastern Celtic or Noric (unknown type). P-Celtic type languages are more innovative (*kʷ > p) while Q-Celtic type languages are more conservative. However, it is not fully known if this grouping of peoples, such as their languages, is a genealogical one ( phylogenetic), based on kinship, or if it is a simple geographically based group. Classical Antiquity authors did not describe the peoples and tribes of the British Islands as “ Celts” or “ Galli” but by the name “ Britons”. They only used the name “Celts” or “Galli” for the peoples and tribes of mainland Europe. [1]
They lived Southern Central Europe (in the Upper Danube basin and neighbouring regions) which is hypothesized as the original area of the Celts ( Proto-Celts), corresponding to the Hallstatt Culture. Later they expanded towards the Middle Danube valley and to parts of the Balkans and towards inland central Asia Minor or Anatolia (Galatians). Hercynian Forest ( Hercynia Silva), north of the Danube and east of the Rhine was in their lands. Celts, especially those from Western and Central Europe, were generally called by the Romans “Galli” i.e. “Gauls”, this name was synonym of “ Celts”, this also means that not all of the peoples and tribes called by the name “Gauls” (Galli) were specifically Gauls in a narrower more regional sense. Their language is scarcely attested and can not be classified as a P-Celtic or Q-Celtic. Some closely fit the concept of a tribe. Others are confederations or even unions of tribes.
In the middle 3rd century BC, Celts from the middle Danube valley, immigrated from Thrace into the highlands of central Anatolia (modern Turkey), which was called Galatia after that. These people, called Galatians, a generic name for “Celts”, were eventually Hellenized, [22] [23] but retained many of their own traditions. They spoke Galatian, a name derived from the generic name for “Celts”. Some closely fit the concept of a tribe. Others are confederations or even unions of tribes.
Gauls were the Celtic people that lived in Gaul having many tribes but with some influential tribal confederations. Galli ( Gauls), for the Romans, was a name synonym of “Celts” (as Julius Caesar states in De Bello Gallico [25]) which means that not all peoples and tribes called “Galli” were necessarily Gauls in a narrower regional sense. Gaulish Celts spoke Gaulish, a Continental Celtic language of the P Celtic type, a more innovative Celtic language - *kʷ > p. Romans initially organized Gaul in two provinces (later in three): Transalpine Gaul, meaning literally "Gaul on the other side of the Alps" or "Gaul across the Alps", is approximately modern Belgium, France, Switzerland, Netherlands, and Western Germany in what would become the Roman provinces of Gallia Narbonensis, Gallia Celtica (later Lugdunensis and Aquitania) and Gallia Belgica. Some closely fit the concept of a tribe. Others are confederations or even unions of tribes.
They seem to have been an older group of Celts that lived in Cisalpine Gaul before the Gaulish Celtic migration. They spoke Lepontic (a Continental Celtic language) a Celtic language that seems to precede Cisalpine Gaulish.
May have been Celtic tribes influenced by Ligurians, heavily Celticized Ligurian tribes that shifted to a Celtic ethnolinguistic identity or mixed Celtic- Ligurian tribes. They dwelt in southeastern Transalpine Gaul and northwestern Cisalpine Gaul, mainly in the Western Alps regions, Rhodanus eastern basin and upper Po river basin.
They lived in large parts of the Iberian Peninsula, in the Northern, Central, and Western regions (half of the Peninsula's territory). The Celts in the Iberian peninsula were traditionally thought of as living on the edge of the Celtic world of the La Tène culture that defined classical Iron Age Celts. Earlier migrations were Hallstatt in culture and later came La Tène influenced peoples. Celtic or ( Indo-European) Pre-Celtic cultures and populations existed in great numbers and Iberia experienced one of the highest levels of Celtic settlement in all of Europe. They dwelt in northern, central and western regions of the Iberian Peninsula, but also in several southern regions. They spoke Celtic languages - Hispano-Celtic languages which were of the Q-Celtic type, more conservative Celtic languages. Romans initially organized the Peninsula in two provinces (later in three): Hispania Citerior ("Nearer Hispania", "Hispania that is Closer", from the perspective of the Romans), was a region of Hispania during the Roman Republic, roughly occupying the northeastern coast and the Iberus (Ebro) Valley and later the eastern, central, northern and northwestern areas of the Iberian peninsula in what would become the Tarraconensis Roman province (of what is now Spain and northern Portugal). Hispania Ulterior ("Further Hispania", "Hispania that is Beyond", from the perspective of the Romans) was a region of Hispania during the Roman Republic, roughly located in what would become the provinces of Baetica (that included the Baetis, Guadalquivir, valley of modern Spain) and extending to all of Lusitania (modern south and central Portugal, Extremadura and a small part of Salamanca province). The Roman province of Hispania included both Celtic speaking and non-Celtic speaking tribes. Some closely fit the concept of a tribe. Others are confederations or even unions of tribes.
Western Hispano-Celts were Celtic peoples and tribes that inhabited most of north and western Iberian Peninsula regions. They are often confused or taken as synonym of Celtiberians but, in fact, they were a distinct Celtic population that was most part of Iberian Peninsula Celtic populations. They spoke Gallaecian (a Continental Celtic language of the Q Celtic type, a more conservative Celtic language) which was not Celtiberian ( Celtic languages of Iberian Peninsula are often lumped as Hispano-Celtic).
Eastern Iberian meseta (Spain), mountains of the headwaters of the rivers Douro, Tagus, Guadiana (Anas), Júcar, Jalón, Jiloca and Turia, (tribal confederation). Mixed Celtic and Iberian tribes or Celtic tribes influenced by Iberians. Not synonymous of all the Celts that lived in the Iberian Peninsula but to a narrower group (the majority of Celtic tribes in the Iberian Peninsula) were not Celtiberians. They spoke Celtiberian (a Continental Celtic language of the Q Celtic type, a more conservative Celtic language).
Insular Celts were the Celtic peoples and tribes that inhabited the British Islands, Britannia ( Great Britain), the main largest island to the east, and Hibernia ( Ireland), the main smaller island to the west. There were three or four distinct Celtic populations in these islands, in Britannia inhabited the Britons, the Caledonians or Picts, the Belgae (not surely known if they were a Celtic people or a distinct but closely related one); in Hibernia inhabited the Hibernians or Goidels or Gaels. Britons and Caledonians or Picts spoke the P-Celtic type languages, a more innovative Celtic language (*kʷ > p) while Hibernians or Goidels or Gaels spoke Q-Celtic type languages, a more conservative Celtic language. Classical Antiquity authors did not call the British islands peoples and tribes as Celts or Galli but by the name Britons (in Britannia). They only used the name Celts or Gauls for the peoples and tribes of mainland Europe. [1]
They spoke Brittonic (an Insular Celtic language of the P Celtic type). They lived in Britannia, it was the name Romans gave, based on the name of the people: the Britanni. Some closely fit the concept of a tribe but others are confederations or even unions of tribes.
They were a different people from the Britons [ citation needed], but may have shared common ancestry. They lived as a tribal confederation in Caledonia (today's Northern Scotland); the Caledonian Forest ( Caledonia Silva) was in their land.
They spoke Goidelic (an Insular Celtic language of the Q Celtic type. According to Ptolemy's Geography (2nd century AD) (in brackets the names are in Greek as on the map):
Para-Celtic has the meaning that these peoples had common ancestors with the Celts but were not Celts themselves (although they were later Celticized and belong to a Celtic culture sphere of influence), they were not direct descendants from the Proto-Celts. They may in fact have been Proto-Celto-Italic, predating the Celtic or Italic languages and originated earlier from either Proto-Celtic or Proto-Italic populations who spread from Central Europe into Western Europe after new Yamnaya migrations into the Danube Valley. [36] Alternatively, a European branch of Indo-European dialects, termed "North-west Indo-European" and associated with the Beaker culture, may have been ancestral to not only Celtic and Italic, but also to Germanic and Balto-Slavic. [36]
A people or a group of related tribes that dwelt in Belgica, parts of Britannia, and may have dwelt in parts of Hibernia and also parts of Hispania (large tribal confederation). According to classical authors works, like Caesar's De Bello Gallico, [25] they were a different people and spoke a different language (Ancient Belgic) from the Gauls and Britons; they were clearly an Indo-European people and may have spoken a Celtic language. There is also the possibility that their language may have been a different language branch of Indo-European from the Nordwestblock culture, which may have been intermediary between Germanic and Celtic, and might have been affiliated to Italic (according to a Maurits Gysseling hypothesis).
Northern Mediterranean Coast straddling South-east French and North-west Italian coasts, including far Northern and Northwestern Tuscany and Corsica. Because of the strong Celtic influences on their language and culture, they were known already in antiquity as Celto-Ligurians (in Greek Κελτολίγυες, Keltolígues). [39] Very little is known about this language, Ligurian (mainly place names and personal names remain) which is generally believed to have been Celtic or Para-Celtic; [40] [41] (i.e. an Indo-European language branch not Celtic but more closely related to Celtic). They spoke ancient Ligurian.
Today's Western Andalusia ( Hispania Baetica), Baetis ( Guadalquivir) river valley and basin, Marianus Mons (Sierra Morena), some consider them Celtic, [43] may have been Pre-Celtic Indo-European people as the Lusitani and Vettones. If their language, called Turdetanian or Tartessian, was not Celtic it may have been Para-Celtic like Ligurian (i.e. an Indo-European language branch not Celtic but more closely related to Celtic). Also may have been a non-Indo-European people related to the Iberians, but not the same people. A tribal confederation but with much more centralized power, may have formed an early form of Kingdom or a Proto-civilisation (see Tartessos)
Transitional people between Celts and Italics? Celticized Italic people? Para-Celtic people?
They lived in Central Alps, eastern parts of present-day Switzerland, the Tyrol in Austria, and the Alpine regions of northern Italy. They spoke the Rhaetian language. There is evidence that the non-Celtic (and Pre-Indo-European) elements (see Tyrsenian languages) had, by the time of Augustus, been assimilated by the influx of Celtic tribes and had adopted Celtic speech. [51] In addition, the abundance of Celtic toponyms and the complete absence of Etruscan place names in the Rhaetian territory leads to the conclusion that, by the time of Roman conquest, the Rhaetians were completely Celticized. [52][ better source needed]
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The ethnic names of this List of ancient Celtic peoples and tribes are stated or implied by the ancient authors to have belonged to an overall ethnic identity called by them generally Celts. Some of the main authors, such as Julius Caesar, explicitly state that Celtic, the adjective, implies the use of a distinctive Celtic language. If a tribe did not speak Celtic, it was not called Celtic. This implication is sufficiently widespread for modern linguists to conclude that if a tribe was called Celtic, it spoke Celtic.
From widespread evidence in literature, inscriptions, and names, modern linguists are able to conclude to a group of closely related languages termed Celtic languages. Linguistic classification of languages by the Tree Method, or Genetic Method, which establishes degree of similarity of vocabulary and syntax between languages, can be used to assign a relationship of one language to another. Closely similar languages are closely related by definition. This relationship is termed ethnolinguistic.
An ethnolinguistic relationship has nothing to do with biological genetic relationships. Two populations may be close ethnolinguistically but totally different genetically, as when one population learns the language of another. Similarly the customs of two populations apart from language have nothing to do with either the people or the language. Among such customs are the archaeologies. The archaeological finds and culture names have nothing to do with the langage, except for inscriptions found. This article attempts to arrange Celtic languages by ethnolinguistic similarity. Nothing is impled concerning the origins of the peoples or their material culture.
In Classical antiquity, Celts were in large number and were a significant part of the population in many regions of Western Europe, Southern Central Europe, the British Isles, parts of the Balkans, and also Central Asia Minor or Anatolia.
Modern people and their languages are excluded from this list. A few Celtic languages are still extant. They are not of interest here.
In the Tree Model of language development, languages develop historically (or diachronically, "through time") by splitting. At a point T1 in time a population of P speaks a common language L. Over the range of P two different groups, P1 and P2, within P begin to speak L differently, so that at T2 there are now L1 and L2 where before was only L. L1 and L2 are sister languages, while L is variously called the common, proto-, or parent language.
It is clear that in the Tree Model of language development, groups of sister languages, L1, L2, ..., Ln, exist, and every group must come from a proto-language. The very assertion that any languages are related implies the former existence of one, and only one, proto-language as ancestor. Thus to refer at all to a group of languages termed Celtic implies the sometime existence of Proto-Celtic. The population P of this L is often referenced as the Proto-Celts. Such a term implies that they spoke the language. There is no other definition of Proto-Celtic. They cannot logically have not spoken it, or have spoken anything else as a primary language.
There is only one Proto-Celtic. From it descend all the Celtic languages without exception. Proto-Celtic is the ancestor of the Celtic languages. The linguistic possibilty that a language might belong to more than one tree and thus have more than one ancestor is not of concern here but is considered in the lists below. Such a case might happen when two populations combine and develop a combined language. There is, however, only one Celtic ancestor of any Celtic language, regardless of what else it might be. If any of its languages are considered out of the group, then it is not Proto-Celtic. If Proto-Celtic is considered not to have existed, then none of the supposed Celtic languages are that. There is a theory that Celtic languages and therefore Celts did not exist as such. Such a view linguistically would require linguists to discard all their dictionaries and start over, an unlikely event.
Merging into the Tree Model is the Genetic Model. In the latter, an ancestor with all its descendants is termed a clade, and is called monophyletic. As languages do not suddenly appear from nowhere, the Celtic clade must have had a mother language as well. It undoubtedly had sister languages to Proto-Celtic. Proto-Celtic and its ancestor alone are called paraphyletic, meaning that some of the sister languages of Proto-Celtic are not considered. One of the problems of historical linguistics is to determine what sister groups are clades and what not.
Asit turns out, Proto-Celtic and all its sister languages are in a virtual clade called Indo-European. The term virtual refers to the possibility of other Indo-European languages being discovered. As this possibility is always open, then neither Indo-European nor any of its descendant groups can ever be a clade. For the time being, however, based on what is known, they are generally considered clades.
Corresponding to this conception there must have been a Proto-Indo-European language spoken by a population that linguists may call Proto-Indo-Europeans. This is a linguistic exonym. The speakers did not imagine themselves such or know of their far-ranging linguistic alliances. Analysis of tribal names suggests they may have called themselves by some sort of family name, such as "the people" or "our people." There is no evidence of an Indo-European race, as anyone could come into contact with the Indo-Europeans and learn Indo-European.
Proto-Indo-European, though the mother of Proto-Celtic was not a Celtic language, nor a Greek language, nor an Anatolian language, nor any of the others. The proto-language has a number of characteristics that, passed on to the descendant languages, are termed in linguistics shared retentions. No daughter language can ever be defined on shared retentions, as there is no way it can differ from the parent. What makes a language distinctive is the shared innovations, characteristics that are not in Proto-Indo-European. It can get these from anywhere as long as it is non-Indo-European. The term shared applies to different subjects in each case. The innovations will be shared by daughter languages of the daughter.
Map 2 depicts the current state of the virtual clades of Indo-European in the view of D.W. Anthony. Credibility requires a fundamental assumption that archaeological cultures can represent language groups. For example, perhaps there is something about the archaeology of London that tags it as English-speaking rather than French-speaking, etc.
The pre-WWII scholars had adopted this view with reservations; for example, Heinrich Schlieman had applied the term Minyan Ware to a Middle Helladic pottery type found over much of Greece, especially at Orchomenus (Boeotia). At that location the legendary king Minyas (mythology) was said to have ruled. Schlieman assigned the pottery to an ethnic identity, which he created from the myth, the Minyans. The traditional archaeologists of the WWII period, such as Carl Blegen, and his students and successors, went Schlieman one better, so to speak, in daring hypotheses by supposing Minyans to have been Proto-Greeks. This supposition was abruptly opposed on the grounds that it was too far out of the evidence to be justitifed. One had to invent Minyans and then invent a Proto-Greek for them without a shred of evidence about the language.
Archaeologists of the times were daring. Eurasian cultures were fair game for anthropological archaeologists such as V. Gordon Childe, who became the British mentor of archaeology. He was sorting through dozens of new cultures without really knowing what to do with them, as there was no way to date them. He threw them all into the thousand years around 2000 BC, and developed some very imaginative links betweem them, influenced, as they all were by the rising Nazi racial standards. James Henry Breasted provided a benchmark with his concept of the Great White Races, as opposed to the Mongoloids and Negroids, who didn't fare so well. He was only a notable example of a general line of thought.
A catastophe was about to fall on the archaeology of the 1950's and before. The field of atomic research concomitant with the development of the atomic bomb discovered a method of dating organic material by estimating time of radioactive decay ( Radiocarbon dating). Streams of new dates for the Eurasian cultures fell upon the works and estimates of the WWII scholars. Although Childe's success in some areas stood, for the most part his sequences lost meaning. The dates were quite different from previously expected. The whole thing needed to be redone. Childe's Aryan Race, for example, vanished away. Aged and ill from cancer, Childe jumped off a cliff.
Continental Celts were the Celtic peoples that inhabited mainland Europe. In the 3rd and 2nd centuries BC, Celts inhabited a large part of mainland Western Europe and large parts of Western Southern Europe ( Iberian peninsula), southern Central Europe and some regions of the Balkans and Anatolia. They were most of the population in Gallia, today's France, Switzerland, possibly Belgica – far Northern France, Belgium and far Southern Netherlands, large parts of Hispania, i.e. Iberian Peninsula – Spain and Portugal, in the northern, central and western regions; southern Central Europe – upper Danube basin and neighbouring regions, large parts of the middle Danube basin and the inland region of Central Asia Minor or Anatolia. They lived in these many regions forming a large arc stretching across from Iberia in the west to the Balkans and Anatolia in the east. Many of the populations from these regions were called Celts by ancient authors. They are thought to have spoken Gaulish ( P-Celtic type), Lepontic ( P-Celtic type), Hispano-Celtic ( Celtiberian and Western Hispano-Celtic or Gallaecian) ( Q-Celtic type), Eastern Celtic or Noric (unknown type). P-Celtic type languages are more innovative (*kʷ > p) while Q-Celtic type languages are more conservative. However, it is not fully known if this grouping of peoples, such as their languages, is a genealogical one ( phylogenetic), based on kinship, or if it is a simple geographically based group. Classical Antiquity authors did not describe the peoples and tribes of the British Islands as “ Celts” or “ Galli” but by the name “ Britons”. They only used the name “Celts” or “Galli” for the peoples and tribes of mainland Europe. [1]
They lived Southern Central Europe (in the Upper Danube basin and neighbouring regions) which is hypothesized as the original area of the Celts ( Proto-Celts), corresponding to the Hallstatt Culture. Later they expanded towards the Middle Danube valley and to parts of the Balkans and towards inland central Asia Minor or Anatolia (Galatians). Hercynian Forest ( Hercynia Silva), north of the Danube and east of the Rhine was in their lands. Celts, especially those from Western and Central Europe, were generally called by the Romans “Galli” i.e. “Gauls”, this name was synonym of “ Celts”, this also means that not all of the peoples and tribes called by the name “Gauls” (Galli) were specifically Gauls in a narrower more regional sense. Their language is scarcely attested and can not be classified as a P-Celtic or Q-Celtic. Some closely fit the concept of a tribe. Others are confederations or even unions of tribes.
In the middle 3rd century BC, Celts from the middle Danube valley, immigrated from Thrace into the highlands of central Anatolia (modern Turkey), which was called Galatia after that. These people, called Galatians, a generic name for “Celts”, were eventually Hellenized, [22] [23] but retained many of their own traditions. They spoke Galatian, a name derived from the generic name for “Celts”. Some closely fit the concept of a tribe. Others are confederations or even unions of tribes.
Gauls were the Celtic people that lived in Gaul having many tribes but with some influential tribal confederations. Galli ( Gauls), for the Romans, was a name synonym of “Celts” (as Julius Caesar states in De Bello Gallico [25]) which means that not all peoples and tribes called “Galli” were necessarily Gauls in a narrower regional sense. Gaulish Celts spoke Gaulish, a Continental Celtic language of the P Celtic type, a more innovative Celtic language - *kʷ > p. Romans initially organized Gaul in two provinces (later in three): Transalpine Gaul, meaning literally "Gaul on the other side of the Alps" or "Gaul across the Alps", is approximately modern Belgium, France, Switzerland, Netherlands, and Western Germany in what would become the Roman provinces of Gallia Narbonensis, Gallia Celtica (later Lugdunensis and Aquitania) and Gallia Belgica. Some closely fit the concept of a tribe. Others are confederations or even unions of tribes.
They seem to have been an older group of Celts that lived in Cisalpine Gaul before the Gaulish Celtic migration. They spoke Lepontic (a Continental Celtic language) a Celtic language that seems to precede Cisalpine Gaulish.
May have been Celtic tribes influenced by Ligurians, heavily Celticized Ligurian tribes that shifted to a Celtic ethnolinguistic identity or mixed Celtic- Ligurian tribes. They dwelt in southeastern Transalpine Gaul and northwestern Cisalpine Gaul, mainly in the Western Alps regions, Rhodanus eastern basin and upper Po river basin.
They lived in large parts of the Iberian Peninsula, in the Northern, Central, and Western regions (half of the Peninsula's territory). The Celts in the Iberian peninsula were traditionally thought of as living on the edge of the Celtic world of the La Tène culture that defined classical Iron Age Celts. Earlier migrations were Hallstatt in culture and later came La Tène influenced peoples. Celtic or ( Indo-European) Pre-Celtic cultures and populations existed in great numbers and Iberia experienced one of the highest levels of Celtic settlement in all of Europe. They dwelt in northern, central and western regions of the Iberian Peninsula, but also in several southern regions. They spoke Celtic languages - Hispano-Celtic languages which were of the Q-Celtic type, more conservative Celtic languages. Romans initially organized the Peninsula in two provinces (later in three): Hispania Citerior ("Nearer Hispania", "Hispania that is Closer", from the perspective of the Romans), was a region of Hispania during the Roman Republic, roughly occupying the northeastern coast and the Iberus (Ebro) Valley and later the eastern, central, northern and northwestern areas of the Iberian peninsula in what would become the Tarraconensis Roman province (of what is now Spain and northern Portugal). Hispania Ulterior ("Further Hispania", "Hispania that is Beyond", from the perspective of the Romans) was a region of Hispania during the Roman Republic, roughly located in what would become the provinces of Baetica (that included the Baetis, Guadalquivir, valley of modern Spain) and extending to all of Lusitania (modern south and central Portugal, Extremadura and a small part of Salamanca province). The Roman province of Hispania included both Celtic speaking and non-Celtic speaking tribes. Some closely fit the concept of a tribe. Others are confederations or even unions of tribes.
Western Hispano-Celts were Celtic peoples and tribes that inhabited most of north and western Iberian Peninsula regions. They are often confused or taken as synonym of Celtiberians but, in fact, they were a distinct Celtic population that was most part of Iberian Peninsula Celtic populations. They spoke Gallaecian (a Continental Celtic language of the Q Celtic type, a more conservative Celtic language) which was not Celtiberian ( Celtic languages of Iberian Peninsula are often lumped as Hispano-Celtic).
Eastern Iberian meseta (Spain), mountains of the headwaters of the rivers Douro, Tagus, Guadiana (Anas), Júcar, Jalón, Jiloca and Turia, (tribal confederation). Mixed Celtic and Iberian tribes or Celtic tribes influenced by Iberians. Not synonymous of all the Celts that lived in the Iberian Peninsula but to a narrower group (the majority of Celtic tribes in the Iberian Peninsula) were not Celtiberians. They spoke Celtiberian (a Continental Celtic language of the Q Celtic type, a more conservative Celtic language).
Insular Celts were the Celtic peoples and tribes that inhabited the British Islands, Britannia ( Great Britain), the main largest island to the east, and Hibernia ( Ireland), the main smaller island to the west. There were three or four distinct Celtic populations in these islands, in Britannia inhabited the Britons, the Caledonians or Picts, the Belgae (not surely known if they were a Celtic people or a distinct but closely related one); in Hibernia inhabited the Hibernians or Goidels or Gaels. Britons and Caledonians or Picts spoke the P-Celtic type languages, a more innovative Celtic language (*kʷ > p) while Hibernians or Goidels or Gaels spoke Q-Celtic type languages, a more conservative Celtic language. Classical Antiquity authors did not call the British islands peoples and tribes as Celts or Galli but by the name Britons (in Britannia). They only used the name Celts or Gauls for the peoples and tribes of mainland Europe. [1]
They spoke Brittonic (an Insular Celtic language of the P Celtic type). They lived in Britannia, it was the name Romans gave, based on the name of the people: the Britanni. Some closely fit the concept of a tribe but others are confederations or even unions of tribes.
They were a different people from the Britons [ citation needed], but may have shared common ancestry. They lived as a tribal confederation in Caledonia (today's Northern Scotland); the Caledonian Forest ( Caledonia Silva) was in their land.
They spoke Goidelic (an Insular Celtic language of the Q Celtic type. According to Ptolemy's Geography (2nd century AD) (in brackets the names are in Greek as on the map):
Para-Celtic has the meaning that these peoples had common ancestors with the Celts but were not Celts themselves (although they were later Celticized and belong to a Celtic culture sphere of influence), they were not direct descendants from the Proto-Celts. They may in fact have been Proto-Celto-Italic, predating the Celtic or Italic languages and originated earlier from either Proto-Celtic or Proto-Italic populations who spread from Central Europe into Western Europe after new Yamnaya migrations into the Danube Valley. [36] Alternatively, a European branch of Indo-European dialects, termed "North-west Indo-European" and associated with the Beaker culture, may have been ancestral to not only Celtic and Italic, but also to Germanic and Balto-Slavic. [36]
A people or a group of related tribes that dwelt in Belgica, parts of Britannia, and may have dwelt in parts of Hibernia and also parts of Hispania (large tribal confederation). According to classical authors works, like Caesar's De Bello Gallico, [25] they were a different people and spoke a different language (Ancient Belgic) from the Gauls and Britons; they were clearly an Indo-European people and may have spoken a Celtic language. There is also the possibility that their language may have been a different language branch of Indo-European from the Nordwestblock culture, which may have been intermediary between Germanic and Celtic, and might have been affiliated to Italic (according to a Maurits Gysseling hypothesis).
Northern Mediterranean Coast straddling South-east French and North-west Italian coasts, including far Northern and Northwestern Tuscany and Corsica. Because of the strong Celtic influences on their language and culture, they were known already in antiquity as Celto-Ligurians (in Greek Κελτολίγυες, Keltolígues). [39] Very little is known about this language, Ligurian (mainly place names and personal names remain) which is generally believed to have been Celtic or Para-Celtic; [40] [41] (i.e. an Indo-European language branch not Celtic but more closely related to Celtic). They spoke ancient Ligurian.
Today's Western Andalusia ( Hispania Baetica), Baetis ( Guadalquivir) river valley and basin, Marianus Mons (Sierra Morena), some consider them Celtic, [43] may have been Pre-Celtic Indo-European people as the Lusitani and Vettones. If their language, called Turdetanian or Tartessian, was not Celtic it may have been Para-Celtic like Ligurian (i.e. an Indo-European language branch not Celtic but more closely related to Celtic). Also may have been a non-Indo-European people related to the Iberians, but not the same people. A tribal confederation but with much more centralized power, may have formed an early form of Kingdom or a Proto-civilisation (see Tartessos)
Transitional people between Celts and Italics? Celticized Italic people? Para-Celtic people?
They lived in Central Alps, eastern parts of present-day Switzerland, the Tyrol in Austria, and the Alpine regions of northern Italy. They spoke the Rhaetian language. There is evidence that the non-Celtic (and Pre-Indo-European) elements (see Tyrsenian languages) had, by the time of Augustus, been assimilated by the influx of Celtic tribes and had adopted Celtic speech. [51] In addition, the abundance of Celtic toponyms and the complete absence of Etruscan place names in the Rhaetian territory leads to the conclusion that, by the time of Roman conquest, the Rhaetians were completely Celticized. [52][ better source needed]
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