Chapter 1: The People Who Came Out Of The Darkness
Flashback to the beginning of the Punic Wars; Romans negotiating with Hasdrubal (nephew/brother of Hannibal who came later); Romans fearful of Carthaginians allying with Celts in France (the Gauls) and the Celts in northern Italy
Chapter 2: A Roman Nightmare
The role of the Celts in the Punic Wars; Hasdrubal and Hannibal; probably lost because Celts finally defeated;
Chapter 3: The Heirs of Alexander and the Celts
Begins with Alexander, 335 BC, "marching" to Bulgaria; through Herodotus knew that the Danube rose in the land of the Celts; therefore he met with one of their leaders (name unknown); Alexander's father had been slain by a Celt; Ptolemy, a young friend of Alexander's recorded part of the conversation between Alexander and the Celt; Aristotle was Alexander's tutor; Aristotle wrote of this later, 30 years later when Alexander was king of Egypt;
Sixty (60) years later, 280 BC, Alexander's kingdom falling apart; Celts move into Greece;
280 BC: the Macedonians/Greeks/Hellenes defeat the first wave of Celts, but then, one year later,
279 BC: three Gallic tribes appear on the western shores of the Dardanelles -- unknown where they came from; names varied -- Tolistoagii, Trocmians, and the Tectosages. The Macedonians again defeated the Celts (on the Gallipoli peninsula); the survivors cross to Troy
Nicomedes, an aristocratic knight-errant from Bithynia on the Bosphorus troubled by the Celts; gave them territory in that part of Anatolia east of his frontiers, the region around modern Ankara --> the Celts accepted the deal --> established Galatia, land of the Galatians, i.e. Celts.
Later, a second Celtic state, Edirne (Adrianople), established; in Turkey on border with Bulgaria; capital of Turkey before Byzantium;
And later, a third Gallic tribe, the Scordisci, west of the Macedonian border, Singidunum, now Belgrade
Now we know more of the story:
The Celts lived not only in Germany, France, Switzerland and northern Italy, but also in Hungary and Romania. Thus, apparently a "single" migration from west of the Danube brought the Celts into Turkey, much as a migration of Celts had gone into Italy a hundred years earlier.
The origin of "Dru" -- page 42, as in "Drunemeton" -- Pliny's "final" suggestion -- "dru" -- Greek name for an oak. Celtic and Greek were Indo-European languages with a common root.
At this time, the city of Pergamon (in general area of Troy) involved in holding off the Celts (p. 45); statues of Gauls at Pergamon fascinated historians, artists, including Lord Byron; Gallatia eventually held off by Pergamon; Romans conquer this area eventually (88 BC); Galatia was given to Rome as a semi-autonomous province (Paul in the 50 BC period).
A quarter of Istanbul: known as "Galata"
[Random note: the berserk style of fighting certain suggests the Celts had their origins in the Vikings.]
Chapter 4: Four Greeks Discover Gaul
Begins with Polybius, to write the history of the Republic, at which he had a "ringside" seat; born in Maglopolis, 200 BC, sixty miles south of Corinth.
Then, Posidonius, age 22, in 113 BC. Set out to sort out "who" the three tribes (Cimbri, Teutones, Ambrones) were. Posidonius wanted to sort out whether these three tribes were Celts, which would fit the traditional theme: a Scythian northeast, a Gallic northwest.
Simplistically, it appeared they were Celts. "But Posidonius's faithful interpreter Strabo describes them, like the Cimbri, as Germans, using a term probably unknown in Greek scholarship before the Massilia journey, for Strabo himself explains it. The Germans, he said, were a people living east of the Rhine. They differed from the Celts of the left bank, being 'even taller, more savage and blond.' Otherwise there was close resemblance in all respects: 'Thus I imagine that the Romans who lived in Gaul called them "Germani" because they wanted to indicate that they were the "authentic," the real Celts. Germani means in their language "genuine" in the sense of original.'
"Thus the Teutones and Cimbri were Germans; these in turn were not just one of the great Celtic family of peoples, as opposed to the Scythian one, but the very heart of the family. They were the most Celtic of the Celts. This is a surprising enough line to take, and there has since been considerable dispute about it.....Were Ligurians Ambrones, Ambrones Germans, and the Germans Celts?"
More to follow in the following chapters on newer research.
Chapter 5: It Began On The Volga
Going back to pre-history to try to determine origin of the Celts. Philology comes into play (p. 91).
1500 BC: "Old-European language" -- the whole region between the Baltic and the Alps, the British Isles and Hungary, a single idiom predominated;
1000 BC: began to disintegrate into individual languages such as Italic (the early form of Latin), Germanic, Slavic, Baltic, and of course Celtic;
The speakers of "Old-European": the same warriors who tamed the horse and up a new hierarchical social system on this basis; they probably brought the horse from where it originated, the steppe;
Then, the history of "Indo-European" discussed. Awesome description!
It is interesting that somewhere I read (I forget where) that no one knows the origin of "Pecos River" in the US. Herm talks about pekos on page 73. The early Indo-Europeans differentiated between the horse (ekuos) and horned animals (peku). Horned animals also meant hides, and shearing.
The chapter provides basis for argument that the Celts originated on the Volga. 3000 - 1500 BC time period.
Chapter 6: When Atlantis Sank
"In the second half of the fifteenth century BC the whole world experienced a series of disasters such as has never since been recorded." Worldwide drought.
The drought was only a prelude to a worldwide tragedy.....earthquakes of unprecedented violence....
A second climax followed: about 1470 BC, a sub-marine volcano erupted on Thera, an island of the Cyclades...seismic tidal waves, earthquakes, volcanic eruptions; the sea receded sucking the rivers dry ... a deathly silence... and then, a roaring wall of water flooded "everywhere."
[I think the book on Helen of Troy had a great chapter on Thera and the volcano; in fact, that's when the story of Helen really began, if I recall correctly.]
The chapter: about Atlantis; about carbon dating;
Chapter 7: The Birth of Celtic Europe
The salt mines and the Hallstatt culture.
That the Celts were involved in the Hallstaat culture is beyond dispute; but influence from outside, from the other side of the Alps. On the Caspian Sea, possibly as early as 1800 BC, the third of the three great barbarian peoples among whom the Greeks also included the Iberians and the Celts: the Scythians (though the earliest archaeological evidence dates from around 700 BC). Herodotus talks about these Scythians: heads as trophies. So, the Scythians came from the Caspian, taking the "low" road to Europe.
Much that seems Celtic in Europe was taken from the Scythians (Ukraine): head-hunting and mustaches. They also gave the Celts their feel for horses.
Much discussion on the Celts in France.
Then discussion on "the old Alpine cattle." The word "alp' -- the source of the name not only for the mountain range, but also, in Swiss dialect, for the high summer-meadows and dairy farming n Austria and Bavaria as Alm -- is of Celtic origin. It went over into Latin and was later re-adopted. It has from that time been the custom to celebrate the first day of May, when the cattle are driven up to their pastures.
So: rich, salt-trading dairy-farmers of the central Alps -- little involved in the Celtic invasion of northern Italy, they did feel the effects to some extent.
But now, on to more, but more speculation, and little evidence...next chapter...
Chapter 8: Head-Hunters, Artists, and Entrepreneurs
5th century BC -- Bronze Age ends; Iron Age begins; learn to harden hot iron with water, or preferably, blood -- in the process, the latter produces phosphorus
The discussion of La Tene, in Switzerland. Archaeological findings clearly Celtic. La Tene culture begins around 450 BC and ends, at least on the Continent, around 50 BC. Ornaments very, very small; almost microscopic designs.
Oppida (settlements): wherever the Celts settled: Yugoslavia, Austria, Bohemia, southern Germany, and, of course, France: settlement names often ended in briga (hill), dunum (fortress), magus (plain), nemeton (sacred place): Lugdunum (the castle of the god Lug) was Lyons; Loudon and Laon in France, also derived from this name, similarly Leyden in Holland and Liegnitz in Silesia; Namneton (Nantes); Noviomagus (Speyer); Cambodunum (Kempten), and Boiodunum (Passau).
The Celtic invention of the barrel replaced the wine-jug north of the Alps. Elegant two- and four-wheeled chariots; factory-production.
Celts: influenced by the Scythians, which incorporated Asiatic traditions, shamans, on the east; on the Mediterranean, the rationalistic culture of Greece, the worldly intellectuals.
The Druids seem to have been a product of this division.
Chapter 9: The Mastery of Death: Deities and Druids
The chapter begins with a look at a long-forgotten opera, Norma, a tragic love story of a Druid's daughter for an officer of the Roman garrison. Tropes: oaks, the moon, Celtic Sarastros (high priest, Isis, Osiris?), Germanic Irminsul (deity/Saxon) from Westphalia.
Laymen of the 19th century: faddish relationship with all things Druid -- moon-worship; midsummer festivals; the Holy Grail; exorcism of devils; phallic worship.
"... the few facts we know about the Celtic priests have grown into a whole mythology."
Mistletoe plays a disproportionate role in this because a Roman writer associated it with the Druids. (Mistletoe, a parasitic plant of trees.) Crushed mistletoe: a juice with high concentration of cholin, acetylcholin and viscotoxin: the pain of malignant ulcers can be eased with crushed mistletoe leaves.
Coligny, Burgundy, bronze tablet fragment: longest known document in the Gallic language. It was the Celtic calendar which the author describes in detail; based on lunar cycle.
Author suggests that Celts originated in India, and then moved westward.
Parallels between Aryan Indians and Irish Druids.
In both cultures, a class of wise men. For the Aryan Indians, the Brahmins. For the Irish Druids, "men of the oak."
Many similarities in law of Hindu Brahmins and Irish Druids, especially contract law.
It appears Druids were political leaders, like Hindu Brahmins, ranking above generals and warriors.
Caesar noted that in Gaul, only two classes that were important and respected: the Druids and the knights. (It will be interesting to re-read the book on Viking chess.)
Sword borne by the chiefs. The sickle -- often equated with the bishop's crook (again, will be interesting to re-read the book on Viking chess.)
The Gallic Druids -- colleagues of the Irish filids.
Druids spoke both laconically (from Sparta) and to the point.
Because they did not write anything down, we don't know much about their mythology.
The author says that to learn more about their mythology we must understand what their attitude toward death was.
The author discusses the Celts
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