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Ancient History |
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THE CELTS IN ANCIENT HISTORY EARLIEST REFERENCES
Even before the Christian era we can find
many different references to a population called by the Greeks Hyperboreans or Celts. They were sometimes in peace, sometimes in
war. About their geographical position there are many different opinions. According to
Herodotus they were dwelling “beyond the pillars of Hercules” and the Danube. Another Greek writer, Aristotle, shared
Herodotus’s opinion about the place where they lived and he thought that they were
righteous and good fighters also because they had conquered Rome. Hellenicus of Lesbos described them as
practicing justice, and also Ephorus believed that they had these customs. Plato considered them a drunken and combative
population. Their attack on Rome is considered one of the landmarks of ancient history. Few elements came to us about their life and
they are above all coins, ornaments and weapons. Some places have Celtic names and this
demonstrates their civilization and domination. A lot of details can be deduced from the
accounts of classical writers and from a few Celtic remains. Celts and Germans Celts and Germans are mentioned by Pytheas,
the eminent Greek traveller and geographer (about 300 B.C) under the name of Cimbri and
Teutones, they descended to Italy to be won by Marius at the close of the second century. Germans were a subject people, who were found in Gaul and in ancient Ireland. They lived under the Celtic domination, and had no independent political existence. A lot of words in modern German and English are similar, because they have the same origin: the Celtic and Teutonic languages. The etymological history of some words is
interesting: “Amt” meaning office in German, goes back to the
ancient “ambhactos”, which is compounded of the words “ambi”, about,
and “actos”, a past participle derived from the Celtic root “ag”,
meaning to act. “ambi” descends from the Indo-European “mbhi” and the
initial “m” is a kind of vowel. This “m” vowel became “n” in
those German words, which are derived from the Indo-European. This word appears as
“ambaht”, that is very similar to “ambhactos” in Celtic. The word “frei” is derived from the earliest Germanic “frijol-s” which comes from the Indo-European “prijol-s”. This word doesn’t mean “free”, but “beloved”. The word “prijol-s” changed in the Celtic language. The Indo-European meaning persists in the German languages (Freund, Friede). The German “Beute”, (plunder and
booty), was a Gaulish word “bodi”,
found in compounds such as the place-name
Segobodium and various personal and tribal names. This word meant “victory”. But the fruits of victory are
“spoil”, and this material sense of
the word is adopted in German, French, Norse
and Welsh. The word preserved its elevated significance in Irish. The Celts didn’t impose their religion
and language on the German tribes. For example the names of the German deities
as well as their funeral customs are different from those of the Celts. They buried their
dead, regarding the use of fire as a humiliation for criminals, slaves or prisoners. The
Germans, on the other hand, burned their illustrious dead on pyres, like the early Greeks
(but the only noblest parts of the body, such as the head and the arms, were burned and
the rest buried). (Anna Chiara Vigo - Silvia Boschiero, 3^B int) |
