The Celts had no tradition of written records and therefore cannot identify themselves to us directly. They are known either archaeologically or through the writing of literate Mediterranean societies. The Celts or Keltoi (in the Greek) were first defined as such by the Greeks before 500 BC. The very earliest reference is in an account of coastal travel from Spain and southern France which is quoted by one Rufus Avienus, proconsul of Africa, in a coastal survey (Ora Maritima). Around 500 BC Celts are again mentioned by Hecataeus of Miletus. Some sixty years later, Herodotus in his Histories talked of the source of the Danube being in the territory of the Celts and stated also that these people were almost the most westerly of all Europeans.
The origin of the peoples called ‘Celts’ by classical writers has long been the subject of speculation and controversy. But it seems irrefutable that somehow, this group of peoples, whose language and material culture contained sufficient unity to be identifiable to their neighbours, had their roots in the later Bronze Age cultures of Europe. However, the Celts – whether in Britain or mainland Europe – did not suddenly appear from a specific place as the result of a single event but, rather, were people who had become ‘Celtic’ by accretion in process of time. No one culture or time should be sought as the immediate source of Celtic beginnings. Indeed it could be argued that it is futile to enquire when the Celts first appeared since the people recognised as such by Graeco-Roman authors were in fact the lineal descendants of generations stretching back as far as the Neolithic farmers of the fifth–fourth millennium BC. The process of ‘celticisation’ should thus be seen as a gradual phenomenon. The classical world, as evidenced by its writers, used the term ‘Celts’ to refer to the ‘barbarian’ peoples who occupied much of North-West and Central Europe. It should be realised that this term, perhaps carelessly applied (and at times misapplied) was employed to describe a multitude of tribes of differing ethnic traditions and varying customs. Nevertheless, as long as this is understood, it is a useful generalisation. Archaeological research has demonstrated that by the fifth century BC large tracts of Europe – from Britain to the Black Sea, and from North Italy and Yugoslavia to Belgium – shared a number of elements. By the fourth century BC the Celts were regarded by their Mediterranean neighbours as one of the four great peripheral nations of the known world. Rapid expansion took Celtic tribes into Italy around 400 BC and in 387 Rome itself was defeated. In 279 BC a group of Celts entered Greece and plundered the sacred site of Delphi; in 278 a splinter group established themselves in Asia Minor (Galatia). Whilst it is impossible to speak of a nation of Celts, processes of trade and exchange, folk-movement and convergent evolution, caused the peoples inhabiting barbarian, non-Mediterranean Europe to develop a degree of cultural homogeneity. It was this which was acknowledged by Graeco-Roman authors and which caused them to use ‘Celts’ as a unifying term. If one speaks entirely archaeologically, it is thus possible to state that Iron Age Celts originated in Central and West Central Europe.
In order to place the Celts in their prehistoric context, it is necessary to look briefly backwards beyond the recognisable emergence of the Celtic world. The later Bronze Age ‘Urnfield’ culture, commencing circa 1300 BC was roughly coincident with the decline of Mycenaean power. In Central Europe new burial rites may be observed at this time, consisting of large-scale cremation-burial in flat cemeteries (giving rise to the term ‘Urnfield’). Their very widespread occurrence around the close of the second millennium BC provides a phenomenon sufficiently coherent for some scholars to equate Urnfield peoples with proto-Celts. This European later Bronze Age is of interest in the present context for two main reasons. One is that the spread of cremation-rites suggests changes in belief about death and the afterlife. Secondly the culture is characterised in material/technological terms by the new ability of bronzesmiths to manipulate bronze into sheets to make such large items as vessels and shields. The vessels were frequently decorated with figural and abstract designs and, along with other paraphernalia, appear to reflect a more mature religious symbolism and more unified methods of religious expression. This prolific sheet-bronze production suggests also both a relatively settled time of prosperous trading and sophisticated organisation of trade-routes. The use of sheet metal vessels (sometimes mounted on wagons) in religious ritual is interesting for, by about 1200–1100 BC, we know that wetter conditions prevailed and it is suggested that this climatic change may be reflected in the water-cults possibly represented by such containers.
The reasons for the rise of the Urnfield people may be sought in the economic turmoil and folk movement, emanating partly from the east, from the region of the Black Sea: such concretions of power as the Hittite and Mycenaean Empires crumbled, giving rise to a consequent diminution of external demand on local European mineral resources. In parallel, skills were being developed by Central and East European metalsmiths. In the eighth century BC the Dorian invasions of Greece ushered in, for the first time in Central Europe, the use of horses for riding rather than merely for traction: this may mark the beginning of pastoral nomadism in Europe. The horse was certainly a symbol of an aristocratic warrior-elite, which was the main feature of later Celtic society. Riding brought with it the rich metal paraphernalia which would naturally accompany such a practice, The new wealth of Central Europe during the early first millennium BC was based partly on metal and partly on salt-mining. Piggott would see the development of Central European sheet metalworking as having association with an early wine-trade with the Mediterranean world. Certainly by the eighth century there was an expansion of peoples from their original Urnfield homelands to what would become the Celtic world incorporating, for example, Italy, the Balkans, France and Iberia.
By about 700 BC new cultural elements may be observed. New metal types associated with horse-harness are present, the distribution of which suggests raiding parties moving rapidly from one region to another. The new material culture is called ‘Hallstatt’ after the type-site in the Salzkammergut of the Hallein/Salzburg area of Austria. Ironworking on a large scale comes in for the first time in this period. The metal was known and utilised as an exotic material before this date but by the end of the eighth century BC iron was commonplace in continental Europe and, somewhat later – by about 600 BC – in Britain and Ireland. The Hallstatt culture is characterised in Central Europe by rich inhumation burial, in wooden mortuary houses under earthen barrows or mounds, with four-wheeled wagons or carts, sometimes partly dismantled. The grave evidence suggests a warrior-elite with members of the ruling class (men and women) elaborately buried. The frequent presence of not two but three sets of horse-trappings in such graves suggests the possible representation not only of the wagon-team but also of the chieftain’s own charger. From the seventh century the main item traded from the Mediterranean to the Celtic world seems to have been wine – reflected archaeologically by wine-vessel imports. The main trade the other way would certainly have included salt.
In about 500 BC the centres of power appear to have shifted north and west to the Rhineland and Marne. There is still evidence for the presence of the warrior-aristocracy, but now the burial-rite of the elite generally consisted of two-wheeled vehicle-burial, reflecting the use of a light chariot or cart. Warrior-accoutrements abound in the archaeological record, as do luxury objects often decorated for the first time with specifically Celtic art-designs. The La Tène, as this first truly Celtic culture is called (after the type-site of La Tène in Switzerland), is characterised also by the presence for the first time of what may be termed proto-towns – large sprawling fortified settlements, permanently settled hillforts or oppida, like Danebury in Britain, Alesia in France, Manching in Bavaria or the Dürrnberg in Austria. These oppida were scattered across the whole of the Celtic world from Iberia to Galatia.
We have reached the point where classical sources and archaeology converge on the Celtic peoples of the later first millennium BC and may now look in more detail at the kind of society represented by this evidence, a society basically heroic, strictly hierarchical, based on kingship and with a martial aristocracy. The evidence of archaeology, classical written sources and some of the early Irish material gives us a fairly detailed picture of swaggering heroes continually fighting and proving their ferocity and valour to their peers; squabbling over who should have the champion’s portion of pork (traditionally this went to the best warrior, along with the right to carve the chief carcase of the feast). Feasting is evidenced archaeologically in Britain: at Danebury, cauldron-hooks and spits are recorded together with remains of joints in midden deposits. The accoutrements of such warriors were spears, a long iron sword and body-covering shield and, above all, a war-chariot. Cattle-rearing (and raiding) would have been the main occupation in Ireland at least, with cattle the staple form of wealth, along with metal treasure; the unit of value was the cow. Irish sources tell us of kings and subkings, nobles and lesser nobles, freemen (landowners, priests, artists/craftsmen) and serfs. The basic unit of social structure was the derbfine or extended family, groups of these making up the tuath or tribe. Kings and sub-kings were bound to each other by oaths of allegiance; and clientdom or vasselage was an important form of relationship between higher and lower social classes. Certainly by the last few centuries BC the Celts had established a deeply stratified social structure in which craftsmen and religious specialists had their place. It is suggested that this may have been stimulated partly by long-distance trade and exposure to the wealth of the classical world which could have brought about a shift from inherited to achieved status. This increase in markets may have facilitated the client-patron relationship between the lower echelons of society and the aristocracy. Kinship-links may have weakened and political ties may have become stronger. We have hints, indeed, that the hierarchical nature of barbarian society had its roots further back in prehistory. We have already seen a warrior-elite at the very end of the Bronze Age, and Burgess would see the deepening of social stratification as early as the later second millennium BC. The client-patron relationship is especially important within the context of Celtic art. This is the main medium through which we are able to study Celtic religious expression certainly in the La Tène and Romano-Celtic periods. In the first place, in a heroic society, the aristocracy would stimulate wealth in the form of metalwork, and give it away as part of the important host-guest relationship between people of equal rank. For the most part, Iron Age Celtic art, and predominantly metalwork, was an aristocratic phenomenon and this obviously distorts any picture gained from it concerning expressions of religious belief. Craftsmen themselves would frequently have been peripatetic, serving a number of patrons at one time and this, together with the hoarding of items for gift-exchange, means that art-transmission from area to area was fluid. It is necessary, within this context, to realise that whilst peasants may have reflected continuity over a long period, aristocratic art-ideas and traditions may quickly and easily have been transmitted over long distances within Europe. One further thing should be said at this stage: there are two main schools of thought concerning the nature of Celtic art. The first view, represented by Megaw is that Celtic art is basically religious. The second, argued by Powell is that it was essentially decorative and that whatever symbolic implications there may be, embellishment is the prime concern. We shall examine the function of Celtic art later, in Chapter One.
A final point needs to be made concerning the nature of our evidence for the religion and gods of the Celtic peoples. By the last two centuries BC, if not somewhat before, Celtic society was localised and fragmented. This is demonstrated by the lack of any unifying style among later Celtic art, including coin-design. Interestingly for us, it is the very divergent nature of god-representation which in the Romano-Celtic period is such an essential feature of Celtic religion.