The bronze age and the Celtic world - Universal History Library

Chapter XV.
CONCLUSION
WE have now traced in outline the history of Celtic peoples and Celtic lands
from the Wurmian glaciation to the Roman conquest of Britain, and have
cited as evidence the conclusions drawn from linguistic science and an extensive
array of data of an anthropological and archaeological character. Though most
of the main conclusions arrived at have been suggested before, many of them to
be subsequently discarded as lacking sufficient evidence, the main story of the Wiros
and their wanderings, as I have outlined it above, seems to be compatible with all the
positive information we possess, though it is in conflict, as I am well aware, with many
theories that have been built upon them.
My views will not, I feel sure, meet with ready acquiescence from some Celtic
scholars, especially from those who follow Zimmer and Kuno Meyer. This school
has for thirty years been engaged in proving that there is no philological evidence for
the existence of GoideHc speech in England or Wales, except such as was introduced
from Ireland in the third or fourth century, a.d. I do not wish to dispute the philological
evidence, nor do I feel competent to do so. I am ready to admit, at any rate for the
sake of argument, that no such philological evidence exists. But England has been
overrun by Kimri, Romans and Saxons, since the Gaels are believed to have come, and
the absence of such evidence is not surprising.
I would, however, point out that the absence of philological evidence of their presence
is not conclusive evidence of their absence. If my equation of the bronze swords and
the finger-tip pottery with Q speaking people is correct, and the evidence from Italy and
the Seine valley seems incontrovertible, the Gaels not only came to England, but
settled there in considerable numbers, and even inhabited the southern slopes of the
Glamorgan hills. No absence of GoideHc elements in British place-names is proof against
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