The bronze age and the Celtic world - Universal History Library

THE PROBLEM 17
groups of languages to which they are in other respects akin. Also it is believed by
some that non-Celtic languages, such as Pictish, survived in this region until relatively
late times, while it is well-known that a primitive non-Celtic tongue, the Basque, is
still spoken in the fastnesses of the Pyrenees. It is important, therefore, if we are to have
before us all the factors which enter into the problem, that we should inquire what
people were here before the first Celts arrived, and that we should make ourselves to
some extent famihar with all the different races and cultures which preceded the Celtic
invaders.
If we pass across England and Wales from east to west, and the same is almost as
true if we cross Scotland, we find, first of all that the population is mainly tall and
fair, while as we proceed we come across elements which are darker and shorter, until in
Wales and the West Highlands we find the majority of the people are small brunettes
of slender build. This dark type is also to be met with in Ireland, especially in the
west, the part of that island in which the Erse language has best survived.
It is because the Celtic tongues, whether qu or p, are spoken chiefly by people
of this small brunette type, that it is frequently called the Celtic race, and yet all the
evidence of ancient authorities goes to show that 2,000 or 2,500 years ago the Celts were
looked upon as a tall, fair people.' Here is another difficulty which must be taken into
consideration as we make our inquiries, for no solution can be considered sound which
cannot, without straining the evidence, answer all these questions.
As we have seen the main areas which were Celtic-speaking in the time of Caesar
were the British Isles and Gaul, west of the Rhine ; these I shall term Celtic lands,
leaving out Spain and Cis-alpine Gaul as areas into which the Celtic invasion arrived at
a relatively late date. Now, besides these Celtic lands Celtic tongues were spoken in
the Alpine zone, and perhaps at one time stiU further east. It is from this area that the
Celtic languages have been thought by some to have entered the lands of the west.
They cannot have been introduced from Spain or Italy, into which they were late entrants,
but it has been suggested by some writers that they arrived from the north-east, from
the Baltic region. It is true that there is some slight evidence that Celtic place-names
have existed in this area, but the balance of evidence, as I shall hope to show, seems to
I Beddoe (1885) 29 ; Holmes (1907) 434, 437, 440 ; Macalister (1921) 2. 41-49.