Women of the Highlands by Katharine Stewart sampler

women of the highlands
The Celtic people lived in close-knit units known as kins, or
families of several generations. They shared the responsibilities
of family life, the raising of children and so on. Care of the sick
was a bounden duty in what was almost a welfare state.
Fostering was an important common practice. The foster
parents would train the children entrusted to them from an early
age in adult skills. The boy would be returned to his biological
parents at the age of 17, the girl at 14. The bond between fosterparents
and children and particularly between foster-brothers, was
very strong and enduring. The fostering habit persisted until the
19th century. The land was held in common by the kin. This idea
of kin was to continue through the ages and is still evident today, in
the closeness of family ties among the people of the Highlands.
It is to the Roman writers of the early centuries that we owe
our knowledge of the Celtic peoples, those of Gaul and later of
Britain, of themselves and their way of life. Ptolemy wrote down
the names of the tribes in north Britain. Caesar and Tacitus also
refer to the ways of the people, allowing us to piece together a
view of what these might have been.
We even have a picture of their personal lives, their fastidious
insistence on cleanliness, on frequent bathing and on neatness of
apparel. Their skills in working metals enabled the casting of
elaborate brooches, torcs (neck-bands) and armlets worn by both
men and women. Both sexes also wore the same kind of woven
clothing.
In appearance the Celts are described as tall, muscled and
white of skin. They are also said to be loud-mouthed and boastful.
The Romans certainly found them to be a formidable enemy.
Amminiamus Marcellinus, writing during the 4th century, draws
an unforgettable picture of the Gaulish women warriors:
Nearly all the Gauls are of a lofty stature, fair and of
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