Celts or Gauls?

[wraitii]

Personal speculation based on thoughts experiments are no solid ground for history or for cultural debate. Further posts about Dorians will be removed.

[Romulus]

Personal speculation based on thoughts experiments are no solid ground for history or for cultural debate. Further posts about Dorians will be removed.

Do I smell zero tolerance in the air for open discussion?

But what is solid ground based ancient history linger in the unknown fog of war?

Define "solid ground"?

[Romulus]

Well anyway

We have two choices here

1 we can believe myths scholars put in our faces...

Or 2 debate the probabilities.

History is history and no theory or speculative tautologies from scholarly jargon gibberish can neither manipulate or change it.

Sad for some ... True for all

Edited January 2, 2014 by Romulous

[Lion.Kanzen]

Well anyway

We have two choices here

1 we can believe myths scholars put in our faces...

Or 2 debate the probabilities.

History is history and no theory or speculative tautologies from scholarly jargon gibberish can neither manipulate or change it.

Sad for some ... True for all

Why you be some ...conflictive? Fight with team is no best idea. Is like cavalry try to shock with a Sarissa.

[Romulus]

Why you be some ...conflictive? Fight with team is no best idea. Is like cavalry try to shock with a Sarissa.

I'm not fighting with the team

I may have somewhat been a little overly controversial... Okay.... Well not conflicting.

But I like everyone else have a firm, contentment with the preservation of historical facts and shouldn't be conflated with hype. No one has said that in this post by like the moderators, I see where a conversation like this going.

To be more specific, I will not try and disprove any historical facts because I don't have an agenda nor a need to. But there will always be debates on the topics without substantial evidence and literature to base claims on where there is no solid ground to be content with. Its unknown, open for debate and if such debates are prohibited on this forum then perfectly understandable quite rightly so.

But I did in the beginning say it was just a theory, I didn't stamp these claims like a pontiff with the gospel word of Jesus because that would be unsettling to most folk and not proper etiquette.

So constructive debating rather than an invitation for a heated discussion is the crux of this thread and therefore that was the intention.

[Lion.Kanzen]

But in internet sounds some rude .

[wraitii]

I understand that what you've stated is just a theory, your theory in particular. I've read that statement. I agree with that statement.

I however do not believe this forum is the place for open debate on controversial cultural matters. These kind of topics are hard to deal with in real life between cool headed people, and are downright challenging to handle on the internet.

So, to quote your own words, "such debates are prohibited on this forum". It is in my view better for every party involved.

[Romulus]

No problem

I believe I started the Dorian subject, but I guess it's kind off topic anyway

[greycat]

The La Tene core is located roughly where the Germanic culture crosses with the Celtic cultures. The Treveri who claim Germanic origins (according to Tacitus) and are located in the center La Tene core circle that extends across the Rhine.

The core territory of the La Tène culture (450 BC) is shown in solid green, the eventual area of La Tène influence by 50 BC in light green.

Edited January 4, 2014 by greycat

[greycat]

The Scordisci seem to be important to La Tène culture also c. 450 BC. (The ethnic affiliation of the Scordisci has been debated by historians. Some refer to them as Celtic,Thracian or Illyrian or a Celtic mix of the above.)

[greycat]

Possible early migration path of Boii triibe = dotted line.

So it is a possibility the Boii may have come from same loaction as the Celtic Parisii (Paris is name after them) or Germanic (acording to Tacitus)Trevari.

(source of pictures:wikipedia)

Edited January 4, 2014 by greycat

[greycat]

That's all fine and dandy what Strabo and Caesar and the ancients said. But what does modern scholarship say?

It seems modern archoligists tend to stay away from exactly equating Celtic culture with La Tène culture because the evidence found does not always coorelate with what ancient writers have concluded.

[Rodmar]

Thanks to Megamania, the link for the Battle of Halzhorn leads to another fictional documentary in German :

About last Werkingetorix's battles you can hear some modern archaeologists.

[greycat]

A modern scholars interpretation.

"Contemporaries saw the great incursion into the west by Cimbri and Teutones at the end of the second century bc as a ‘Celtic’, not a Germanic, phenomenon. Rome’s dealings with ‘the Germani’ start, as with so many things, with Julius Caesar. He is usually credited with the very invention of the term: having come across the word Germani in a way which remains unknown to us, he used it to identify a distinct, non-Celtic, population, made up of various tribes (gentes) living for the most part east of the Rhine."

The Alamanni and Rome 213–496 (Caracalla to Clovis)
JOHN F. DRINKWATER

Edited March 21, 2014 by greycat

[Genava55]

In my opinion there is no trouble to distinguish between Insular Celts (Britons) and Continental/Mainland Celts (Gauls) while keeping them in the same group/faction. It is true that Celtic culture doesn't mean La Tène culture, but Celtic cultures are very diversified on a large timescale. The peoples from the Atlantic Bronze Age and from the Urnfield culture are actually proposed as the first Celts to explain the differences between the Iron Age Celts (There is a book about this: "Celtic from the West"). Then all the following cultures (Castro, Hallstatt, Golasecca, La Tène etc.) are Celtic from this point of view. The actual purpose of the game is to represent the Celts known by the classical texts. Since the Celtiberians are among the Iberian faction and the less-known cultures (Castro, Golasecca, Liguro-Venetic, Przeworsk etc.) are not considerate as potential factions,  there are only remaining the La Tène culture and the Britonnic iron age culture. The Britonnic iron age started around 700-600 BC, and before this period the Atlantic Bronze Age was still the main culture in Britain.

And there is a lot of connections between the Insular Celts and the Continental Celts. Since the fifth century, according to Barry Cunliffe:

Quote

During the latter part of the fifth century Continental influences become apparent in three disparate regions: in Cornwall the earliest decorated pottery so far discovered, though produced in local fabrics, was similar to contemporary Breton styles; La Tène pottery forms turned up in the region of the Thames, and adjacent areas to the north; while in Yorkshire the appearance of a distinctive style of burial rite involving the use of the mortuary cart reflects contemporary rites in northern France. Clearly the interchange of ideas between the coastal regions of Britain and the adjacent Continent was widespread if only for a brief period in the decades before 400 BC. The evidence of imported metalwork tells the same story (p. 424). The nature of these contacts is difficult to assess. The introduction of a mortuary rite, together with the associated range of Continental-inspired artefacts, strongly suggests the immigration of a small population including an elite, but the ceramic innovations in the Thames region and Cornwall need imply little more than active systems of cross-Channel exchange.

Quote

It is widely believed that the Arras culture arose as the result of a folk movement into eastern Yorkshire late in the fifth or early in the fourth century. Thereafter local development modified the culture, but as late as the first century BC its alien origins were still apparent. A careful consideration of the niceties of burial rite and the typology of the earliest group of artefacts has led Stead (1965) to propose a complex origin for the invaders, coming from the Burgundian area (where dismantled carts and the absence of weapons and pottery are similar to the British burials) via the Seine. In the Nanterre-Paris region part of the band remained to give rise to the Parisii while those destined for Britain moved on, to found another community in Yorkshire, known to Ptolemy as the Parisi: the coincidence is noteworthy. The cultural affinities of the Pexton Moor burial, with its rectangular enclosure ditches and wheel pits, may however indicate that some part of the immigrant force had connections with the La Tène group in the Champagne. The alternative view, that the Arras phenomenon was a local development, the aristocracy adopting ‘foreign’ burial rites as a means of expressing status, has been persuasively argued by Higham (1987).

There is Early La Tène items in Wales too:

Quote

In the period lasting from the fifth to the first century BC, the south Welsh coastal plain west of the Usk and the hills of Carmarthenshire and Pembrokeshire were densely settled. In Glamorganshire the settlement on Merthyr Mawr Warren, with its two La Tène I brooches, offers an insight into an occupation site of the third or second century where, in addition to the normal domestic rubbish, debris from bronze-and iron-working was recovered.

The origin of the war chariots is speculated from the La Tène influence by Barry Cunliffe:

Quote

At what stage war chariots were introduced into Britain is unclear. Horse-riding and vehicles are well attested in the Hallstatt period (pp. 411–15) but there is no evidence to suggest that chariots were in use this early. It is more likely that the light two-wheeled vehicle was introduced during the La Tène I period in the late fifth or early fourth century. Thereafter, as we have seen, it remained in use into the first century AD in Scotland. In Ireland it survived for several centuries more.

About the artistic influence:

Quote

Much has been written on the problem of British La Tène art and its relationship to Continental styles. De Navarro, basing his work on the scheme created by Paul Jacobstahl, divided the British finds into four styles which he numbered I–IV. This terminology has been revised by Stead (1985b) who has extended it by adding a Style V. Stead’s scheme provides a simple classification which helps to place individual pieces in a broad chronological context. Style I is characterized by motifs of recognizable Greek ancestry incorporating palmettes flanked by lotus flowers. Few objects decorated in this style are known in Britain. The scabbard from Minster Ditch, near Oxford, with its somewhat halting attempts at a flowing pattern (Figure 17.22), is close to the early Continental style though evidently of local manufacture, but by far the most impressive of the early British pieces is the scabbard of a dagger found in the Wisbech area, Cambs. (Figure 17.23). It is decorated in the rocked tracer technique with a palmette flanked by lotus petals or lyres. The same motifs, though in more elaborate combinations, decorate the flange of a bronze lid from a cist grave at Cerrig y Drudion, Clwyd (Stead 1982). This last item is particularly interesting in that it may be an import; such pieces would have inspired native craftsmen, like those who made the Minster Ditch and Wisbech scabbards, in their experiments which created the first insular La Tene art style in Britain.

Aside the first contact in Early La Tène, there is very Late La Tène connection in south-eastern Britain. There is evolution in the coinage and in the pottery. There is indication of a military tense situation:

Quote

The period from c. 120–60 BC was one of rapid change for the tribes of the south-eastern part of Britain. Undreamed of trading possibilities were opening up with distant Mediterranean systems, migrating bands were arriving, and the proximity of Caesar in Gaul was creating a turmoil of diplomatic activity and mercenary movements. These various stimuli were spread unevenly in time and space but their cumulative effect was to cause such disruption that the socio-economic systems established in the third and second centuries BC became destabilized and collapsed. Signs of this dislocation can be most clearly seen in the last stages of hillfort development. At Danebury, Hants., in the heart of Wessex the east entrance was massively defended some time towards 100 BC. Previously a simple timber gate had existed in the univallate defence. This was now replaced with a more massive construction set further back in the entrance gap, while in front two curved inner hornworks were built, creating a flint-walled approaching corridor 46 m long and 6 m wide along which any attacker would have had to run the gauntlet while defenders on the north inner hornwork could have rained down volleys of slingstones (Figure 6.7). The inner hornworks were further defended by two claw-like outer hornworks fronted by V-shaped ditches, which returned to join the main ditches of the fort. In the centre of these outer works was a dual-portal outer gate. The entire complex was brilliantly designed so that every part was clearly visible from the sling platform on the end of the north inner hornwork and all lay within the slingers’ range of 60 m. There can be little doubt that the concept was purely military. Some indication of the date is given by the discovery of a goldplated Gallo-Belgic C coin from the top of the primary silt of the outer hornwork ditch. The coin was in a fresh condition and is hardly likely to have been dropped much after 70 BC. Judging by the degree of silting beneath it, a construction date of c. 100 BC would seem reasonable

About the sword here is the view of Barry Cunliffe:

Quote

The principal weapons were swords and daggers, spears and slings. In Britain swords have a long ancestry: fine examples were being manufactured in bronze in many parts of Britain, particularly the south-east, throughout the Late Bronze Age and as we have seen above (pp. 407–11) the introduction of the Hallstatt C Gündlingen type in the seventh century was widely accepted by British swordsmiths who soon responded by developing variants of their own. How long these Hallstatt long swords continued in use it is impossible to say on the evidence from Britain alone. There is no reason to suppose that they were short-lived, but on the Continent, in late Hallstatt and early La Tène times (c. 600–450 BC), daggers and short swords were more frequently found accompanying warrior burials. Short swords are rare in Britain but daggers seem to have become popular among the aristocracy as the remarkable collection of high quality weapons recovered from various parts of the Thames amply demonstrates (pp. 470–3). It is possible, therefore, that fashions in Britain followed those of the Continent. By the end of the fifth or beginning of the fourth century, long swords, now of iron, became common again and from this time forward the sword was once more the principal weapon. The early swords of La Tène I type were comparatively short, measuring between 50 and 65 cm long but by La Tène III times the norm was from 70–90 cm. There was also a change in shape. The earlier varieties had tapering blades with long sharp points designed for both thrusting and slashing, while the later swords, with their longer parallel sided blades, were better adapted for slashing. Clearly a change in fighting methods is indicated. One possibility is that the La Tène III slashing sword was designed for fighting from horseback. The mounted warrior is depicted on several British coins and Gaulish cavalry were a great nuisance to Caesar during his campaigns in France in the mid-first century BC. In Britain most of the known swords have been recovered from rivers where they were ritually deposited, but a few warrior burials have been discovered (pp. 508–9). These provide some indication of the normal equipment of the warrior. At Grimthorpe, Yorks., and Owslebury, Hants., each dead man was accompanied by his sword, spear and shield; at North Grimston, Yorks., the burial contained two swords and a shield; at Whitcombe, Dorset, and five graves from Burton Flemming (North Humberside) a sword and a spear, but no shield, were interred; another of the Burton Flemming graves, however, was accompanied by a sword and seven spears (Stead 1985b, 44). Of the two male burials with vehicles from Wetwang Slack, Yorks., one was equipped with a sword, seven spears and a shield, the other with a sword and possibly a shield. The sample is too small to allow patterns of grave sets to be recognized but the norm of sword, shield and one or more spears is clear enough. Spears, javelins and lances feature prominently in the archaeological record and are illustrated on some British  coins. Caesar also makes specific reference to them in his conquest of Britain (BG IV, 24). The spear thrown in volleys at the beginning of an engagement was an effective weapon for it could not only maim and kill but, by piercing the shields of the defenders and remaining lodged there, it could greatly encumber the opponent and might cause him to throw away his shield. Thus the prime function of the spear was for use as an artillery weapon in the opening stages of an engagement. The lance, used for thrusting, was essentially a cavalry weapon and as such is sometimes depicted on coins.

 

Edited June 17, 2018 by Genava55

[av93]

Then @Genava55 what units could be added to the gauls ans britons rosters? Swordman infantry and spear cavalry?

The first wasn.t added because it was argued that the sword was only for the noblemen (so they only have sword the infantry champs and cavalry units).

And what about changing the two handed sword champion for the britons? Any idea?

Edited June 19, 2018 by av93

[Genava55]

On 6/19/2018 at 11:22 PM, av93 said:

Then @Genava55 what units could be added to the gauls ans britons rosters? Swordman infantry and spear cavalry? 

The first wasn.t added because it was argued that the sword was only for the noblemen (so they only have sword the infantry champs and cavalry units).

And what about changing the two handed sword champion for the britons? Any idea?

For the Gauls, swordsmen wasn't that rare. In the warriors burials of the Parisii, it was in 96% of the La Tène B2 tombs and 94% of the La Tène C1 tombs. In Hungary, it represented 55% of the tombs and 62% of the tombs respectively for LT B2 and C1 tombs. During La Tène D2, it represented 45% of the warrior burials of the Treveri.

In a general analysis of several long-term sanctuaries, the votive offers are in majority composed of swords. Especially during La Tène C2.

For the Gauls, I can suggest some regional unit like the Nervii swordsmen, the Treveri cavalrymen, the Suebi anti-cavalry warriors (germanic), the Volcae raiders etc. etc. But there is also stronger spearmen as a possibility for the common roster.

 

For the Britons two-handed swordsman, I suggest to go for something more common, like a champion. Or for regional units from irish anx caledonian worlds with swords and clubs maybe.

Edit some examples:

https://mobile.twitter.com/EBTeam/status/646606115178942465

https://mobile.twitter.com/ebteam/status/646032847879438336

https://mobile.twitter.com/EBTeam/status/646306476684914689

Edited June 26, 2018 by Genava55