Editing Celts (section)

==Origins==
{{main|Pre-Celtic|Celticization}}

The [[Celtic languages]] are a branch of the [[Indo-European languages]]. By the time Celts are first mentioned in written records around 400 BC, they were already split into several language groups, and spread over much of western mainland Europe, the [[Iberian Peninsula]], Ireland and Britain. The languages developed into [[Celtiberian language|Celtiberian]], [[Goidelic languages|Goidelic]] and [[Brittonic languages|Brittonic]] branches, among others.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Celtic language Branch - Origins & Classification - MustGo |url= https://www.mustgo.com/worldlanguages/celtic-branch/ |access-date=25 August 2022 |website=MustGo.com |language=en-US |archive-date=24 October 2022 |archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20221024221253/https://www.mustgo.com/worldlanguages/celtic-branch/ |url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |url= https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/62381207 |title=Celtic culture : a historical encyclopedia |date=2006 |publisher=[[ABC-CLIO]] |first=John T. |last=Koch |isbn=978-1-85109-440-0 |location=Santa Barbara, California |pages=34, 365–366, 529, 973, 1053 |oclc=62381207 |access-date=25 August 2022 |archive-date=7 October 2022 |archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20221007170317/https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/62381207 |url-status=live}}</ref>

===Urnfield-Hallstatt theory===
[[File:Hallstatt LaTene.png|thumb|upright=1.5|Overview of the [[Hallstatt culture|Hallstatt]] and [[La Tène culture|La Tène]] cultures.<small>
{{legend|#f6bc0a|The core Hallstatt territory (HaC, 800 BC) is shown in solid yellow.}}
{{legend|#d5c089|The eventual area of Hallstatt influence (by 500 BC, HaD) in light yellow.}}
{{legend|#80da34|The core territory of the La Tène culture (450 BC) in solid green.}}
{{legend|#9bce9b|The eventual area of La Tène influence (by 250 BC) in light green. }}
The territories of some major [[List of Celtic tribes|Celtic tribes]] of the late La Tène period are labelled.</small>]]

The mainstream view during most of the twentieth century is that the Celts and the [[proto-Celtic language]] arose out of the [[Urnfield culture]] of [[central Europe]] around 1000 BC, spreading westward and southward over the following few hundred years.<ref name="ChadCorc" /><ref>{{cite book |last=Chadwick |first=Nora |title=The Celts |date=1970 |page=30}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Kruta |first=Venceslas |title=The Celts |date=1991 |publisher=[[Thames & Hudson]] |pages=89–102}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Stifter |first=David |title=Old Celtic Languages - Addenda |date=2008 |page=25}}</ref> The Urnfield culture was preeminent in central Europe during the late [[Bronze Age]], [[wikt:circa|circa]] 1200 BC to 700 BC. The [[Iron Age|spread of iron-working]] led to the [[Hallstatt culture]] (c. 800 to 500 BC) developing out of the Urnfield culture in a wide region north of the Alps. The Hallstatt culture developed into the [[La Tène culture]] from about 450 BC, which came to be identified with [[Celtic art]].{{Citation needed|date=April 2022}}

In 1846, [[Johann Georg Ramsauer]] unearthed an ancient [[grave field]] with distinctive grave goods at [[Hallstatt]], Austria. Because the burials "dated to roughly the time when Celts are mentioned near the [[Danube]] by [[Herodotus]], Ramsauer concluded that the graves were Celtic".<ref name="Koch 386">{{cite book |last=Koch |first=John |author-link=John T. Koch |title=Celtic Culture: A Historical Encyclopedia |date=2006 |publisher=[[ABC-CLIO]] |page=386}}</ref> Similar sites and artifacts were found over a wide area, which were named the 'Hallstatt culture'. In 1857, the archaeological site of [[La Tène (archaeological site)|La Tène]] was discovered in Switzerland.<ref name="Koch 386" /> The huge collection of artifacts had a distinctive style. Artifacts of this 'La Tène style' were found elsewhere in Europe, "particularly in places where people called Celts were known to have lived and early Celtic languages are attested. As a result, these items quickly became associated with the Celts, so much so that by the 1870s scholars began to regard finds of the La Tène as 'the archaeological expression of the Celts'".<ref name="Koch 386" /> This cultural network was overrun by the Roman Empire, though traces of La Tène style were still seen in [[Gallo-Roman culture|Gallo-Roman artifacts]]. In Britain and Ireland, the La Tène style survived precariously to re-emerge in [[Insular art]].{{Citation needed|date=April 2022}}

The Urnfield-Hallstatt theory began to be challenged in the latter 20th century, when it was accepted that the oldest known Celtic-language inscriptions were those of [[Lepontic language|Lepontic]] from the 6th century BC and [[Celtiberian language|Celtiberian]] from the 2nd century BC. These were found in northern Italy and Iberia, neither of which were part of the 'Hallstatt' nor 'La Tène' cultures at the time.<ref name="Sims-Williams" /> The Urnfield-Hallstatt theory was partly based on ancient [[Greco-Roman world|Greco-Roman]] writings, such as the ''[[Histories (Herodotus)|Histories]]'' of Herodotus, which placed the Celts at the [[source of the Danube]]. However, [[Stephen Oppenheimer]] shows that Herodotus seemed to believe the Danube rose near the [[Pyrenees]], which would place the Ancient Celts in a region which is more in agreement with later classical writers and historians (i.e. in Gaul and Iberia).<ref>{{cite book |last=Oppenheimer |first=Stephen |title=The Origins of the British |pages=21–56 |date=2007 |publisher=[[Robinson (publisher)|Robinson]]}}</ref> The theory was also partly based on the abundance of inscriptions bearing Celtic personal names in the Eastern Hallstatt region ([[Noricum]]). However, Patrick Sims-Williams notes that these date to the later Roman era, and says they suggest "relatively late settlement by a Celtic-speaking elite".<ref name="Sims-Williams" />

==='Celtic from the West' theory===
[[File:Europe late bronze age.png|thumb|upright=1.5|A map of Europe in the Bronze Age, showing the Atlantic network in red]]
In the late 20th century, the Urnfield-Hallstatt theory began to fall out of favour with some scholars, which was influenced by new archaeological finds. 'Celtic' began to refer primarily to 'speakers of Celtic languages' rather than to a single culture or ethnic group.<ref name="Sims-Williams" /> A new theory suggested that Celtic languages arose earlier, along the Atlantic coast (including Britain, Ireland, [[Armorica]] and [[Iberia]]), long before evidence of 'Celtic' culture is found in archaeology. [[Myles Dillon]] and [[Nora Kershaw Chadwick]] argued that "Celtic settlement of the British Isles" might date to the [[Bell Beaker culture]] of the [[Copper Age|Copper]] and Bronze Age (from c. 2750 BC).<ref>Myles Dillon and Nora Kershaw Chadwick, ''The Celtic Realms'', 1967, 18–19</ref><ref name="cunliffewest">{{cite book |last=Cunliffe |first=Barry |title=Celtic from the West Chapter 1: Celticization from the West – The Contribution of Archaeology |date=2010 |publisher=[[Oxbow Books]] |location=Oxford |isbn=978-1-84217-410-4 |page=14}}</ref> [[Martín Almagro Gorbea]] (2001) also proposed that Celtic arose in the [[3rd millennium BC]], suggesting that the spread of the Bell Beaker culture explained the wide dispersion of the Celts throughout western Europe, as well as the variability of the Celtic peoples.<ref>2001 p 95. La lengua de los Celtas y otros pueblos indoeuropeos de la península ibérica. In Almagro-Gorbea, M., Mariné, M. and Álvarez-Sanchís, J.R. (eds) Celtas y Vettones, pp. 115–21. Ávila: Diputación Provincial de Ávila.</ref>

[[John T. Koch]]<ref name="Koch2009">{{cite journal |last=Koch |first=John T. |title=Tartessian: Celtic from the Southwest at the Dawn of History in Acta Palaeohispanica X Palaeohispanica 9 |journal=Palaeohispánica: Revista sobre lenguas y culturas de la Hispania antigua |date=2009 |pages=339–51 |url= http://ifc.dpz.es/recursos/publicaciones/29/54/26koch.pdf |issn=1578-5386 |access-date=17 May 2010 |url-status=live |archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20100623034727/http://ifc.dpz.es/recursos/publicaciones/29/54/26koch.pdf |archive-date=23 June 2010}}</ref> and [[Barry Cunliffe]]<ref>{{cite book |last=Cunliffe |first=Barry |title=A Race Apart: Insularity and Connectivity in Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society 75 |date=2008 |publisher=[[Prehistoric Society]] |pages=55–64 [61]}}</ref> have developed this 'Celtic from the West' theory. It proposes that the proto-Celtic language arose along the Atlantic coast and was the ''[[lingua franca]]'' of the [[Atlantic Bronze Age]] cultural network, later spreading inland and eastward.<ref name="Sims-Williams" /> More recently, Cunliffe proposes that proto-Celtic had arisen in the Atlantic zone even earlier, by 3000 BC, and spread eastwards with the Bell Beaker culture over the following millennium. His theory is partly based on [[glottochronology]], the spread of ancient Celtic-looking placenames, and thesis that the [[Tartessian language]] was Celtic.<ref name="Sims-Williams" /> However, the proposal that Tartessian was Celtic is widely rejected by linguists, many of whom regard it as unclassified.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Sims-Williams |first=Patrick |date=2 April 2020 |title=An Alternative to 'Celtic from the East' and 'Celtic from the West' |journal=Cambridge Archaeological Journal |volume=30 |issue=3 |pages=511–529 |doi=10.1017/s0959774320000098 |s2cid=216484936 |issn=0959-7743 |doi-access=free |hdl=2160/317fdc72-f7ad-4a66-8335-db8f5d911437 |hdl-access=free}}</ref><ref>{{Citation |last=Hoz |first=J. de |title=Method and methods |date=28 February 2019 |url= http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/oso/9780198790822.003.0001 |work=Palaeohispanic Languages and Epigraphies |pages=1–24 |publisher=[[Oxford University Press]] |doi=10.1093/oso/9780198790822.003.0001 |isbn=978-0-19-879082-2 |access-date=29 May 2021}}</ref>

==='Celtic from the Centre' theory===
Celticist Patrick Sims-Williams (2020) notes that in current scholarship, 'Celt' is primarily a linguistic label. In his 'Celtic from the Centre' theory, he argues that the proto-Celtic language did not originate in central Europe nor the Atlantic, but in-between these two regions. He suggests that it "emerged as a distinct Indo-European dialect around the [[second millennium BC]], probably somewhere in [[Gaul]] [centered in modern France]&nbsp;... whence it spread in various directions and at various speeds in the [[first millennium BC]]". Sims-Williams says this avoids the problematic idea "that Celtic was spoken over a vast area for a very long time yet somehow avoided major dialectal splits", and "it keeps Celtic fairly close to Italy, which suits the view that [[Italo-Celtic|Italic and Celtic were in some way linked]]".<ref name="Sims-Williams" />

===Linguistic evidence===
{{Main|Proto-Celtic language}}
{{Further|Celtic toponymy}}

The [[Proto-Celtic language]] is usually dated to the Late Bronze Age.<ref name="ChadCorc" /> The earliest records of a Celtic language are the [[Lepontic]] inscriptions of [[Cisalpine Gaul]] (Northern Italy), the oldest of which pre-date the [[La Tène period]]. Other early inscriptions, appearing from the early La Tène period in the area of [[Marseille|Massilia]], are in [[Gaulish language|Gaulish]], which was written in the [[Greek alphabet]] until the Roman conquest. [[Celtiberian language|Celtiberian]] inscriptions, using their own Iberian script, appear later, after about 200 BC. Evidence of [[Insular Celtic]] is available only from about 400 AD, in the form of [[Primitive Irish]] [[Ogham inscriptions]].{{Citation needed|date=April 2022}}

Besides epigraphic evidence, an important source of information on early Celtic is [[toponymy]] (place names).<ref>e.g. Patrick Sims-Williams, ''Ancient Celtic Placenames in Europe and Asia Minor'', Publications of the [[Philological Society]], No. 39 (2006);
Bethany Fox, 'The P-Celtic Place-Names of North-East England and South-East Scotland', ''The Heroic Age'', 10 (2007), {{cite web |url= http://www.heroicage.org/issues/10/fox.html |title=Fox—The P-Celtic Place-Names of North-East England and South-East Scotland |access-date=9 January 2018 |url-status=live |archive-url= http://archive.wikiwix.com/cache/20180111041001/http://www.heroicage.org/issues/10/fox.html |archive-date=11 January 2018}} (also available at [http://www.alarichall.org.uk/placenames/fox.htm Fox: P-Celtic Place-Names]).{{Dead link|date=July 2018 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}
See also [[List of Celtic place names in Portugal]].</ref>

===Genetic evidence===
{{See also|Corded Ware culture#Genetic studies}}
Arnaiz-Villena et al. (2017) demonstrated that Celtic-related populations of the European Atlantic (Orkney Islands, Scottish, Irish, British, Bretons, Basques, Galicians) shared a common [[HLA system]].{{clarify|date=January 2022}}<ref>International Journal of Modern Anthropology Int. J. Mod. Anthrop. (2017) 10: 50–72 HLA Genes in Atlantic Celtic populations: Are Celts Iberians? Available online at: www.ata.org.tn</ref>

Other genetic research does not support the notion of a significant genetic link between these populations, beyond the fact that they are all West Europeans. [[Early European Farmers]] did settle Britain (and all of Northern Europe) in the [[Neolithic]]; however, recent genetics research has found that, between 2400 and 2000 BC, over 90% of British DNA was overturned by [[Western Steppe Herders|European Steppe Herders]] in a migration that brought large amounts of Steppe DNA (including the [[Haplogroup R-L21|R1b haplogroup]]) to western Europe.<ref name="Olalde et al.">{{cite bioRxiv |last1=Olalde |first1=I |display-authors=et. al |date=May 2017 |title=The Beaker Phenomenon and the Genomic Transformation of Northwest Europe |biorxiv=10.1101/135962}}</ref> Modern autosomal genetic clustering is testament to this fact, as both modern and Iron Age British and Irish samples cluster genetically very closely with other North Europeans, and less so with Galicians, Basques or those from the south of France.<ref>{{Citation |last1=Novembre |first1=J |last2=Johnson |first2=T |last3=Bryc |first3=K |title=Genes mirror geography within Europe |journal=Nature |volume=456 |issue=7218 |pages=98–101 |date=November 2008 |pmid=18758442 |doi=10.1038/nature07331 |pmc=2735096 |bibcode=2008Natur.456...98N |display-authors=1 |last4=Kutalik |last5=Boyko |first5=AR |last6=Auton |first6=A |last7=Indap |first7=A |last8=King |first8=KS |last9=Bergmann |first9=S |last10=Nelson |first10=MR |last11=Stephens |first11=M |last12=Bustamante |first12=CD}}</ref><ref>{{Citation |vauthors=Lao O, Lu TT, Nothnagel M |title=Correlation between genetic and geographic structure in Europe |journal=Curr. Biol. |volume=18 |issue=16 |pages=1241–48 |date=August 2008 |pmid=18691889 |doi=10.1016/j.cub.2008.07.049 |s2cid=16945780 |display-authors=etal |doi-access=free |bibcode=2008CBio...18.1241L}}</ref>

===Archaeological evidence===
{{Further|Iron Age Europe}}
{{multiple image
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| caption1 = Reconstruction of a late La&nbsp;Tène period settlement in Altburg near [[Bundenbach]], Germany<br />(first century BC)
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| caption2 = Reconstruction of a late La&nbsp;Tène period settlement in [[Havranok]], Slovakia<br />(second–first century BC)
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The concept that the Hallstatt and La Tène cultures could be seen not just as chronological periods but as "Culture Groups", entities composed of people of the same ethnicity and language, had started to grow by the end of the 19th century. At the beginning of the 20th century the belief that these "Culture Groups" could be thought of in racial or ethnic terms was held by [[Gordon Childe]], whose theory was influenced by the writings of [[Gustaf Kossinna]].<ref>{{cite book |url= https://books.google.com/books?id=EZ7Gj2ocIEsC&pg=PA346 |title=Milestones in Archaeology: A Chronological Encyclopedia |page=346 |date=2007 |access-date=2 October 2010 |isbn=978-1-57607-186-1 |last1=Murray |first1=Tim |publisher=[[ABC-CLIO]] |url-status=live |archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20111222214917/http://books.google.com/books?id=EZ7Gj2ocIEsC&pg=PA346&dq=%22Gordon+Childe%22+la+tene |archive-date=22 December 2011}}</ref> As the 20th century progressed, the ethnic interpretation of La Tène culture became more strongly rooted, and any findings of La Tène culture and flat inhumation cemeteries were linked to the Celts and the Celtic language.<ref>{{cite book |url= https://books.google.com/books?id=bQMxOC66jvsC&pg=PA48 |title=Prehistoric Europe: Theory and Practice |page=48 |access-date=2 October 2010 |isbn=978-1-4051-2597-0 |last1=Jones |first1=Andrew |date=2008 |publisher=[[John Wiley & Sons]]}}</ref>
<!-- The Iron Age [[Hallstatt culture|Hallstatt]] (c. 800–475 BC) and [[La Tène culture|La Tène]] (c. 500–50 BC) cultures are typically associated with Proto-Celtic and Celtic culture.<ref>F. Fleming, ''Heroes of the Dawn: Celtic Myth'', 1996. pp. 9, 134.</ref> -->

In various{{Clarify|date=July 2010}} [[List of academic disciplines|academic disciplines]], the Celts were considered a Central European Iron Age phenomenon, through the cultures of Hallstatt and La Tène. However, archaeological finds from the Halstatt and La Tène culture were rare in Iberia, southwestern France, northern and western Britain, southern Ireland and Galatia<ref>{{cite book |url= https://books.google.com/books?id=jEJyWT1gwg0C&pg=PA5 |title=pg5 |access-date=2 October 2010 |isbn=978-0-415-35177-5 |last1=Harding |first1=Dennis William |date=2007 |publisher=[[Routledge]] |url-status=live |archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20111222210715/http://books.google.com/books?id=jEJyWT1gwg0C&pg=PA5&dq=no+la+tene+in+western+france |archive-date=22 December 2011}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |url= https://books.google.com/books?id=f899xH_quaMC&pg=PA386 |title=Celtic Culture: A-Celti |page=386 |access-date=2 October 2010 |url-status=live |archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20111222191026/http://books.google.com/books?id=f899xH_quaMC&pg=PA386&dq=no+la+tene+in+south+ireland#v=onepage&q=no%20la%20tene%20in%20south%20ireland&f=false |archive-date=22 December 2011 |isbn=978-1-85109-440-0 |date=2006 |publisher=[[ABC-CLIO]]}}</ref> and did not provide enough evidence for a culture like that of Central Europe. It is equally difficult to maintain that the origin of the Iberian Celts can be linked to the preceding Urnfield culture. This has resulted in a newer theory that introduces a 'proto-Celtic' substratum and a process of Celticisation, having its initial roots in the Bronze Age [[Bell Beaker culture]].<ref name="Lorrio">{{cite web |url= http://www.uwm.edu/Dept/celtic/ekeltoi/volumes/vol6/6_4/lorrio_zapatero_6_4.html |title=Center for Celtic Studies &#124; UW-Milwaukee |access-date=27 April 2006 |url-status=dead |archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20060819015554/http://www.uwm.edu/Dept/celtic/ekeltoi/volumes/vol6/6_4/lorrio_zapatero_6_4.html |archive-date=19 August 2006}} The Celts in Iberia: An Overview – Alberto J. Lorrio (Universidad de Alicante) & Gonzalo Ruiz Zapatero ([[Complutense University of Madrid|Universidad Complutense de Madrid]]) – Journal of Interdisciplinary [[Celtic studies]], Volume 6: 167–254 The Celts in the Iberian Peninsula, 1 February 2005</ref>

The La Tène culture developed and flourished during the late Iron Age (from 450 BC to the Roman conquest in the 1st century BC) in eastern France, Switzerland, Austria, southwest Germany, the Czech Republic, Slovakia and Hungary. It developed out of the Hallstatt culture without any definite cultural break, under the impetus of considerable Mediterranean influence from [[Ancient Greece|Greek]], and later [[Etruscan civilisation]]s. A shift of settlement centres took place in the 4th century. The western La Tène culture corresponds to historical [[Gaul|Celtic Gaul]]. Whether this means that the whole of La Tène culture can be attributed to a unified Celtic people is difficult to assess; archaeologists have repeatedly concluded that language and material culture do not necessarily run parallel. Frey notes that in the 5th century, "burial customs in the Celtic world were not uniform; rather, localised groups had their own beliefs, which, in consequence, also gave rise to distinct artistic expressions".<ref>*[https://web.archive.org/web/20110517084539/http://www.ria.ie/publications/journals/journaldb/index.asp?select=fulltext&id=100427.  Otto Hermann Frey, "A new approach to early Celtic art"]. Setting the Glauberg finds in context of shifting iconography, [[Royal Irish Academy]] (2004)</ref> Thus, while the La Tène culture is certainly associated with the [[Gauls]], the presence of La Tène artefacts may be due to cultural contact and does not imply the permanent presence of Celtic speakers.{{Citation needed|date=April 2022}}

===Historical evidence===
[[File:Herodotus world map-en.svg|thumb|The world according to [[Herodotus]]]]
The Greek historian [[Ephorus]] of Cyme in [[Asia Minor]], writing in the 4th century BC, believed the Celts came from the islands off the mouth of the [[Rhine]] and were "driven from their homes by the frequency of wars and the violent rising of the sea". [[Polybius]] published a [[history of Rome]] about 150 BC in which he describes the Gauls of Italy and their conflict with Rome. [[Pausanias (geographer)|Pausanias]] in the 2nd century AD says that the Gauls "originally called Celts", "live on the remotest region of Europe on the coast of an enormous tidal sea". [[Posidonius]] described the southern Gauls about 100 BC. Though his original work is lost, later writers such as [[Strabo]] used it. The latter, writing in the early 1st century AD, deals with Britain and Gaul as well as Hispania, Italy, and Galatia. [[Julius Caesar|Caesar]] wrote extensively about his [[Commentarii de Bello Gallico|Gallic Wars]] in 58–51 BC. [[Diodorus Siculus]] wrote about the Celts of Gaul and Britain in his 1st-century history.{{Citation needed|date=April 2022}}

[[Diodorus Siculus]] and [[Strabo]] both suggest that the heartland of the people they call Celts was in [[Southern France|southern Gaul]]. The former says that the Gauls were to the north of the Celts, but that the Romans referred to both as Gauls (linguistically the Gauls were certainly Celts). Before the discoveries at Hallstatt and La Tène, it was generally considered that the Celtic heartland was southern Gaul, see [[Encyclopædia Britannica]] for 1813.{{Citation needed|date=April 2022}}