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Online museum and repository for historical and ancestral knowledge.
Part of the Celtic treasure-hoard discovered in the forest near Frasnes-lez-Buissenal, in Hainaut, Belgium; 1st century B.C. 🇧🇪
The treasure included two gold torcs exquisitely executed in La Tène style, and eighty un-inscribed gold coins of types frequently found in northern Gaul and Britain and associated with the Gallic Nervii and Morini tribes. Now on display at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, in New York City, USA.
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“Tandragee Man”, stone sculpture of a male figure with a horned helmet, discovered somewhere in county Armagh, Northern Ireland.
The statue is thought to depict the deity Nuada of the Silver Hand. According to Irish myth, Nuada and his people, the Tuatha Dé Danann, invaded Ireland and displaced its former inhabitants, the Fir Bolg, after defeating them at the first Battle of Maige Tuired. King Nuada lost his hand in the battle, during a single combat with the Fir Bolg champion Sreng. The loss of his hand temporarily disqualified Nuada from being king, but this was remedied when a silver prosthesis was made for him by the physician god Dian Cecht; hence his epithet.
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A quarrel breaks out between two Gauls at a feast; art by Peter Connolly (RIP: 1935-2012).
The theme portrayed here was a commonly recurring pattern across the Celtic world. Feasting was the central and most important social activity in ancient European societies. The Greek historian Diodorus Siculus described Gallic feasts in France and Central Europe, in book 5 of his Library of History. He stated that there existed a custom of cutting the choicest piece of meat and giving it to the man who was considered the bravest warrior, as a gesture of recognition. He stated moreover, that it was extremely common for quarrels and violent brawls to break out at these feasts, sometimes over trivial matters.
Medieval Irish literature has confirmed the testimony of Diodorus, and demonstrated that these patterns recurred through the ages and pervaded across various Celtic societies. Tales such as Bricriu’s Feast and The Story of Mac Da Thó’s Pig describe identical scenes in Ireland: The choicest piece of meat (usually boar or pig) is cut for the man considered the bravest warrior; there was even a term for these cuts: Curadmír. In both stories, a dispute arises as to which warrior is worthy of the curadmír. In The Story of Mac Da Thó’s Pig, the dispute escalates into a chaotic free-for-all battle, in which weapons, chariots, and an attack dog are involved.
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Sea cliffs and moorland at Cape Wrath (Gaelic: Am Parbh); near Durness, in Sutherland, Scotland. 🏴
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Bronze “Eastern Montefortino” style helmet with a figure of a raven perched atop, from the burial of a Gallic chieftain at Ciumesti, in Satu Mare county, Romania; 4th century B.C. 🇷🇴 On display at the King Ferdinand I National Military Museum, in Bucharest, Romania.
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ON THIS DAY: 23 AUGUST 1170: Arrival of Strongbow, and described in the Annals of Ulster as “the beginning of the woes of Ireland”.
#gript
https://gript.ie/on-this-day-23-august-1170-arrival-of-strongbow-4/
Pictish carved stone from Invereen, in the Highland region of Scotland; 7th century AD. 🏴
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Bronze flask discovered in a Gallic chieftain’s grave, near the salt-mining settlement of Dürrnberg-Hallein, in the Salzburg state of Austria; 4th century B.C. 🇦🇹
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Bronze figurine of a woman riding a bull, found near Barnetby-le-Wold, in Lincolnshire, England; 1st century B.C. 🏴
The Barnetby Bull Rider, found in the territory of the ancient Celtic Corieltauvi tribe of Britain, is the only known Celtic representation of a person riding a bull. It is very likely that the figurine represents the Greek myth of Europa (Greek: “Wide Eyes/Face”), a Greek/Phoenician princess who fell in love with the god of sky and thunder, Zeus, after he had shape-shifted into the form of a bull. Zeus eloped with Europa and carried her on his back to the island of Crete, where he made her the island’s first queen and fathered the future king Minos on her. The figurine shows that even then, Celts were familiar with Greek myths and apparently incorporated them into their own lore from time to time.
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View towards Lough Beltra and Nefin Mountain, in county Mayo, Ireland. 🇮🇪
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Oak tree (Quercus Robur) in Chatelherault Country Park, in South Lanarkshire, Scotland. 🏴 Some of the oaks located on the former Hamilton estate (previously known as Cadzow), are the oldest known trees in Scotland, some of them being 6-700 years old.
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King Vortigern is burned to death; 14th century manuscript from northern England. 🏴🏴
Vortigern (Welsh: Gwrtheyrn; “chiefly man”) is a name forever associated with infamy. According to historical sources, Vortigern was a corrupt and depraved tyrant who ruled the southern half of Britain during the mid 5th century AD, shortly after the collapse of Roman rule over the island. He seems to have ruled from the city of Glevum, now Gloucester, England. It was Vortigern who first invited Germanic (i.e. Anglo-Saxon) mercenaries to settle in Britain (year AD 447), giving them Kent in exchange for a marriage with Rowena, the beautiful daughter of their chieftain, Hengist. They were brought over on the pretext that they’d help fight against Pictish and Irish raiders, but it’s quite possible that Vortigern intended to use them against political rivals.
After the Germanic settlers mutinied and plundered much of Britain, Vortigern was briefly overthrown, his sons Vortimer and Catigern taking the reins of government, and leading a successful war against their father’s troublesome guests. Catigern fell in battle, and Vortimer died of natural causes shortly thereafter. Vortigern ascended the throne again and invited the Saxons back to the island. At a festive gathering in the Salisbury Plain of Wiltshire, the Saxons betrayed their British hosts and massacred the island’s nobility, taking Vortigern hostage and utterly humiliating him; he was released in exchange for further land grants. Lambasted and denounced by the Catholic bishop Germanus of Auxerre, Vortigern was again overthrown and forced to flee to the far western parts of Wales. It was there that he perished together with his multiple wives, including Rowena; tradition has it that the fortress he was living in was struck by lightning and burned. ⚡️🔥
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Incomplete funerary stele depicting a mounted warrior standing over what appears to be a pile of captured enemy shields, found near the ancient Celtiberian city of Clunia, now Coruña del Conde, in Burgos province, Spain; 1st century B.C. 🇪🇸
The stele has an inscription in the Celtiberian script, which is presumably the deceased person’s name: Cabarinos (“Little helper”). The name of the city of Clunia means “meadow”, being the same Celtic root word as the Gaelic/Irish word cluain. Many locations in Ireland contain this word in their toponymy; i.e. Clonard (Cluain Iraird), Clonmacnoise (Cluain Mhic Nóis) Clontibret (Cluain Tiobrad), etc. Clunia still bears its former name, as the Spanish name Coruña is simply a corruption of the same word.
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Bronze razor found near Acy-Romance, in the Ardennes department of France; 8th or 7th century B.C. 🇫🇷
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Clay jug depicting waterfowl (Celtic symbol of death and rebirth), from the ruins of the Celtiberian city of Numantia, in Soria province, Spain; 2nd century B.C. 🇪🇸
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Castell Dinas Brân, in Denbighshire, Wales. 🏴 Fourth image is a digital reconstruction of the site.
Castell Dinas Brân was first built in the late 12th or early 13th century by Madog, son of Gruffydd Maelor, who ruled the Kingdom of Powys Fadog. The site he chose contained the ruins of an ancient hill-fort dating to the Iron Age. The first medieval construction was made entirely from wood, and it was destroyed in a fire after a few decades of occupation. The castle was then rebuilt in stone by Gruffydd, the son of the aforementioned Madog, during the decade of the 1260s. The castle was not long in existence, as it was extensively damaged —and never repaired— during the wars between king Edward I of England and king Llywelyn ap Gruffudd of Gwynedd (1277-1282), which ended in the final conquest of Wales by England.
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Maxium territorial expansion of Brittany by AD 867. Treaties between France and Brittany and the territorial cessions by the former to the latter listed and color-coded.
The Treaty of Angers (year 851) followed Breton military victories over France at the Battle of Ballon (year 845), and the Battle of Jengland (year 851). By the Treaty of Compiègne (year 867), France ceded parts of Normandy to Brittany, after suffering a disastrous military defeat at the Battle of Brissarthe (year 866). In this episode, the Bretons had teamed up with a band of Danish Vikings to raid French territory. A large French army responded and chased the Bretons and Vikings into the local church at Brissarthe. Through skillful use of archery and a well-timed surprise attack, the joint Breton-Danish army was able to completely rout the French, killing Robert the Strong, Margrave of Neustria, and Ranulf I, Duke of Aquitaine. The next year, king Charles the Bald of France signed the treaty with Duke Salomon of Brittany, who subsequently began using the title “King of Brittany”.
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The traditional territorial divisions of the Duchy of Brittany.
These territorial divisions correspond to medieval lordships. The northern regions of Trégor, Pays de St. Brieuc, Pays de St. Malo, and the Pays de Dol, once formed a lordship called Domnonée. The names of this lordship and that of the neighboring Cornouaille, are cognate with those of the Kingdom of Dumnonia and of the region of Cornwall, in Britain (the latter a subdivision of the former). The Viscounty of Léon was nominally a vassal of Cornouaille.
Notably, the other Breton lordships and their capital cities retained the names of the Gallic tribes that had been recorded there since pre-Roman times: The Vannetais (Breton: Bro Gwened) was the country of the Gallic Veneti, while the Pays Nantais (Breton: Bro An Naoned) retains the name of the Namnetes tribe, and the Pays Rennais (Breton: Bro Roazon) that of the Redones. Thus, there appears to be a dividing line in Brittany, clearly demarcating areas where colonies of Celtic Britons became established, from areas where the native Gauls retained their former ethnic and political identities (as opposed to their French kindred, who largely forgot their heritage and became assimilated to both Roman culture and the Frankish political identity). It may just be that to consider Breton people a derivative of the Celtic Britons is a bit of an oversimplification. It’d perhaps be more accurate to consider them a sort of synthesis of two once distinct Celtic nations: Britons and Gauls. If this is accurate, it would mean that Brittany represents a sort of survival of the Gallic ethnos on the European continent, in spite of the Roman conquests.
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Bronze riveted cauldron recovered from a Gallaecian hill-fort near Santa María de Besomaño, in the Pontevedra province of Galicia, Spain. 🇪🇸 The cauldron is of a type commonly dated to the late bronze age, but was found in a settlement layer ascribed to the 2nd century B.C. (iron age); as such, there is some confusion as its dating. The cauldron seems to have been hammered into a lump of scrap metal, probably after out-living it’s use and original purpose. Likely the intent was to melt it down and recycle it, but for some reason the process was never completed.
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Artistic reconstruction of the 4th century B.C. Gallic chieftain buried at Ciumesti, in Satu Mare county, Romania. 🇷🇴 Among the grave goods entombed with him was a beautiful bronze helmet with a raven perched at the top, and a pair of bronze greaves, probably imported from Greece. Art by Maria Lashkevich; 2008.
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7th century gold coin minted by the Breton king Judicael, who ruled the minor Kingdom of Domnonée in northern Brittany from AD 615 to AD 642.
As is evident from the kingdom’s name, it was founded by British migrants from the Celtic Kingdom of Dumnonia, many of whom came as refugees escaping the Anglo-Saxon invasions. Dumnonia encompassed the greater part of the West Country of England, what are now Cornwall, Devon, Somerset, and probably also Dorset and parts of Wiltshire. Before becoming king, Judicael was a Christian monk at the Abbey of St. John, at Gaël, Brittany. He was forced into this life by his younger brother Haeloc, who usurped the throne in a coup upon their father’s death. Following the death of Haeloc, Judicael returned to secular life to rule the kingdom, being remembered as a wise and just ruler. His reign was uneventful, as he opted for peace with his more powerful neighbor, king Dagobert I of France, through acceptance of the latter’s suzerainty. In the year AD 642, an elderly Judicael abdicated the throne and returned to monastic life at Gaël; he was later canonized as a saint.
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Miniature bronze bowl or cup decorated in La Tène style, discovered near Keshcarrigan, in county Leitrim, Ireland; 1st century AD. 🇮🇪 The cup is only 14 cm in diameter.
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Knife discovered in a Gallic burial at Acy-Romance, in the Ardennes department of France; 5th century B.C. 🇫🇷
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NOTE: This article contains an error: “They were likely used by the Corieltavi tribe, who inhabited the area during the Iron Age.” The Corieltauvi did not have territory in Wales; they inhabited the English Midlands and Lincolnshire. The Isle of Anglesey, where these coins were found, was part of the territory of the Ordovices, who inhabited northern and central Wales, as well as some neighboring parts of England. 🏴🏴 The mistake possibly arises from the fact that the coins have been identified as having been minted by the Corieltauvi. Possibly they were acquired by the other tribe as plunder, tribute, or payment for an alliance.
https://www.sott.net/article/483513-2000-year-old-gold-treasure-from-Iron-Age-tribe-unearthed-by-metal-detectorists-in-Wales
Maps illustrating aspects of the end of Roman rule in Britain and the Anglo-Saxon settlement of the island.
There are some notable realities that can be highlighted: (1) The Anglo-Saxons settled and had the most success in the more Romanized and urbanized parts of Britain (third map shows concentrations of early Anglo-Saxon cemeteries); in some of these areas, they seem to have encountered feeble resistance or none at all. (2) They encountered stiffer resistance as their conquests progressed westward and encountered populations that had either retained their native Celtic culture and lifestyles, or become “re-Celticized” —so to speak— as a result of having been colonized by settlers from Ireland and Scotland. The second map shows distribution of Irish language inscription stones in Wales and Cornwall, illustrating the extent of Irish colonization of these regions. North Wales was also later colonized by members of the Brittonic Votadini tribe, who were brought over from Scotland by Britain’s post-Roman rulers to drive out the Irish. (3) Another notable aspect of Anglo-Saxon colonization is that archaeologists have found extensive evidence for Germanic settlements pre-dating the collapse of Roman rule over the island. During the late Roman Empire period, the Romans had resorted to recruiting foreign mercenaries, particularly Germanic, and paying them with land-grants within the empire. It seems they had been doing this in Britain long before the time of Vortigern. Thus, it would seem that Britain’s post-Roman rulers were merely imitating a familiar policy, without thinking of its long-term consequences.
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Roman cavalry clash with Gauls at the Battle of Telamon (now Talamone, in Tuscany, Italy); 225 B.C. 🇮🇹 Art by José Daniel Cabrera Peña. More information about this conflict in the post from February 13 (pinned).
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Glencoe, in Argyll, Scotland. 🏴
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Bronze horse-bit found in the Galatian burial mound of Hidirsihlar, in Bolu province, Turkey; 3rd century B.C. 🇹🇷
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Entry AD 1206 from the Annals of Innisfallen:
Donal, son of (Dermot) MacCarthy, high king of Munster, died… this year… It was he, of all the contemporary kings of Ireland, who was most feared by the foreigners (English) and the Irish. During the twenty years he held the kingship, he never submitted to a foreigner; and though an army of English and Irish often came against him, he gave them at times no more (terms) than were due, while at other times he gave them nothing. And it was he who killed the speckled kerne, (which was) led by Geoffrey de Cogan, the most hated kerne that ever was in Ireland, and he had this Geoffrey flayed. And it was he who inflicted the (battle-) rout of Inis Eóganáin, and also that of Cell Mo-Chommóc, and the rout of Bern Meic Ímuir, and who successfully attacked the castles of Lismore, Dún Cuireda, In Cora, and Magh Ua Mairgili, and the castles of all (the district of) Imokilly. By him nine (English) justiciars were slain, and twenty one battles fought in Munster, and many other exploits performed.
Context: English conquerors had been invading Ireland since the year 1169. The map shows the maximum extent of the conquests they achieved by the year 1300. The MacCarthy clan were the native rulers of the Kingdom of Desmond or South Munster, which survived and continued resisting in the southwest; shown is their original coat of arms. The word “kerne” referred to bands of roving Irish mercenaries. The word “speckled” is probably a mistranslation of the Old Irish word brecc, which often meant “checkered”; a reference to plaid clothing. Geoffrey de Cogan would have been a grandson of Miles de Cogan, one of the first and most successful English invaders of Ireland (KIA: 1185). The nine “justiciars” killed by MacCarthy during his career were probably English Sheriffs of Cork, rather than actual “justiciars” (i.e. Lords Justice; English governors/viceroys of Ireland).
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Gallic bronze bracelet of “Hohlbuckelring” type, decorated in La Tène style, on display at the National Archaeological Museum of Saint-Germain-en-Laye near Paris, France; 3rd century B.C. 🇫🇷
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