The Mythology of the British Islands: An Introduction to Celtic Myth, Legend, Poetry, and RomanceSquire, Charles
General
The Mythology of the British Islands: An Introduction to Celtic Myth, Legend, Poetry, and Romance
Squire, Charles
Celts -- Folklore; Mythology, Celtic
predominant one in many parts of the west both of Britain and Ireland,
and is believed by some ethnologists to be generally upon the increase
all over England.
The second of the two races was the exact opposite to the first. It was
the tall, fair, light-haired, blue- or gray-eyed, broad-headed people
called, popularly, the “Celts”, who belonged in speech to the “Aryan”
family, their language finding its affinities in Latin, Greek, Teutonic,
Slavic, the Zend of Ancient Persia, and the Sanscrit of Ancient India.
Its original home was probably somewhere in Central Europe, along the
course of the upper Danube, or in the region of the Alps. The “round
barrows” in which it buried its dead, or deposited their burnt ashes,
differ in shape from the “long barrows” of the earlier race. It was in a
higher stage of culture than the “Iberians”, and introduced into Britain
bronze and silver, and, perhaps, some of the more lately domesticated
animals.
Both Iberians and Celts were divided into numerous tribes, but there is
nothing to show that there was any great diversity among the former. It
is otherwise with the Celts, who were separated into two main branches
which came over at different times. The earliest were the Goidels, or
Gaels; the second, the Brythons, or Britons. Between these two branches
there was not only a dialectical, but probably, also, a considerable
physical difference. Some anthropologists even postulate a different
shape of skull. Without necessarily admitting this, there is reason to
suppose a difference of build and of colour of hair. With regard to
this, we have the evidence of Latin writers—of Tacitus,[12] who tells us
that the “Caledonians” of the North differed from the Southern Britons
in being larger-limbed and redder-haired, and of Strabo,[13] who
described the tribes in the interior of Britain as taller than the
Gaulish colonists on the coast, with hair less yellow and limbs more
loosely knit. Equally do the classic authorities agree in recognizing
the “Silures” of South Wales as an entirely different race from any
other in Britain. The dark complexions and curly hair of these Iberians
seemed to Tacitus to prove them immigrants from Spain.[14]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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