Rodney Castleden - The Element Encyclopedia of the Celts

In the 1950s it was estimated that there were about 250,000 people in Britain in 100 BC, increasing to 400,000 by the time of the Roman invasion. More recent estimates have been more cautious, and few prehistorians now will attempt even to guess a population figure, but the numbers do seem to have increased in the late Iron Age. This population growth may have been associated with improvements in food production. Julius Caesar’sdescription leaves out numbers:

The population [of Britain] is exceedingly large, and the ground thickly studded with homesteads, closely resembling those of the Gauls, and the cattle very numerous… There is timber of every kind, as in Gaul, except beech and fir. Hares, fowl and geese they think it unlawful to eat, but rear them for pleasure and amusement. The climate is more temperate than in Gaul, the cold being less severe… Most of the tribes of the interior do not grow corn, but live on milk and meat and wear skins.

It was Julius Caesar who also created for posterity the enduring image of blue-painted savages: “All the Britons, indeed, dye themselves with woad, which occasion a bluish colour and thereby have a more terrible appearance.” It is still not clear whether this meant that the Britons painted their bodies with woad or tattooed themselves.

Diodorus Siculusgave a description of what the Gauls did to their hair. Men and women wore it long, sometimes plaited: “They continually wash their hair with limewash and draw it back from the forehead to the crown and to the nape of the neck, with the result that their appearance resembles that of Satyrs or of Pans, for the hair is so thickened by this treatment that it differs in no way from a horse’s mane.” This description is supported by the statue of the Dying Gaul ( see Symbols: Nudity ) and the coinportrait of Vercingetorix.

Normally, the Celts were warmly clad. They wore close-fitting trousers that the Romans referred to as bracae , “breeches.” Over these they wore a long tunic made either of wool or of linen, which was held at the waist by a belt. Over this, they wore a cloakthat was fastened at the shoulder with a brooch. The textiles were dyed bright colors and threads of different colors were woven so as to produce striking striped or checked patterns ( See Tartan ). The Roman observers were startled by the colors and patterns, which they were not used to seeing.

Nor were they used to seeing beards and moustaches. The Celts grew both and grew them long. Diodorus commented fastidiously, “When they are eating, the moustache becomes entangled in the food, and when they are drinking the drink passes, as it were, through a sort of strainer” ( See Dress ).

Peredur and his brother Gwrgi were co-rulers of the kingdom of York (north-east England) in the late sixth century. They were the sons of King Eliffer of the Great Army. Peredur Steel-Arm was King of York from about 560 until 580, when he was killed in the Battle of Caer Greu.

A prince called Arthur was associated with Peredur, doubtless named after the great overking of southern Britain who had died not long before ( See Arthur ).

A Dark Age Celtic saint, the son of Clemens, a Cornish chief. He studied in Ireland for many years, returning to Cornwall with disciples Dagan, Credanus, and Medanus. They landed near Padstow (Petroc’s Stowe). Both Samsonand Wethenoc had set themselves up in oratories in the area, and they were expected to move out to make way for Petroc, which they did with reluctance.

After a seven-year pilgrimage to Rome and Jerusalem, Petroc returned to Cornwall following the death of King Theodoric. Then Wethenoc returned and, to avoid a quarrel, Petroc withdrew to Little Petherick. He baptized the Cornish King Constantine. A powerful local magnate, Kynan, built an oratory in his honor near Bodmin.

After many years at Padstow and Petherick, Petroc moved to Bodmin, where he displaced the hermit Guron. He was visiting the monks at Padstow and Petherick when he was taken ill; he died at a farmhouse at Treravel.

St. Petroc spent much of his time teaching and despatching missionary monks from Padstow, which was then the main port for southern Ireland, south Wales, southern Dumnonia, and Brittany.

A Celtic tribein Gaul, with its main center at Lemonum (Poitiers). Julius Caesardepended on the Pictones to build ships for him on the Loire. At the time of the Roman conquest, Duratios was King of the Pictones and frequently aided Caesar in naval battles. The Pictones supported the Romans because they were afraid of the expansionist strategies of other Gaulish tribes. Even so, they did send 8,000 men to support Vercingetorixduring the Gaulish rebellion of 52 BC.

A general Latin name given to the people who lived in the northern half of Scotland, “Pictland,” in the third century AD. “The Painted People” was a nickname given by the Romans to northern Brits who wore woad or sported tattoos. “Pict” does not therefore really define a tribal or ethnic group in the Roman period, and Pictland, Alba, and Caledonia seem to have been thought of as being much the same area—Scotland.

In the past it has been suggested that the Picts were in some way the pre-Celtic inhabitants of Scotland, but that presupposes a belief that the Celts arrived in these islands during the Iron Age. Now that we see that they were well-established there by that stage, in fact they had been settled in Britain for thousands of years, the concept of “pre-Celts” has no meaning.

One theory holds that the Picts came originally, in the first millennium BC, from Ireland, having been displaced by incoming Celts—but there seems to be no particular reason for believing this. Any cultural or “ethnic” differences between the Picts and the people living to the south could be explained by their geographical isolation. They did evolve some extraordinary pictorial symbols, which appear to relate to their language. In other words the Picts’ carved memorial stones carry pictograms (no pun intended).

The Irish called the Picts Cruithin , which is an early Irish transliteration of Britanni , so the Irish were not really identifying them as a distinct people either.

A plaid is a tartanblanket thrown over one shoulder to make a kind of cloak. Plaid is the Gaelic word for “blanket.”

A Greek philosopher and polymath (135–51 BC) who studied at Athens. In 86 BC he settled in Rome, where he became a friend of Cicero and other leading figures. He wrote about history and geography and is a source of information about the Celts in the late Iron Age.

King of the Icenitribe in the first century AD. He was Boudicca’s husband. On his death he left half of his kingdom to Rome and assumed Rome would allow his family to inherit the other half. He underestimated the greed of the Roman administrator, who took everything; this led his successor and widow to lead a revolt against Roman rule in AD 60–61.