The "First" Irish people

Wibbs · 01-10-2010 9:46am

purplepanda wrote: »

So where is this Celtic European DNA present nowadays so we can take exact samples to compare with Ireland's modern day population??? I doubt if you could even extract pure Slavic or Germanic DNA anywhere either.

Actually you could if you had a mind to. Well given we've extracted DNA from the teeth and bones and are currently building the genome of Neanderthals, mapping the genetics of peoples of say 2500 years ago would be significantly easier.

All the lands that were originally Celtic have been invaded & settled by many other people's since the fall of the Roman Empire including Ireland.

Yes and no. Invasions, judging from the genetics, even in central Europe while having an effect, don't always have as big a replacement effect as we may think. New flavours come and go but you still recognise the main recipe. http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/gnxp/2008/08/genetic-map-of-europe-genes-vary-as-a-function-of-distance/ In the UK when the DNA of one of the oldest skeletons of modern humans thus far found was compared to the modern day population it showed direct link over many 1000's of years. A local school teacher was the closest match. http://pw2.netcom.com/~duchess/old_stuff/stone.html

The modern population of Ireland, particularly the East coast has significant Germanic blood. The West of Ireland also has many surnames that are not originally Gaelic.

Nope it doesn't. Again look at the genetic maps. While appearing to be neat and tidy, surnames are a very bad judge of the underlying genetic heritage anyway. The west of Ireland especially has a tiny amount of central european DNA. The east isn't much higher. Language is also a bad judge of genetic heritage. You see this in the world today. A native American will be an English speaker, may even have a European surname, but he's certainly not English. Ditto for a Native Peruvian. He may be called Pablo Sanchez and speak Spanish, but he ain't an Iberian.

Vikings, Saxon's, Normans, Fleming's English, Dutch, German's & Scots & Welsh, even the later two could some Germanic blood before their arrival in Ireland.

Well for a start humans, never mind Europeans are very "inbred" as a species. The genetic differences are very small. So it's in the small details you can discern individual populations. That said these small differences do show up and central European/Germanic "blood" is largely absent from Ireland and indeed Scotland, Wales and England. Ireland has hung onto a large chunk of both the H and R1b genetic group. The highest in Europe other than the Basques. Scotland, Wales and England follow behind us. Those groups are a remnant of what was likely a more widespread genetic grouping in the past. They held onto it by virtue of isolation and the lack of "new blood" coming in. The English like to think they're Saxons, not unlike the Irish like to think they're Celtic, but we're far more related to each other than to Saxons or Celts. Even in the south east coast of England do you get Saxon DNA to any degree and it's no more than a third and falls off rapidly the further west and north you go. You do get strong preserved pockets of Viking DNA in places like the Orkneys, Shetlands and the isle of man funny enough, but elsewhere, they were either too small to make much of an impact or were bred out quite quickly.

fontanalis wrote:

It's not a case of pure, people will still carry old markers.
Again we are applying a modern label to wide groups of people who may not even have called themselves that name.

Exactly. We're also applying a romantic notion to it too. Even the Germanic location of the "Celts" is likely down to a mistake by Herodotus. He mentions the Keltoi originating near the Danube, but he seems to mistake the Danube as rising in the Pyrenees. Then again they(like the Romans after them) thought Spain laid quite close to the west of Ireland. Julius Caesar mused on a two pronged invasion of Ireland, one from Britain and the other from Spain. Long trip in the latter. The ancient Greeks while great thinkers they were, geographers they were not. We may well be related to those Iberian "Celts", but not the central European groups. Old Julius also places the Celts in southern France. This germanic notion comes more from that early mistake and the first finds of the culture one could broadly describe as Celtic. The "Celtic" culture in metalwork et al, was a fashion that spread throughout Europe outside the Roman sphere picking up local influences as it went. Indeed even there they nicked some stylistic things from the Romans. And again even there this influence when it gets to these islands is distinct locally. It gets a lot more swirly whirly circular for a start. The notion of a central european Celtic homeland is pretty wrong IMHO.

Johnmb · 01-10-2010 10:27am

purplepanda wrote: »

All the lands that were originally Celtic have been invaded & settled by many other people's since the fall of the Roman Empire including Ireland.

Actually, no Ireland hasn't been invaded and settled many times since , well ever really. All the genetic and archaeological evidence points to Ireland being settled once, in the Mesolithic, and having no significant input of new blood since. Vikings came, but failed to successfully invade and left no significant markers outsider of the small areas they ended up settling in. Same thing for the Anglo-Normans, even though they eventually were successful with their invasion. That's the whole point, Ireland has some of the most ancient DNA in Europe (along with the Basques).

Enkidu · 01-10-2010 10:43am

Wibbs wrote: »

The other way to look at it, is that it didn't mutate as such, but merely added to one degree or other the local language? Hence the insular features?

Yes, this is a strong possibility. Let me illustrate the issues involved with one grammatical example. Like Latin and the other romantic languages, Gaulish indicated something which occurs right now with a continuous present. For example in English "I am going to the shop in a minute". This "ing" construction is the present continuous. Gaulish and the Romance languages have a present continuous , although they achieve it in different ways and use it with different frequency.

However Irish and Welsh do not do this. Irish and Welsh use something called the verbal noun. This is present in English as well. For instance "run" is a verb, but "a run" is a noun, similarly "understand" and "an understanding". Basically a verbal noun is the noun related to the verb. Let's say I wanted to say "He is doing the work". In Irish this would be achieved with:
"Tá sé ag déanamh na hoibre"
Translating this literally:
Tá sé = He is
ag = at
déanamh = the doing (this is the verbal noun, I now it's hard to imagine what a "doing" is!)
na hoibre = of the work

So,
He is at the doing of the work
or
He is at the work's doing.

So you can see the grammatical ideas here. Rather than "doing the work", there is a thing, called the "doing of the work" and he is "at it".

This construction exists only in Irish, Welsh, Cornish, Breton, Scottish and Manx and no other Indo-European language.

So the possibility is that it existed in the previous languages, because it is not a Celtic thing. However there are five other languages known to do this:
Ancient Hebrew, Ancient Egyptian, Old Arabic, Punic (language of Carthage) and Akkadian (language of Babylon).

What does that mean? Who knows!

Enkidu · 01-10-2010 11:16am

fontanalis wrote: »

Are there many similarites?
The reason I ask is based on two place names. Dover whichis suppsoed to be based on a Brythonic word for water and Gweedore, where the Dore part comes from an old irish word for water.

There is a lot of similarities. If you strip away the actual words used, Irish and Welsh have nearly identical syntax and grammar, as well as similar sound alterations used for grammatical purposes. As for the actual words there is a simple c->p rule:
Welsh:
Pa (What)
Paham (Why)
Map (Son)

Irish:
Cá (What)
Cé (Who)
Mac (Son)

and a f->g rule:
Irish:
fir (man)
fionn (white)

Welsh:
gwr (man)
gwyn (white)

I use c-->p and f-->g rather than p-->c and g-->f, because Irish is the more conservative language and the Welsh features an innovation.

Enkidu · 01-10-2010 11:22am

Wibbs wrote: »

This germanic notion comes more from that early mistake and the first finds of the culture one could broadly describe as Celtic.

Very good point. Indeed most archaeological and linguistic evidence suggests that the true Germanic people (by which I mean the people who spoke Germanic languages) lived only in the extreme North of Germany, Denmark and Scandinavia. They only spread outwards after the power vacuum left by Rome's collapse. The people the Romans call "German" in the records were often linguistically Celtic.

Johnmb · 01-10-2010 11:50am

Enkidu wrote: »

The people the Romans call "German" in the records were often linguistically Celtic.

That's true. Regardless of the language spoken, culturally there was no difference between the people who lived in the border areas on each side at least. The Romans merely called those on the other side "Germanic" as their excuse for not invading. Caesar had built up the "Celts" (or Gauls as he referred to them) as a noble people who had so much potential and just needed the Romans to bring them civilisation in order to reach that potential. So when that was done, his propaganda had to be reversed to justify not allowing the other people to reach their potential, and they did that by reclassifying those people as Germanic rather than Gauls, even though there was no difference between them. Likely, some Germanic people were in the lands conquered, and some Gauls were on the outside. Archaeologically speaking, I doubt many people could differentiate between the artefacts.

purplepanda · 01-10-2010 4:02pm

fontanalis wrote: »

Again we are applying a modern label to wide groups of people who may not even have called themselves that name.

Same as happened to other groups of people, I doubt if the Germanic tribes called themselves by that name either.

The Hungarians don't call themselves by the name that most of Europe knows them as & there are plenty more examples throughout history until the present.

I still maintain that Britain & Ireland are originally related to what are commonly still called Celtic peoples in Europe, not from central & eastern Europe but nearer to our location, from the NW European coast. Gallo-Belgae, Armoricans, & via the Atlantic coastal trading culture Northern Spain & SW France.

As for East Ireland, certainly SE Ireland, has been well documented as having differing DNA markers to other parts of Ireland. I have English, Flemish & Norse names in my family, I don't believe that in the past they all appeared by someone deciding to change their surname because it sounded better. These names are well known in Wexford & they all have historical precedent.

fontanalis · 01-10-2010 4:24pm

purplepanda wrote: »

Same as happened to other groups of people, I doubt if the Germanic tribes called themselves by that name either.

The Hungarians don't call themselves by the name that most of Europe knows them as & there are plenty more examples throughout history until the present.

I still maintain that Britain & Ireland are originally related to what are commonly still called Celtic peoples in Europe, not from central & eastern Europe but nearer to our location, from the NW European coast. Gallo-Belgae, Armoricans, & via the Atlantic coastal trading culture Northern Spain & SW France.

As for East Ireland, certainly SE Ireland, has been well documented as having differing DNA markers to other parts of Ireland. I have English, Flemish & Norse names in my family, I don't believe that in the past they all appeared by someone deciding to change their surname because it sounded better. These names are well known in Wexford & they all have historical precedent.

I still maintain that Britain & Ireland are originally related to what are commonly still called Celtic peoples in Europe, not from central & eastern Europe but nearer to our location, from the NW European coast

That's what the genetic evidence seems to indicate (but with Britain due to it's location having a lot of interaction with areas across the North Sea) but the whole timing issue is up in the air but why call them celtic? I know I'm being pedantic.
Regarding the timing of movements the whole R1b haplogroup seems to be younger than previously thought.
http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/gnxp/2010/09/a-tale-of-y-chromosomes-and-tea-leaves/

As for East Ireland, certainly SE Ireland, has been well documented as having differing DNA markers to other parts of Ireland

Wasn't that area the main Norman settlement area? And the East coast was invaded by Danish vikings. I think both those groups fall under the R1a haplotype, while R1b is more associated with the rest of ireland and the Atlanic Fringe of Europe in gerneral, also Norwegian viking markers could be mixed in on the west coast and hard to seperate due to common ancestry.

Wibbs · 01-10-2010 4:48pm

purplepanda wrote: »

I still maintain that Britain & Ireland are originally related to what are commonly still called Celtic peoples in Europe, not from central & eastern Europe but nearer to our location, from the NW European coast. Gallo-Belgae, Armoricans, & via the Atlantic coastal trading culture Northern Spain & SW France.

That's a bit of a switch from your earlier position when you held it was "germanic" in origin. Even so the groups you describe this time around are more likely to be "celts", but the genes simply don't show the link and it happened loooong before the very notion of any celtic group emerged. Culturally we can see definite links along the western seaboard around the time of Newgrange like you mentioned, but that's 5000 odd years ago.

Look at the genetic maps I linked to again. For the average European, ones genes overwhelmingly match up within a 100 miles of ones geographical origin. And that's with all the imagined mixing back and forth. It takes a helluva lot of getting down and dirty with locals to overwhelm the local genetic grouping. It seems invaders are bred out remarkably quickly. All sorts of reasons for that. The invaders may only mate with each other, considering the locals beneath them(EG the norse in Britain). They may not remain long enough for any definite echoes to remain and people don't move around as much as we think over time. Women migrate more than men, so Y chromosomes will tend to show less change. Even so the X seems pretty stable geographically too.

As for East Ireland, certainly SE Ireland, has been well documented as having differing DNA markers to other parts of Ireland. I have English, Flemish & Norse names in my family, I don't believe that in the past they all appeared by someone deciding to change their surname because it sounded better. These names are well known in Wexford & they all have historical precedent.

Yes and no. More the latter. http://www.insideireland.com/sample19.htm The variation that does exist between east and west Ireland is remarkably small, considering those with english, norse, etc names in their family. The overwhelming majority of the Irish Y chromosome is haplogroup 1. Nearly 80% of Irish men have it. Given a fair few western english have it too, its not surprising their influence on us(and us on them) appears pretty negligible. More info here, http://www.independent.ie/national-news/study-finds-no-genetic-divide-between-celts-and-english-135269.html but again he pushes this notion of Celts. Wrongly IMHO. At best celtic was a very loose cultural description of a myriad of groups of migratory farmers outside the roman influence. As a genetic heritage its on much less firm ground. The romans themselves made the distinction between celts and picts that they found in the UK. You'll notice that the same study shows feck all saxon markers in the UK population, so even if your Irish and your name is of stout English anglo saxon yeoman stock, the chances are almost 100% that you'll have little or no saxon DNA in you. There might be if you have recent dutch/flemish ancestors, but not from the time of Egbert.

purplepanda · 01-10-2010 4:54pm

fontanalis wrote: »

but why call them celtic? I know I'm being pedantic.

Blame the historians who decided to label a culture & people who ranged from Holland to North Italy, Spain to Asia Minor all with the same designation.:rolleyes:

Although these various people's were obviously culturally & linguistically similar the term is confusing & too far reaching to refer to such a large grouping of people.

My understanding is that R1b is still much more common in Western Europe than R1a, it all goes back to the end of the last ice age when 3 groups of people moved northwards from their refuges at the edge of the ice sheets to populate Northern European regions.

http://www.fettywww.com/europe_haplogroups.jpg

DNA science confuses me LOL!

fontanalis · 01-10-2010 5:06pm

purplepanda wrote: »

Blame the historians who decided to label a culture & people who ranged from Holland to North Italy, Spain to Asia Minor all with the same designation.:rolleyes:

Although these various people's were obviously culturally & linguistically similar the term is confusing & too far reaching to refer to such a large grouping of people.

My understanding is that R1b is still much more common in Western Europe than R1a, it all goes back to the end of the last ice age when 3 groups of people moved northwards from their refuges at the edge of the ice sheets to populate Northern European regions.

http://www.fettywww.com/europe_haplogroups.jpg

DNA science confuses me LOL!

I think the idea is that R1a moved up through central Europe from around the Balkan or Ukranian refuge and R1b took the coastal route.
I think the genetic evidnence is best for an overall picture but there may be a lot of small movements that will never get picked up, the whole mutation rate thing is very complicated as estimates have to be made for population size and growth and I think even family sizes, so statistics play a big part i it.

fontanalis · 01-10-2010 5:58pm

Interesting article about Stone'enge (where a man's a man and the children dance to the pipes of pan). I wonder if anything similar happened with ireland?
http://dienekes.blogspot.com/2010/09/bronze-age-mediterraneans-may-have.html

Wibbs · 01-10-2010 11:43pm

I'd be shocked if it didn't. Only recently a chaps bones found in a Roman graveyard in Italy was found to be of eastern Asian origin, probably Chinese. And this is 2000 odd years ago. We do tend to make the mistake that our forebears were all static and that travel is a 20th century thing. That's not to say they left the evidence of that travel in the DNA, that currently fashionable compass to find humanities way. But they, that sometime small band, even individual, did leave it somewhere else. Something more important. Influence.

oflynno · 04-10-2010 10:15am

Crikey

did i start a debate or what?

i wanted to find out more about whereabouts my ancestors came from,and how little relevant history we were taught in primary and secondary school.the excuse seems to be that we are too old as a country to keep tabs on what happenened and when.

i enjoy hearing a name and being able to roughly track where it came from,down to a county,area,or rough background.

it doesnt take much to see that my name is O' Flynn.according to mixture of genealogical companies,it originated from the word Ruddy,or Reddish(being the hair colour/complextion of the people at some stage)

from finding out where various families of O' Flynn/Flynn originated from too,a main body seems to be in Roscommon or West Cork
also popped up that the name in some areas is linked with Lynn,where it was anglicised from e.g John of the Lynn Family to John of Lynn to John O'Flynn.
The O'Flynn vs Flynn argument depends on who wrote the name down for census/written/legal reasons,again matter of opinion.

Here is my take on some myth or legend

The story of the Fir Bolg is plausible,as they are described as an Ugly race(would this tie in with the Neanderthal?),they werent very pretty.
Also I believe,some Fir Bolg people survive(check out the nightclubs on any weekend)

The language thing confuses me though,about celtic language.i had a chat with a random Latvian guy i met at work a few years ago and he was able to plot backwards the age of the Albanian language,that it was the oldest language in europe,if not the world itself.
Most Celtic reference pictures seem to show more Norse traits than Irish/Welsh/Scottish traits

Bringing me back to my own name,generations of my grandfather and before seem to have passed down the notion that the O'Flynn or Flynn people came from the Nordic countries.it waould be nice to have some proof,or a place name to back it up.
i dont think it will be as simple as hopping on a plane and looking for cousins in Norway though.

Add to the pot the fact that europe was all joined up at some stage and the earths plates seperated to form continents,most records were kept by the church and nobody knows who the nine hostages were that gave Niall his name.

Johnmb · 04-10-2010 12:15pm

oflynno wrote: »

Here is my take on some myth or legend

The story of the Fir Bolg is plausible,as they are described as an Ugly race(would this tie in with the Neanderthal?),they werent very pretty.
Also I believe,some Fir Bolg people survive(check out the nightclubs on any weekend)

I think you're losing track of time here. Neanderthal died out as a species about 30,000 years ago, Ireland was inhabited about 10,000 years ago. Neanderthal wouldn't even be a distant memory at that stage, they'd be completely forgotten.

The language thing confuses me though,about celtic language.i had a chat with a random Latvian guy i met at work a few years ago and he was able to plot backwards the age of the Albanian language,that it was the oldest language in europe,if not the world itself.

Pretty much anyone can do that for any language if they are talking to someone who doesn't know any better and are selective with the facts. Albanian is just an Indo-European language, and therefore no older than any other Indo-European language, including English, Irish, etc. If he meant Albanian specifically (i.e. not what it evolved from), then it is nowhere close to being the oldest. Greek would be a lot older, and I'm sure some linguists around would be able to point out many more.

Most Celtic reference pictures seem to show more Norse traits than Irish/Welsh/Scottish traits

Reference pictures are modern, they have little/no resemblance to what a people looked like about 2000 years ago.

Bringing me back to my own name,generations of my grandfather and before seem to have passed down the notion that the O'Flynn or Flynn people came from the Nordic countries.it waould be nice to have some proof,or a place name to back it up.
i dont think it will be as simple as hopping on a plane and looking for cousins in Norway though.

O'Flynn is a typical Irish name, not a Nordic one. So unless it was a Nordic female who entered the bloodline, it would mean one of the women having an illegitimate son fathered by a Nordic man, but who was taken in by an Irish man and given his name. Y-Chromosome DNA testing would confirm/deny that possibility (although wouldn't necessarily say when it happened).

Add to the pot the fact that europe was all joined up at some stage and the earths plates seperated to form continents,most records were kept by the church and nobody knows who the nine hostages were that gave Niall his name.

These are all different things. Europe was joined up prior to the rising sea levels that came at the end of the last ice age. There was no church, nor was there any writing around to keep a written history at that time. The movement of the earths plates hasn't been noticeable since our species evolved, except in localised areas from earthquakes/eruptions, i.e. the continents existed pretty much as they are ever since the first Homo Sapiens was born, the only changes we'd notice being as a result of sea level change, not plate movement. I'm not sure why it is that important who the hostages were tbh.

Wibbs · 04-10-2010 12:27pm

oflynno wrote: »

The story of the Fir Bolg is plausible,as they are described as an Ugly race(would this tie in with the Neanderthal?),they werent very pretty.

Seriously unlikely. As far as we know at the moment the last Neanderthal died around 30,000 years ago. The first settlement of Ireland we know of was by modern humans, sometime after the last ice age retreated. Around 10000 years back? I personally believe Neanderthals were here before that for a few reasons. Number one because britain has archaic humans going back near a million years, so chances are high some made it here too. Just the aforementioned ice ages did a good job of scraping the evidence away in Ireland, whereas in southern Britain there are deposits that the ice never touched. Neanderthals anywhere in europe 10000 years ago would be a huge upset to current theories and evidence, so I reckon we can rule that one out for Ireland and them surviving in legend. Though again personally the european legends of trolls etc may be a race memory as their original descriptions are a prtty good match for our ancient cousins. That's just me being wacky though.

Plus its very common for the victors to reduce the vanquished in the eyes of history. Make them smaller or brutish or ugly. Make them barbarians basically.

The language thing confuses me though,about celtic language.i had a chat with a random Latvian guy i met at work a few years ago and he was able to plot backwards the age of the Albanian language,that it was the oldest language in europe,if not the world itself.

Albanian wouldnt be even close to the oldest in Europe, never mind the world. The first verifiable Albanian was written down as late as the 15th century. Indeed outside the romance languages(greek/latin) Irish would be up there as one of the oldest local languages written down. Way before Albanian anyway. Oldest in Europe may be Basque as it has bugger all links to the rest of the indo european languages. I wonder would Enkidu, who defo has more knowledge of this stuff, be able to see if there are any vague connections between Basque and the "gaelic" languages? Lithuanian would be another old one. Worldwide, Hebrew and Aramaic would be older again and AFAIK Tamil is very old.

I reckon your Latvian guy was just bigging up his culture more than having any basis in fact. You hear Irish people say similar about Irish as the oldest language, but they're on more solid ground. Certainly as a local written language.

Add to the pot the fact that europe was all joined up at some stage and the earths plates seperated to form continents,

Yes and no. It's a question of when. The continental plates have moved very little since the evolution of modern humans, so one can discount that. These islands were joined up with europe when sea levels were lower in the ice ages. The last time was 8000 odd years ago. After which we were islands again.

most records were kept by the church and nobody knows who the nine hostages were that gave Niall his name.

Well they were the only ones on the ground who were keeping records. Thankfully and out of character with other Christians in europe, the early Irish church was only too willing to record the local stuff. Indeed they're among the oldest records of non romance language legends in Europe. Well they were the only ones capable of writing the stuff down. Up to that point we were an oral tradition. Without them we would know nothing of the Tain, or any of the early legends.

fontanalis · 04-10-2010 2:09pm

oflynno wrote: »

Crikey

did i start a debate or what?

i wanted to find out more about whereabouts my ancestors came from,and how little relevant history we were taught in primary and secondary school.the excuse seems to be that we are too old as a country to keep tabs on what happenened and when.

i enjoy hearing a name and being able to roughly track where it came from,down to a county,area,or rough background.

it doesnt take much to see that my name is O' Flynn.according to mixture of genealogical companies,it originated from the word Ruddy,or Reddish(being the hair colour/complextion of the people at some stage)

from finding out where various families of O' Flynn/Flynn originated from too,a main body seems to be in Roscommon or West Cork
also popped up that the name in some areas is linked with Lynn,where it was anglicised from e.g John of the Lynn Family to John of Lynn to John O'Flynn.
The O'Flynn vs Flynn argument depends on who wrote the name down for census/written/legal reasons,again matter of opinion.

Here is my take on some myth or legend

The story of the Fir Bolg is plausible,as they are described as an Ugly race(would this tie in with the Neanderthal?),they werent very pretty.
Also I believe,some Fir Bolg people survive(check out the nightclubs on any weekend)

The language thing confuses me though,about celtic language.i had a chat with a random Latvian guy i met at work a few years ago and he was able to plot backwards the age of the Albanian language,that it was the oldest language in europe,if not the world itself.
Most Celtic reference pictures seem to show more Norse traits than Irish/Welsh/Scottish traits

Bringing me back to my own name,generations of my grandfather and before seem to have passed down the notion that the O'Flynn or Flynn people came from the Nordic countries.it waould be nice to have some proof,or a place name to back it up.
i dont think it will be as simple as hopping on a plane and looking for cousins in Norway though.

Add to the pot the fact that europe was all joined up at some stage and the earths plates seperated to form continents,most records were kept by the church and nobody knows who the nine hostages were that gave Niall his name.

Out of interest, have you any pcitures to show us?

Off topic but is there any connection between the two images below, obviously the cuchuilainn one is only recent with "The dying Gaul" being very old. Anyone know the history of the cuchulainn one?

Anyway, as Wibbs has said describing someone as trollish or ugly was a way to denigrate them and give the more recent crowd some legitimacy as with trying to link the milesains to the bible.

Wibbs · 04-10-2010 3:18pm

Well the dying Gaul is likely more accurate picture of mid european "celt" anyway. I gather its a copy of an earlier sculpture? He's got the spiky hair and torc around his neck, the sword and a horn lying on his shield.

The cuchuilainn one in the GPO is early 20th century IIRC? With a definite victorian ideal to it. The sword looks more greek than celt to me? Nicely done mind.

oflynno · 04-10-2010 6:32pm

the images i was on about are the likes of this one

images%3Fq%3Dnatural%2Bhistory%2Bmuseum%2Bthe%2Bcelts%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26client%3Dfirefox-a%26rls%3Dorg.mozilla:en-GB:official%26biw%3D1016%26bih%3D570%26tbs%3Disch:1&um=1&itbs=1&iact=rc&dur=119&ei=IA6qTITbPMuu4Ab7-KGlDQ&oei=5Q2qTMXwKtq5jAfn84iFDQ&esq=10&page=1&ndsp=17&ved=1t:429,r:4,s:0&tx=73&ty=77

images%3Fq%3Dnatural%2Bhistory%2Bmuseum%2Bthe%2Bcelts%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26client%3Dfirefox-a%26rls%3Dorg.mozilla:en-GB:official%26biw%3D1016%26bih%3D570%26tbs%3Disch:1&um=1&itbs=1&iact=rc&dur=119&ei=IA6qTITbPMuu4Ab7-KGlDQ&oei=5Q2qTMXwKtq5jAfn84iFDQ&esq=10&page=1&ndsp=17&ved=1t:429,r:4,s:0&tx=73&ty=77

and the likes of these men,with viking looking moustaches

images%3Fq%3Dancient%2Bceltic%2Bwarrior%2Bimage%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26client%3Dfirefox-a%26rls%3Dorg.mozilla:en-GB:official%26biw%3D1016%26bih%3D570%26tbs%3Disch:10%2C1821&um=1&itbs=1&iact=hc&vpx=118&vpy=237&dur=2940&hovh=225&hovw=225&tx=110&ty=98&ei=Zw-qTNe6DsyM4gaH982lDQ&oei=OA-qTPjjAsiQjAfK5Jz4DA&esq=6&page=5&ndsp=22&ved=1t:429,r:8,s:71&biw=1016&bih=570

images%3Fq%3Dancient%2Bceltic%2Bwarrior%2Bimage%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26client%3Dfirefox-a%26rls%3Dorg.mozilla:en-GB:official%26biw%3D1016%26bih%3D570%26tbs%3Disch:10%2C1821&um=1&itbs=1&iact=hc&vpx=118&vpy=237&dur=2940&hovh=225&hovw=225&tx=110&ty=98&ei=Zw-qTNe6DsyM4gaH982lDQ&oei=OA-qTPjjAsiQjAfK5Jz4DA&esq=6&page=5&ndsp=22&ved=1t:429,r:8,s:71&biw=1016&bih=570

i know these arent exactly photos from the day,but are they realistic depictions of what celts looked like?

goose2005 · 04-10-2010 7:21pm

fontanalis wrote: »

I read somewhere about possible links between Southern Wales and Wexford. Might explain that accent!
Is there evidence of Celtic languages being spoken around the North Sea coast.

I think those immigrations from Wales were far more recent. Explains the predominance of Welsh surnames (e.g. Griffin from ap Grufydd) in Wexford

fontanalis wrote: »

I read they are a recent creation, used almost as a justification for the Ulster plantation.

No, the Cruthin appear in many early sources, the name coming from Qritani - related to Pretani, from which "Britain" derives.

mikhail · 04-10-2010 8:36pm

A few pages back, I asked if there were examples known of a language coming to dominate a community without a significant immigration.

Some previous posts mentioned that the English are not genetically Germanic.

However, modern English is Germanic with a strong influence from French (via the Norman invasion) and a lesser influence directly from Latin (via its scholarly use or the Roman invasion or both?). Old English is very Germanic. Do we know how that came to pass?

fontanalis · 04-10-2010 8:55pm

mikhail wrote: »

A few pages back, I asked if there were examples known of a language coming to dominate a community without a significant immigration.

Some previous posts mentioned that the English are not genetically Germanic.

However, modern English is Germanic with a strong influence from French (via the Norman invasion) and a lesser influence directly from Latin (via its scholarly use or the Roman invasion or both?). Old English is very Germanic. Do we know how that came to pass?

I think it's due to the East Coasts proximity to the countries on mainland Europe that border the North Sea. There was supposed to be a lot of back and forth between these two regions for a long time and of course there was the Saxon (may have been a term to bundle together Angles, Jutes and Saxons) take over in the 4th or 5th century.
In Origins of the British, Stephen Oppenheimer claims there may have been a Southern Swedish influence on the development of English, one point I remember was that Beawulf is suppsoed to be one of the main early English works of literature but it describes events in Sweden.

Enkidu · 04-10-2010 9:11pm

Wibbs wrote: »

Albanian wouldn't be even close to the oldest in Europe, never mind the world. The first verifiable Albanian was written down as late as the 15th century. Indeed outside the romance languages(greek/latin) Irish would be up there as one of the oldest local languages written down. Way before Albanian anyway. Oldest in Europe may be Basque as it has bugger all links to the rest of the indo european languages. I wonder would Enkidu, who defo has more knowledge of this stuff, be able to see if there are any vague connections between Basque and the "gaelic" languages? Lithuanian would be another old one. Worldwide, Hebrew and Aramaic would be older again and AFAIK Tamil is very old.

I reckon your Latvian guy was just bigging up his culture more than having any basis in fact. You hear Irish people say similar about Irish as the oldest language, but they're on more solid ground. Certainly as a local written language.

This is a great thread I must say. Albanian is weird one. It is tentatively put in its own separate subfamily of Indo-European, although the linguistic community believes (linguists are a very tentative crowd, the evidence is actually enormous) that it's just the last remaining member of an older group of languages called the Balkan languages. Despite the name this group didn't include Greek which is a Hellenic language.

Of course it isn't the oldest by a long shot. The real oldest Indo-European language is either Icelandic or Sanskrit. Sanskrit still has a few speakers, but some argue that it isn't really evolving or organic and hence is dead. For example it isn't really any different from a bunch of kids in a few villages in Italy being raised to speak grammatically perfect senatorial Latin in addition to everyday Italian.

Icelandic on the other hand is vibrant and grammatically conservative enough to deal with the modern world and still be the same language it was a millennium ago. Icelandic is conservative enough to be essentially the last surviving dialect of Old Norse, the language of the Vikings. A modern day Icelander can read the old Eddas. Of course there are anachronisms and the script is different, but a few anachronisms and funny letters aren't the reason I can't read Beowulf.

Basque and Gaelic is a very interesting one. Obviously there was a language here before Gaelic and this language was almost certainly a language of Old Europe* like Basque. It is thought it influenced Irish through certain words and grammatical features. The collection of theories related to it is known as the goidelic substrate hypothesis.
Ironically the Old European languages related to Basque were in quite a healthy state in France and Spain until the expansion of the Celtic languages. So you could say the grandfather of Irish killed the siblings of Basque!

*Old Europe is a generic term for Europe before the arrival of Indo-European culture and languages.

fontanalis · 04-10-2010 9:48pm

A bit more info on languages.
https://pantherfile.uwm.edu/noonan/www/Celtic%20lecture.IE.pdf

fontanalis · 04-10-2010 10:01pm

oflynno wrote: »

the images i was on about are the likes of this one

and the likes of these men,with viking looking moustaches

i know these arent exactly photos from the day,but are they realistic depictions of what celts looked like?

Who knows, celts from a language speaking people point of view covered a wide group, the romantic notion of celts is just that, a romantic notion.
Like you say the pictures aren't from the day and may reflect the artists own idea.
But then again porn star taches could have been all the rage back then

oflynno · 04-10-2010 11:37pm

fontanalis wrote: »

Who knows, celts from a language speaking people point of view covered a wide group, the romantic notion of celts is just that, a romantic notion.
Like you say the pictures aren't from the day and may reflect the artists own idea.
But then again porn star taches could have been all the rage back then

i dont know where they went?
i will try and reattach them again tomorrow
i am really enjoying this thread to be honest and i'm learning loads.

mikhail · 05-10-2010 12:15am

fontanalis wrote: »

I think it's due to the East Coasts proximity to the countries on mainland Europe that border the North Sea. There was supposed to be a lot of back and forth between these two regions for a long time and of course there was the Saxon (may have been a term to bundle together Angles, Jutes and Saxons) take over in the 4th or 5th century.
In Origins of the British, Stephen Oppenheimer claims there may have been a Southern Swedish influence on the development of English, one point I remember was that Beawulf is suppsoed to be one of the main early English works of literature but it describes events in Sweden.

It's interesting to see that once again, we don't really know. I guess linguistic scholarship must be very frustrating once you start to pre-date extensive written artefacts.

goose2005 · 05-10-2010 1:22am

The real oldest Indo-European language is either Icelandic or Sanskrit.

Actually the oldest Indo-European written language is either Luwian or Minoan, both of which go back to c.1800 BC. All Indo-European languages are derived from Proto-Indo-European, spoken c. BC.

Two speculative PIE sentences:

ʕʷeuis iosmi ʕuelʔn neʔst ʔekuns ʔe 'dērkt, tom 'gʷrʕeum uogom ugentm, tom m'geʕm borom, tom dgmenm ʔoʔku brentm. ʔe uēukʷt ʕʷeuis ʔkumus: kʷntske ʔmoi kērt ʕnerm ui'denti ʔekuns ʕ'gentm. ʔe ueukʷnt ʔkeus: kludi ʕʷuei, kʷntske nsmi kērt ui'dntsu: ʕnēr potis ʕʷuiom ʕulʔenm subi gʷormom uestrom kʷrneuti, ʕʷuimus kʷe ʕuelʔn neʔsti. To'd kekluus ʕʷeuis ʕe'grom ʔe bēu'gd.

Which meant:
A sheep that had no wool saw horses, one of them pulling a heavy wagon, one carrying a big load, and one carrying a man quickly. The sheep said to the horses: "My heart pains me, seeing a man driving horses". The horses said: "Listen, sheep, our hearts pain us when we see this: a man, the master, makes the wool of the sheep into a warm garment for himself. And the sheep has no wool". Having heard this, the sheep fled into the plain.

and

Pótis gʰe ʔest. Só-kʷe n̥gn̥ʔtós ʔest, sū́num-kʷe wl̥next. So ǵʰutérm̥ pr̥ket: "Sū́nus moi gn̥hjotām!" ǵʰutḗr nu pótim weukʷet: "Jégeswo gʰi déiwom Wérunom." úpo pro pótis-kʷe déiwom sesore déiwom-kʷe jegto. "Kludʰí moi, dejwe Werune!" Só nu km̥ta diwós gʷāt. "Kʷód wl̥nexsi?" "Wl̥néxmi sū́num." "Tód ʔestu", wéwkʷet lewkós déjwos. Pótnī gʰi sū́num gegonʔe.

Which meant:
Once there was a king. He was childless. The king wanted a son. He asked his priest: "May a son be born to me!" The priest said to the king: "Pray to the god Werunos". The king approached the god Werunos to pray now to the god. "Hear me, father Werunos!" The god Werunos came down from heaven. "What do you want?" "I want a son." "Let this be so", said the bright god Werunos. The king's lady bore a son.

Ponster · 05-10-2010 7:30am

oflynno wrote: »

i dont know where they went?

Enkidu · 05-10-2010 8:46am

goose2005 wrote: »

Actually the oldest Indo-European written language is either Luwian or Minoan, both of which go back to c.1800 BC. All Indo-European languages are derived from Proto-Indo-European, spoken c. BC.

We have no idea if Minoan was Indo-European or not. Luwian is one of the first Indo-European languages, but it's not the oldest since it is now dead. Proto-Anatolian would have been an even earlier language.

The "First" Irish people

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