vania-janet/multiturn-rag-retrieval-data huggingface dataset:
Celts
The history of pre-Celtic Europe and the exact relationship between ethnic , linguistic and cultural factors in the Celtic world remains uncertain and controversial . The exact geographic spread of the ancient Celts is disputed ; in particular , the ways in which the Iron Age inhabitants of Great Britain and Ireland should be regarded as Celts have become a subject of controversy . According to one theory , the common root of the Celtic languages , the Proto - Celtic language , arose in the Late Bronze Age Urnfield culture of Central Europe , which flourished from around 1200 BC . According to a theory proposed in the 19th century , the first people to adopt cultural characteristics regarded as Celtic were the people of the Iron Age Hallstatt culture in central Europe ( c. 800 -- 450 BC ) , named for the rich grave finds in Hallstatt , Austria . Thus this area is sometimes called the `` Celtic homeland '' . By or during the later La Tène period ( c. 450 BC to the Roman conquest ) , this Celtic culture was supposed to have expanded by trans - cultural diffusion or migration to the British Isles ( Insular Celts ) , France and the Low Countries ( Gauls ) , Bohemia , Poland and much of Central Europe , the Iberian Peninsula ( Celtiberians , Celtici , Lusitanians and Gallaeci ) and northern Italy ( Golasecca culture and Cisalpine Gauls ) and , following the Celtic settlement of Eastern Europe beginning in 279 BC , as far east as central Anatolia ( Galatians ) in modern - day Turkey .
Celts
Little is known of family structure among the Celts . Patterns of settlement varied from decentralised to urban . The popular stereotype of non-urbanised societies settled in hillforts and duns , drawn from Britain and Ireland ( there are about 3,000 hill forts known in Britain ) contrasts with the urban settlements present in the core Hallstatt and La Tène areas , with the many significant oppida of Gaul late in the first millennium BC , and with the towns of Gallia Cisalpina .
Celts
The Romans knew the Celts then living in what became present - day France as Gauls . The territory of these peoples probably included the Low Countries , the Alps and present - day northern Italy . Julius Caesar in his Gallic Wars described the 1st - century BC descendants of those Gauls .
Celts
By the mid-1st millennium , with the expansion of the Roman Empire and migrating Germanic tribes , Celtic culture and Insular Celtic languages had become restricted to Ireland , the western and northern parts of Great Britain ( Wales , Scotland , and Cornwall ) , the Isle of Man , and Brittany . Between the 5th and 8th centuries , the Celtic - speaking communities in these Atlantic regions emerged as a reasonably cohesive cultural entity . They had a common linguistic , religious and artistic heritage that distinguished them from the culture of the surrounding polities . By the 6th century , however , the Continental Celtic languages were no longer in wide use .
Celts
In various 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 the Iberian Peninsula , in southwestern France , northern and western Britain , southern Ireland and Galatia and did not provide enough evidence for a cultural scenario comparable to that of Central Europe . It is considered equally difficult to maintain that the origin of the Peninsular Celts can be linked to the preceding Urnfield culture . This has resulted in a more recent approach that introduces a ' proto - Celtic ' substratum and a process of Celticisation , having its initial roots in the Bronze Age Bell Beaker culture .
Celts
In the 19th and 20th centuries , scholars commonly dated the `` arrival '' of Celtic culture in Britain ( via an invasion model ) to the 6th century BC , corresponding to archaeological evidence of Hallstatt influence and the appearance of chariot burials in what is now England . Some Iron Age migration does seem to have occurred but the nature of the interactions with the indigenous populations of the isles is unknown . In the late Iron Age . According to this model , by about the 6th century ( Sub-Roman Britain ) , most of the inhabitants of the Isles were speaking Celtic languages of either the Goidelic or the Brythonic branch . Since the late 20th century , a new model has emerged ( championed by archaeologists such as Barry Cunliffe and Celtic historians such as John T. Koch ) which places the emergence of Celtic culture in Britain much earlier , in the Bronze Age , and credits its spread not to invasion , but due to a gradual emergence in situ out of Proto - Indo - European culture ( perhaps introduced to the region by the Bell Beaker People , and enabled by an extensive network of contacts that existed between the peoples of Britain and Ireland and those of the Atlantic seaboard .
Celts
Archaeological evidence suggests that the pre-Roman Celtic societies were linked to the network of overland trade routes that spanned Eurasia . Archaeologists have discovered large prehistoric trackways crossing bogs in Ireland and Germany . Due to their substantial nature , these are believed to have been created for wheeled transport as part of an extensive roadway system that facilitated trade . The territory held by the Celts contained tin , lead , iron , silver and gold . Celtic smiths and metalworkers created weapons and jewellery for international trade , particularly with the Romans .
Celts
The native peoples under Roman rule became Romanised and keen to adopt Roman ways . Celtic art had already incorporated classical influences , and surviving Gallo - Roman pieces interpret classical subjects or keep faith with old traditions despite a Roman overlay .
Celts
Until the end of the 19th century , traditional scholarship dealing with the Celts did acknowledge their presence in the Iberian Peninsula as a material culture relatable to the Hallstatt and La Tène cultures . However , since according to the definition of the Iron Age in the 19th century Celtic populations were supposedly rare in Iberia and did not provide a cultural scenario that could easily be linked to that of Central Europe , the presence of Celtic culture in that region was generally not fully recognised . Modern scholarship , however , has clearly proven that Celtic presence and influences were most substantial in what is today Spain and Portugal ( with perhaps the highest settlement saturation in Western Europe ) , particularly in the central , western and northern regions .
Celts
Before the 19th century , scholars assumed that the original land of the Celts was west of the Rhine , more precisely in Gaul , because it was where Greek and Roman ancient sources , namely Caesar , located the Celts . This view was challenged by the 19th - century historian Marie Henri d'Arbois de Jubainville who placed the land of origin of the Celts east of the Rhine . Jubainville based his arguments on a phrase of Herodotus ' that placed the Celts at the source of the Danube , and argued that Herodotus had meant to place the Celtic homeland in southern Germany . The finding of the prehistoric cemetery of Hallstat in 1846 by Johan Ramsauer and the finding of the archaeological site of La Tène by Hansli Kopp in 1857 drew attention to this area .
Celts
Under Caesar the Romans conquered Celtic Gaul , and from Claudius onward the Roman empire absorbed parts of Britain . Roman local government of these regions closely mirrored pre-Roman tribal boundaries , and archaeological finds suggest native involvement in local government .
Celts
The western La Tène culture corresponds to historical 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 , material culture , and political affiliation 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 '' . 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 . Borders
Celts
The Hallstatt culture was succeeded by the La Tène culture of central Europe , which was overrun by the Roman Empire , though traces of La Tène style are still to be seen in Gallo - Roman artefacts . In Britain and Ireland La Tène style in art survived precariously to re-emerge in Insular art . Early Irish literature casts light on the flavour and tradition of the heroic warrior elites who dominated Celtic societies . Celtic river - names are found in great numbers around the upper reaches of the Danube and Rhine , which led many Celtic scholars to place the ethnogenesis of the Celts in this area .
Celtic Britons
The Britons , also known as Celtic Britons or Ancient Britons , were Celtic people who inhabited Great Britain from the British Iron Age into the Middle Ages , at which point their culture and language diverged into the modern Welsh , Cornish and Bretons ( among others ) . They spoke the Common Brittonic language , the ancestor to the modern Brittonic languages .
Celts
Polybius published a history of Rome about 150 BC in which he describes the Gauls of Italy and their conflict with Rome . 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 it was used by later writers such as Strabo . The latter , writing in the early 1st century AD , deals with Britain and Gaul as well as Hispania , Italy and Galatia . Caesar wrote extensively about his Gallic Wars in 58 -- 51 BC . Diodorus Siculus wrote about the Celts of Gaul and Britain in his 1st - century history .
Celts
Insular Celtic culture diversified into that of the Gaels ( Irish , Scottish and Manx ) and the Celtic Britons ( Welsh , Cornish , and Bretons ) of the medieval and modern periods . A modern Celtic identity was constructed as part of the Romanticist Celtic Revival in Great Britain , Ireland , and other European territories , such as Portugal and Spanish Galicia . Today , Irish , Scottish Gaelic , Welsh , and Breton are still spoken in parts of their historical territories , and Cornish and Manx are undergoing a revival .
Celts
Like other European Iron Age tribal societies , the Celts practised a polytheistic religion . Many Celtic gods are known from texts and inscriptions from the Roman period . Rites and sacrifices were carried out by priests known as druids . The Celts did not see their gods as having human shapes until late in the Iron Age . Celtic shrines were situated in remote areas such as hilltops , groves , and lakes .
Celts
The Celts were described by classical writers such as Strabo , Livy , Pausanias , and Florus as fighting like `` wild beasts '' , and as hordes . Dionysius said that their
Celts
Celt is a modern English word , first attested in 1707 , in the writing of Edward Lhuyd , whose work , along with that of other late 17th - century scholars , brought academic attention to the languages and history of the early Celtic inhabitants of Great Britain . The English form Gaul ( first recorded in the 17th century ) and Gaulish come from the French Gaule and Gaulois , a borrowing from Frankish * Walholant , `` Land of foreigners or Romans '' ( see Gaul : Name ) , the root of which is Proto - Germanic * walha - , `` foreigner , Roman , Celt '' , whence the English word Welsh ( Old English wælisċ < * walhiska - ) , South German welsch , meaning `` Celtic speaker '' , `` French speaker '' or `` Italian speaker '' in different contexts , and Old Norse valskr , pl . valir , `` Gaulish , French '' ) . Proto - Germanic * walha is derived ultimately from the name of the Volcae , a Celtic tribe who lived first in the south of Germany and in central Europe and then migrated to Gaul . This means that English Gaul , despite its superficial similarity , is not actually derived from Latin Gallia ( which should have produced * * Jaille in French ) , though it does refer to the same ancient region .
Celts
In the 1st century BC , Julius Caesar reported that the people known to the Romans as Gauls ( Galli ) called themselves Celts , which suggests that even if the name Keltoi was bestowed by the Greeks , it had been adopted to some extent as a collective name by the tribes of Gaul . The geographer Strabo , writing about Gaul towards the end of the first century BC , refers to the `` race which is now called both Gallic and Galatic , '' though he also uses the term Celtica as a synonym for Gaul , which is separated from Iberia by the Pyrenees . Yet he reports Celtic peoples in Iberia , and also uses the ethnic names Celtiberi and Celtici for peoples there , as distinct from Lusitani and Iberi . Pliny the Elder cited the use of Celtici in Lusitania as a tribal surname , which epigraphic findings have confirmed .
Celts
The first recorded use of the name of Celts -- as Κελτοί -- to refer to an ethnic group was by Hecataeus of Miletus , the Greek geographer , in 517 BC , when writing about a people living near Massilia ( modern Marseille ) . In the fifth century BC , Herodotus referred to Keltoi living around the head of the Danube and also in the far west of Europe . The etymology of the term Keltoi is unclear . Possible roots include Indo - European * kjel ' to hide ' ( present also in Old Irish ceilid ) , IE * kjel ' to heat ' or * kel ' to impel ' . Several authors have supposed it to be Celtic in origin , while others view it as a name coined by Greeks . Linguist Patrizia De Bernardo Stempel falls in the latter group , and suggests the meaning `` the tall ones '' .
Celts
In addition to Gauls infiltrating from the north of the Pyrenees , the Roman and Greek sources mention Celtic populations in three parts of the Iberian Peninsula : the eastern part of the Meseta ( inhabited by the Celtiberians ) , the southwest ( Celtici , in modern - day Alentejo ) and the northwest ( Gallaecia and Asturias ) . A modern scholarly review found several archaeological groups of Celts in Spain :
Celts
The Roman occupation of Gaul , and to a lesser extent of Britain , led to Roman - Celtic syncretism . In the case of the continental Celts , this eventually resulted in a language shift to Vulgar Latin , while the Insular Celts retained their language .
Celts
In contrast the less well known but often spectacular art of the richest earlier Continental Celts , before they were conquered by the Romans , often adopted elements of Roman , Greek and other `` foreign '' styles ( and possibly used imported craftsmen ) to decorate objects that were distinctively Celtic . After the Roman conquests , some Celtic elements remained in popular art , especially Ancient Roman pottery , of which Gaul was actually the largest producer , mostly in Italian styles , but also producing work in local taste , including figurines of deities and wares painted with animals and other subjects in highly formalised styles . Roman Britain also took more interest in enamel than most of the Empire , and its development of champlevé technique was probably important to the later Medieval art of the whole of Europe , of which the energy and freedom of Insular decoration was an important element . Rising nationalism brought Celtic revivals from the 19th century .
Celtic Britons
An undercurrent of British influence is found in some artefacts from the Roman period , such as the Staffordshire Moorlands Pan , and it appears that it was from this , passing to Ireland in the late Roman and post-Roman period , that the `` Celtic '' element in Early Medieval Insular art derived .
Celts
Myles Dillon and Nora Kershaw Chadwick accepted that `` the Celtic settlement of the British Isles '' might have to be dated to the Bell Beaker culture concluding that `` There is no reason why so early a date for the coming of the Celts should be impossible '' . Martín Almagro Gorbea proposed the origins of the Celts could be traced back to the 3rd millennium BC , also seeking the initial roots in the Beaker period , thus offering the wide dispersion of the Celts throughout western Europe , as well as the variability of the different Celtic peoples , and the existence of ancestral traditions an ancient perspective . Using a multidisciplinary approach , Alberto J. Lorrio and Gonzalo Ruiz Zapatero reviewed and built on Almagro Gorbea 's work to present a model for the origin of the Celtic archaeological groups in the Iberian Peninsula ( Celtiberian , Vetton , Vaccean , the Castro culture of the northwest , Asturian - Cantabrian and Celtic of the southwest ) and proposing a rethinking of the meaning of `` Celtic '' from a European perspective . More recently , John Koch and Barry Cunliffe have suggested that Celtic origins lie with the Atlantic Bronze Age , roughly contemporaneous with the Hallstatt culture but positioned considerably to the West , extending along the Atlantic coast of Europe .
Celts
Celtic art is generally used by art historians to refer to art of the La Tène period across Europe , while the Early Medieval art of Britain and Ireland , that is what `` Celtic art '' evokes for much of the general public , is called Insular art in art history . Both styles absorbed considerable influences from non-Celtic sources , but retained a preference for geometrical decoration over figurative subjects , which are often extremely stylised when they do appear ; narrative scenes only appear under outside influence . Energetic circular forms , triskeles and spirals are characteristic . Much of the surviving material is in precious metal , which no doubt gives a very unrepresentative picture , but apart from Pictish stones and the Insular high crosses , large monumental sculpture , even with decorative carving , is very rare ; possibly it was originally common in wood . Celts were also able to create developed musical instruments such as the carnyces , these famous war trumpets used before the battle to frighten the enemy , as the best preserved found in Tintignac ( Gaul ) in 2004 and which were decorated with a boar head or a snake head .
Celts
As there is no archaeological evidence for large - scale invasions in some of the other areas , one current school of thought holds that Celtic language and culture spread to those areas by contact rather than invasion . However , the Celtic invasions of Italy and the expedition in Greece and western Anatolia , are well documented in Greek and Latin history .
Celts
In some regards the Atlantic Celts were conservative : for example , they still used chariots in combat long after they had been reduced to ceremonial roles by the Greeks and Romans . However , despite being outdated , Celtic chariot tactics were able to repel the invasion of Britain attempted by Julius Caesar .
Celts
The Celtic languages form a branch of the larger Indo - European family . By the time speakers of Celtic languages entered history around 400 BC , they were already split into several language groups , and spread over much of Western continental Europe , the Iberian Peninsula , Ireland and Britain . The Greek historian Ephorus of Cyme in Asia Minor , writing in the 4th century BC , believed that 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 '' .
Celtic Britons
The earliest known reference to the inhabitants of Britain seems to come from 4th century BC records of the voyage of Pytheas , a Greek geographer who made a voyage of exploration around the British Isles between 330 and 320 BC . Although none of his own writings remain , writers during the time of the Roman Empire made much reference to them . Pytheas called the islands collectively αἱ Βρεττανίαι ( hai Brettaniai ) , which has been translated as the Brittanic Isles ; he also used the term Pretannike . The peoples of these islands were called the Πρεττανοί ( Prettanoi ) , Priteni , Pritani or Pretani . The group included Ireland , which was referred to as Ierne ( Insula sacra `` sacred island '' as the Greeks interpreted it ) `` inhabited by the race of Hiberni '' ( gens hibernorum ) , and Britain as insula Albionum , `` island of the Albions '' . The term Pritani may have reached Pytheas from the Gauls , who possibly used it as their term for the inhabitants of the islands .
Celts
Diodorus Siculus and Strabo both suggest that the heartland of the people they called Celts was in southern France . The former says that the Gauls were to the north of the Celts , but that the Romans referred to both as Gauls ( in linguistic terms the Gauls were certainly Celts ) . Before the discoveries at Hallstatt and La Tène , it was generally considered that the Celtic heartland was southern France , see Encyclopædia Britannica for 1813 .
Celts
Further south , Celts settled in Thrace ( Bulgaria ) , which they ruled for over a century , and Anatolia , where they settled as the Galatians ( see also : Gallic Invasion of Greece ) . Despite their geographical isolation from the rest of the Celtic world , the Galatians maintained their Celtic language for at least 700 years . St Jerome , who visited Ancyra ( modern - day Ankara ) in 373 AD , likened their language to that of the Treveri of northern Gaul .
Celts
Slavery , as practised by the Celts , was very likely similar to the better documented practice in ancient Greece and Rome . Slaves were acquired from war , raids , and penal and debt servitude . Slavery was hereditary , though manumission was possible . The Old Irish and Welsh words for ' slave ' , cacht and caeth respectively , are cognate with Latin captus ' captive ' suggesting that the slave trade was an early means of contact between Latin and Celtic societies . In the Middle Ages , slavery was especially prevalent in the Celtic countries . Manumissions were discouraged by law and the word for `` female slave '' , cumal , was used as a general unit of value in Ireland .
Celtic Britons
Although the La Tène style , which defines what is called Celtic art in the Iron Age , was late in arriving in Britain , after 300 BC the ancient British seem to have had generally similar cultural practices to the Celtic cultures nearest to them on the continent . There are significant differences in artistic styles , and the greatest period of what is known as the `` Insular La Tène '' style , surviving mostly in metalwork , was in the century or so before the Roman conquest , and perhaps the decades after it . By this time Celtic styles seem to have been in decline in continental Europe , even before Roman invasions .
Celts
Some scholars think that the Urnfield culture of western Middle Europe represents an origin for the Celts as a distinct cultural branch of the Indo - European family . This culture was preeminent in central Europe during the late Bronze Age , from circa 1200 BC until 700 BC , itself following the Unetice and Tumulus cultures . The Urnfield period saw a dramatic increase in population in the region , probably due to innovations in technology and agriculture .
Celts
The spread of iron - working led to the development of the Hallstatt culture directly from the Urnfield ( c. 700 to 500 BC ) . Proto - Celtic , the latest common ancestor of all known Celtic languages , is considered by this school of thought to have been spoken at the time of the late Urnfield or early Hallstatt cultures , in the early 1st millennium BC . The spread of the Celtic languages to Iberia , Ireland and Britain would have occurred during the first half of the 1st millennium BC , the earliest chariot burials in Britain dating to c. 500 BC . Other scholars see Celtic languages as covering Britain and Ireland , and parts of the Continent , long before any evidence of `` Celtic '' culture is found in archaeology . Over the centuries the language ( s ) developed into the separate Celtiberian , Goidelic and Brittonic languages .