FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   12   13   14   15   16   17   18   19   20   21   22   23   24   25   26   27   28   29   30   31   32   33   34   35   36  
37   38   39   40   41   42   43   44   45   46   47   48   49   50   51   52   53   54   55   56   57   58   59   60   61   >>   >|  
ore this conquest, the Celtae had already mingled with the aboriginal dolichocephalic folk of Gaul, Iberians, or Mediterraneans of Professor Sergi. The latter had apparently remained comparatively pure from admixture in Aquitaine, and are probably the Aquitani of Caesar.[10] But were the short, brachycephalic folk Celts? Caesar says the people who call themselves "Celtae" were called Gauls by the Romans, and Gauls, according to classical writers, were tall and fair.[11] Hence the Celtae were not a short, dark race, and Caesar himself says that Gauls (including Celtae) looked with contempt on the short Romans.[12] Strabo also says that Celtae and Belgae had the same Gaulish appearance, i.e. tall and fair. Caesar's statement that Aquitani, Galli, and Belgae differ in language, institutions, and laws is vague and unsupported by evidence, and may mean as to language no more than a difference in dialects. This is also suggested by Strabo's words, Celtae and Belgae "differ a little" in language.[13] No classical writer describes the Celts as short and dark, but the reverse. Short, dark people would have been called Iberians, without respect to skulls. Classical observers were not craniologists. The short, brachycephalic type is now prominent in France, because it has always been so, eliminating the tall, fair Celtic type. Conquering Celts, fewer in number than the broad and narrow-headed aborigines, intermarried or made less lasting alliances with them. In course of time the type of the more numerous race was bound to prevail. Even in Caesar's day the latter probably outnumbered the tall and fair Celts, who had, however, Celticised them. But classical writers, who knew the true Celt as tall and fair, saw that type only, just as every one, on first visiting France or Germany, sees his generalised type of Frenchman or German everywhere. Later, he modifies his opinion, but this the classical observers did not do. Caesar's campaigns must have drained Gaul of many tall and fair Celts. This, with the tendency of dark types to out-number fair types in South and Central Europe, may help to explain the growing prominence of the dark type, though the tall, fair type is far from uncommon.[14] (2) The second theory, already anticipated, sees in Gauls and Belgae a tall, fair Celtic folk, speaking a Celtic language, and belonging to the race which stretched from Ireland to Asia Minor, from North Germany to the Po, and were masters of Te
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   12   13   14   15   16   17   18   19   20   21   22   23   24   25   26   27   28   29   30   31   32   33   34   35   36  
37   38   39   40   41   42   43   44   45   46   47   48   49   50   51   52   53   54   55   56   57   58   59   60   61   >>   >|  



Top keywords:
Celtae
 

Caesar

 

classical

 
Belgae
 

language

 

Celtic

 
observers
 

writers

 

differ

 
Strabo

Germany

 

called

 

Romans

 
number
 
Iberians
 

Aquitani

 

France

 

brachycephalic

 
people
 

alliances


lasting

 

generalised

 

visiting

 

numerous

 

outnumbered

 

Celticised

 

Frenchman

 

prevail

 

Central

 

theory


anticipated

 

speaking

 
uncommon
 

belonging

 

masters

 
stretched
 

Ireland

 

prominence

 

growing

 

campaigns


opinion

 

modifies

 
drained
 

Europe

 

explain

 
tendency
 

German

 
describes
 
looked
 
contempt