The Picts were they Celts ?

[Paskal]

Hello everyone,

The Picts were they Celts ?

Paskal

[Deleted User]

The term “Celt” is best used as a descriptive word for culture. You seem to be giving it the outmoded form of some sort of racial designation. My apologies if I’ve read this incorrectly.

The Picts were, of course,  a confederation of peoples who lived in what is today eastern and northern Scotland during the Late Iron Age and Early Medieval periods. They spoke the Pictish language, which was closely related to the Celtic Brittonic language spoken by the Britons who lived to the south of them. I should mention the Venerable Bede & less venerable modern folk, claim Pictish to be an entirely separate language, unrelated to Celtic.

My view is this is wrong.

Further, the Picts are assumed to have been the descendants of the Caledonii and other tribes that were mentioned by Roman historians. Thus, it is reasonably safe to assume the Picts were the descendants of the indigenous hunter-gatherers who entered Alba after the last Ice Age and a group who, like most of the inhabitants of the British isles, had absorbed some Celtic culture.

It is probably useful to imagine cultural exchanges to be two-way, of course. So: “The Celts were they Picts”? is about as accurate as your original query.

irann uract cheuc chrocs,

donald

[Paskal]

The term “Celt” is better used as a descriptive word for culture?

I seem to give it the old-fashioned form of some sort of racial designation?

Yes that’s what I’m doing and I’m sorry, if you misunderstood …

A culture ?

You can love or adopt the culture of a people, you would never be part of it, because when you are something, you are by the blood, not loving or adopting its culture, or by asking and receiving such or such nationality as we do now …

The Celts are an ethnic group (this not to speak of races …), which linked the members of this ethnic group it was their languages ​​and their blood, so the Celtic languages ​​which made their ethnic origin common, Celtic in fact. ..

the Picts are supposed to be the descendants of the Caledonii and other tribes mentioned by Roman historians? The Caledonians were south of the Picts and after having suffered for 3 years, the assaults of the Roman army of Septime Severe, the Picts could absorb them …

So the Caledonians were not the descendants of the Picts since they were their contemporaries …

[Tony Hughes]

It is a very old fashioned view to consider that ethnicity is always directly linked with blood relationship. There are so many instances of a coherent culture that spans people of very mixed origins that it is no longer considered valid. The Celts are one of the very obvious exceptions to the old way of thinking – the genetic connections between Celtic cultures across Europe are often minimal. Language is a strong cultural force but not always a determinant. The Jewish tribes adopted the common language of Aramaic without actually changing their own culture significantly.

Caledonii & Pictii were names given to them by foreigners, nobody is really sure what they called themselves and no written Pictish survives (AFAIK), though it is said that they were literate. Relying on Romans for the internal history of a ‘barbarian’ country is notoriously unsafe without some other evidence.

 

[Steelonsand]

I would second the posters above – my take would be ‘Celtic’ is a cultural thing that formed an identity that was strongly identified with by potentially many ethnicities, and then grew perhaps to characterise those groups…, stretching a point here, somewhat anachronistically, but look at the prevalence of late twentieth century popular culture based around music of mostly Black American/Afro Caribbean origin…..

Clothes, fashion, language, social interaction, music, all having commonalities – a value of ‘Cool’ that makes it irresistible and becomes an identifier of so much more than its origins…..

Hypothetical historians in the far future might easily fall into putting us all into one pot with a convenient identifier, given how similar depictions and artefacts of our current culture might appear…..

 

[Paskal]

I do not know if it is a very old vision to consider that ethnicity is always directly related to blood relations, but it is the best and it comes back to fashion, stop usurpations of identities …

It’s the blood that makes the ethnic origin!

It is true that there are many examples of a coherent culture that includes people from a wide variety of backgrounds, but  culture and ethnicity origins are two different things!

The genetic links between the Celtic peoples in Europe are not minimal and if the language was a strong and decisive cultural force in the distant past, it is no longer so because to speak the language of this ethnic group does not mean that belongs to it.

The Caledonians and the pictes for the little we know about them were  different

[A Lot of Gaul]

Someone Pict a fight. 

"Ventosa viri restabit." ~ Harry Field

[Deleted User]

Paskal wrote:

. The Caledonians and the pictes for the little we know about them were different

No, this is wrong. Both names are what the Romans called confederation of tribes in the same area. The confederations may have changed but the people were essentially the same ones: or are you proposing the Picts came from Scythia????

I think you are confusing the Picts & the Scotti.

The idea of a an ethnic group called ‘The Celts’ is C19th romantic nonsense.

donald

BTW Tony, there is some Ogham script. nI ended my first post with a bit of Pictish Ogham. It means, very roughly, “Iain made this cross”

[Whirlwind]

Paskal wrote:

The genetic links between the Celtic peoples in Europe are not minimal

Hold on, I thought those links were minimal

[Deleted User]

Whirlwind wrote:

Paskal wrote:

The genetic links between the Celtic peoples in Europe are not minimal

Hold on, I thought those links were minimal

What an excellent article on the study of ethnicity in the UK. Many thanks.

 

donald

[Paskal]

Donald Ochoin The Caledonians lived well south of the Picts …

Severe Septim attacks have so weakened the Caledonians that the Picts were able to conquer them …

I do not confuse the pictes (which were perhaps brittonic Celts) and the scots, name given to the Irish of antiquity (and who are Gaelic Celts) …

The scots will create the kingdom of Dal Riada then found Scotland with the Picts …

If the Picts had not been so weak this country should have been called Pictland …

The idea of ​​an ethnic group called ‘The Celts’ is C19th romantic nonsense? Come tell us that in Brittany, you will see the difference between the Cornish and Britonnics Celts, (Bretons) the Gallic Celts (Descendant of the Gallo-Romans who occupied Armorica at the time of Caesar (now Brittany) and the rest….

To make studies on the genetic origins of our days is to die of laughing seen all the mixtures that there was …

I guarantee you that at the beginning of the Dark Ages, the peoples of the present British Isles of the time knew their differences,  Britonnics Celts ,  Gaelic Celts, Cornish Celts, Germans (many of whom were Proto-Scandinavian when they came from Denmark) and Scandinavians …

[Steelonsand]

Ahh….. Being ‘Celt-ic’…..

(Until recently!) I was European

I am Caucasian

I am White

I am a British subject/citizen

I am English

I could be said to be a White Anglo Saxon Protestant

I have Welsh (uh-oh…..’Celt-ic!) ancestry……

I am from Western Europe…….

How will I be defined or described fifteen hundred years from now?

answers on a postcard please……

 

[Mike]

Steelonsand wrote:

How will I be defined or described fifteen hundred years from now?

Our immortal emperor, purger of heresy and saviour of humanity?

[Paskal]

Yes it’s a bit like you just – Caucasian type then Aryan (white) then Celtic then Cornish Celts then Breton..

Some Bretons are Britonnics Celts, but it’s not the majority…

Nationality Beurkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkk ! No interest since we can change as a shirt …

European but  some confuse this with being white…? Yes if you want, but there is no European nationality, it’s just a continent, namely a geographical expression…

[Paskal]

Yes you are right, the Picts must have been ******* LOL

[Whirlwind]

Paskal wrote:

Yes you are right, the Picts must have been niggers LOL

Paskal, using that n-word for people is really offensive in the UK, maybe you could delete or amend?

[Mike]

Whirlwind wrote:

Paskal, using that n-word for people is really offensive in the UK, maybe you could delete or amend?

It is really offensive pretty much everywhere in the world, TWW included.
Please remove.

[Paskal]

So now, with all this discussion, I wonder if the Picts were they human beings ? But now I should I be careful because there may be some picts on this forum ?

[Mike]

Paskal wrote:

Yes – even though I’m not British I remove – But now I do not even know if the Picts were they human beings ?

What do you think they were?

[Whirlwind]

Paskal wrote:

So now, with all this discussion, I wonder if the Picts were they human beings ? But now I should I be careful because there may be some picts on this forum ?

Paskal, I am really not sure where you are going with this.  Anyway, apparently there isn’t a particularly strong “Celtic” identity in genetic terms, or “blood”, if you prefer.  IIRC there was some speculative talk a couple of years back about a gene which did appear more commonly in Scottish men than other men in the UK and which ‘might’ indicate a particularly ‘Pictish’ gene, although the summaries I read didn’t indicate why it was more likely to be ‘Pictish’ than some other group of people that were linked to Scotland.  Search for ‘Pictish Gene’ to find the stories.

On the other hand,  I guess that you could consider them ‘Celtic’ from certain cultural viewpoints precisely because they did share cultural similarities despite the lack of any strong genetic connection between different ‘Celtic’ groups.

[Tony Hughes]

I can see where Pascal is going with this, in fact he has already gone too far with it already.

This time you are wrong in so many ways it would take a week to explain – but you would never listen to it, you rarely do listen to those who obviously know more than you and are not burdened with nationalistic preconceptions.

This is the last ‘discussion’ I’ll take part in with you and I’d ask others to show their disgust at your attitude by doing the same.

 

 

[Paskal]

@Mike    Picts ?  The Picts were they Picts ? What remains to prove…

@Whirlwind     Yes the Picts were not Celts because the Celts do not exist, the Germans do not exist either, the Cheyenne no more than the others ect…and we are all the same.

[Mike]

Paskal wrote:

@Mike Picts ? What remains to prove…

@Whirlwind Yes the Picts were not Celts because the Celts do not exist, the Germans do not exist either, the Cheyenne no more than the others ect…and we are all the same.

Why do you think the picts are not human?

[Whirlwind]

Deleted User wrote:

What an excellent article on the study of ethnicity in the UK. Many thanks.

Happy it was of interest Donald.

[Paskal]

I do not know, look, here are pictures of them from their time !

Pictes Haches

[Mike]

Paskal wrote:

I do not know, look, here are pictures of them from their time !

http://conan.paintings.free.fr/?page_id=1362&lang=fr

That is a modern drawing of a fantasy race from a fictional world.
You know that I hope, so back to my question, if you please.

Why do you think the Picts are not human?
If you have no sensible answer I will have to assume you are trolling.

[Paskal]

No, but as was to be expected with this kind of discusion, there are some who have benefited from it, it’s like that when we talk about ethnic origin, of course that it was about humans, now people who do not react not so, could have answered :

“The Picts were they Celts ?Probably not, very different origins they were probably the last of the native peoples of the continent. The Pictish culture was very different to Celto germanic tribes. Little gold no metals, still using flint arrow heads, poisoned. Evolved very quickly and disappeared / absorbed by the Celtic Scotti.

But according to Wikipedia yes.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Picts

I’ll have to re-read THE AGE OF ARTHUR by John Morris

 

[Who Asked This Joker]

Bede probably actually knew a Pict or two.  Either they could speak a language different from English or Brithonic/Welsh, or they spoke English with a rather impenetrable accent like many might speak a second language.  Either way, it suggests that they spoke something else other than English or Brithonic/Welsh.  It also might suggest that their language blended with other languages spoken in the area much like Brithonic was a blend of the Celtic language and Latin.

I believe there is one “origins legend” of the Picts dealing somehow with the Irish.  A tribe landed in Ireland and the Picts wanted to stay.  But the Irish said they could not but could settle in lands to the east.  As payment for their help in settling this land, the Picts would adopt the Irish custom of every other leader would be a Queen instead of a King.   It’s off  the top of my head.  I don’t remember where I read it.  That this legend exists further suggests that maybe the Picts came from some place else.  Maybe they were very early Norse?  It would be hard to prove or disprove since the Northmen used Scotland as their stomping grounds at a much later date which would likely taint any evidence for or against.

John

"Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man's character, give him power."

--Abraham Lincoln

[Steve Burt]

Why ask a question if you don’t want to listen to any of the answers?

The Celts are not a race in any sense of the term. They share related languages and some culture.

[Not Connard Sage]

Steve Burt wrote:

Why ask a question if you don’t want to listen to any of the answers? .

 

He’s back on ignore. I urge everyone else to do the same. Lacking an audience here he may find another home more receptive to his views.

 

Obvious contrarian and passive aggressive old prat, who is taken far too seriously by some and not seriously enough by others.

[Steelonsand]

Nice picture of a troll….. Or is it a pict? 

To be fair to Paskal – he phrased a legitimate question, but I think things get difficult when it is hard to come up with a definite or definitive answer……..  I guess we will never know for sure exactly who or what the Picts were, or where they come from, but isn’t it that hint of mystery that makes them so enigmatic and interesting in the first place?

Experts in what artefacts/places/…..traces they may have left behind can speak with as much authority as possible as to their likely origins and affiliations…. But at such a remove, there will always be an element of doubt and speculation, won’t there?

I think all shades of opinion can cloak themselves in the midst of just such obscurity…..

[Shahbahraz]

I live in what would have been part of the old Pictish heartland. We know a surprising amount about them, and far from the supposed flint-using savages, they lived in complex urban centres, carved in stone, and were to all intents and purposes exactly the same as us.

Locally the tradition is that dark hair and blue eyes are ‘Pictish’ markers, but that’s in all likelihood, an old wives tale. Frankly, tales told of mysterious savages in far away lands by Roman are a constant trope. At not too far a remove from the period when the Pictii were supposed to be mysterious and dangerous creatures, Herodotus was regaling audiences with far more outlandish tales about lands to the East.  Given that very few travellers would be calling them lies, I suspect all sorts of stories were circulated about these dangerous outsiders.

From what I recall, we don’t know for certain who the Picts were related to, but they were Crannog and Broch builders, had a matrilineal line, and traded extensively. They also had very sophisticated carvings skills, and left many monuments.

--An occasional wargames blog: http://aleadodyssey.blogspot.co.uk/ --

[Deleted User]

Shahbahraz wrote:

I live in what would have been part of the old Pictish heartland. .

Dad was a Fifer with his family living near Pitlochry (oooh, Pict-lochry!!) I have dark hair & blue eyes like him. Mum’s family are Outer Hebridean & several of my sisters have red hair. It is entirely probable that my ancestors were Picts, Scotti, & maybe with a dash of Norse (amongst who knows & who cares what other admixtures). But it’s like taking these Ancestory DNA tests: a footling conceit that tries to make something profound out nothing very important.

Culture is everything, ethnicity a will-o-the-wisp. Anyone like to explain what a “ethnic” Roman of the period looked like?

donald

[Oh no….]

He just doing his usual……………… oh dear, how sad………

I do wonder why my ignore this user setting doesn’t seem to work on Paskal?

[Mike]

As not everyone can respond to comments here, please be wary of who you talk about, as they may not be able to reply, and also it is a bit uncool.
Please do have a discussion about the topic though, maybe…
But please try to refrain from making digs* at people..

Ta and all that.

*unless the archaeological kind. 😀

[Guy Farrish]

Picts? Celts? Probably. Define Celt. Culture. Ethnicity, define? Not race.  Race – no.

Genetics – b****y difficult. DNA , needs a lot of interpretation – I’ve seen several different interpretations of Brits genetic sampling over the last 20 years proving anything from Roswell to Cheddar man. Too complex to prove anything yet. We ‘Celts’ have to stick together. I’m German, Polish, English, Welsh, Scottish, Irish, French and a few other bits and bobs that I know about – no DNA testing required – gawd knows what would turn up if I did?!

So Picts? People mate, people.

[Norm S]

I am not at all familiar with the subject, so I am not charging anything for this opininion  but I always thought that the Celts, were rather like the Romans, from the point of view that they were a single culture who essentially became and had the hallmarks of empire and so spread a mix of empire based influences across a large area and left a legacy of such influnces. The Picts on the other hand were a later group, who’s centre of gravity was in Scotland and who would have been (like everyone else) touched by Celt cultural influences. They eventually gave way to the power and expansion of the Scotti.

[Deleted User]

Excellent Norm. There are many theories & theories, like noses, are meant to be picked (or is that Pict?). Yours are as good as any.

 

cheers, donald

[Joe]

yikes

[Thaddeus Blanchette]

Just speaking as someone who gets paid to teach about culture, race, and ethnicity: culture isn’t carried in the blood or the DNA. Paskal is right about one thing, however. Identity is made up of two parts: what you say you are and what other people say you are. Some human groups are more accepting of letting oursiders in than others, but in times of comflict or stress, one’s origins will surely be remembered. As for this being a “new” thing (exchange of group members), it’s been going on forever. In fact, if you believe French anthropologist Leví-Strauss, exchange of group members is the rock upon which post-cognitive revolution human sociability is founded.

It should also be remarked that every group has mechanisms for expulsing members, too. So no, one’s culture isn’t carried in one’s blood and one’s birth doesn’t necessarily determine what one is.

Of course, I am speaking as an immigrant, myself, so I would say that, neh? I never had much pacience for “blood and land” essentialist theories of human identity, however.

I would imagine that as neighboring peoples, the Picts and Celts exchanged languages, culture, and DNA on a regular basis and that there were probably “ pictish” groups and individuals considered to be celts and vice versa. That is the usually human pattern along a frontier of contact.

We get slapped around, but we have a good time!

[Author]

Posts