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Julian Cope presents Head Heritage

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National Geographic and Celts
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gorseddphungus
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kelt and kraut
Mar 15, 2006, 20:11
We should also think that there was a time only a thousand years earlier than the peat bog sacrifices (around the bronze age or earlier), when both celtic and germanic were exactly the same tribe and earlier than that, well into megalithic times, the population was essentially indistinguishable, look at neolithic cultures in europe at the time, they have common pottery 'cultures' that extend for hundreds of miles (although this is also partly due to trade).

But you're right,even in the Iron Age and in clear cases like the Belgae (later 'celtic' conquerors of britain) modern prehistorians find it hard to tell whether they were one thing or the other. And that is the part of Europe we were talking about earlier, the area 'bounded and joined' by the Rhine. And also, the fact that many Britons are said to have 'betrayed' their 'celtic' brethren by calling the saxons in is far too legendary. More likely, it was nearly impossible to distinguish one from the other at the time especially in central europe.

However, one thing must be taken into account. The Irish and the Danes were different in one respect - the amount of ancient culture they may have retained and the degree to which it was retained. As I said on my other reply to Fitzcoraldo, the 'Danes'/proto-Vikings etc were virtual newcomers who may have somewhat cornered the scandinavian natives (absorbing fewer elements from them) and brought in more IE culture than, say, the Irish or the Keltiberians who actually absorbed all the newcomers (if there were any IE migrations at all !) and thus kept far more original beliefs than the Danes. That's maybe why the Scando-Germanic kept Odin so clearly with little 'native' intervention.
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Re: kelt and kraut (PeterH)
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