Celtic Culture and the Arts

Celtic Culture and the Arts

The legacy the Celts and their culture have bestowed upon the face of civilization is powerful and enduring. With their rich and intriguing history, and their complex and beautiful beliefs, they have been a great influence in many aspects of present day life, from their art and innovations, to deeply rooted traditions modern humanity still

continues to preserve. It is through the examination of the Celtic culture as a whole, from their origins, tool usage and inventions, social systems, judicial systems, to their intricate spiritual beliefs that one is able to draw a strong sense of unity and connection to these mysterious people from whom most every Indo-European descendant draws

their ancestry. The Celts were a people unsurpassed in their skill and endurance as a culture, and even now, at the dawning of the new millennia, their influence and inspiration continues to be felt.

The Celts are thought to have originated in the area of what is now Central Europe, primarily east of the Rhine River, such as southern Germany, Austria, Slovakia, the Czech Republic, Hungary, or even so far as the Volga Steppes in western Russia at about 2000 BC (Pennick, 1997). These inhabitants were called the Beaker People, named for their tradition of burying pottery and various artifacts with their dead (Blundell, 1996).

By the twelve century BC, they had expanded across the continent until they dominated most of central, western and northwestern Europe.

There their culture flourished as they began to settle into an increasing agricultural lifestyle, gradually becoming less nomadic, and dependent of hunting and gathering as a primary means of survival. This is what is widely regarded as the Urnfield culture.

The Urnfielders, with their name derived from their practice of cremating

their dead, are now thought to be the immediate ancestors of the Celts as they had similar social and societal structures. It has even been suggested that the Urnfielders spoke an early form of Celtic language. The Celts emerged from this lineage at some point between 1200 to 700 BC. The traditional Celts were a result of a mixture

of many bloodlines from cultures during that period, ultimately arising from the interbreeding and mingling of of a variety of existing cultures and spiritual practices, eventually developing into the Celtic culture a...

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...int, or to ward off the mischievous “faery folk” or the little people. There still remains an order of Druids, a select group of neo-pagan priests who are dedicated to the preservation of the ancient belief system of their ancestors, the Celts.

With more pagan traditions emerging today from former Celtic traditions, such as that of Wicca and Druidry, the world, or so it seems, has never been more fascinated with the Celts. But, like anything else that has the power of endurance, the Celts as a people have changed in every aspect of their lives to adapt with the pressures facing

them, and thus, despite the resurgence of Celtic spiritualists, the original beliefs as the Celts once held them are now essentially lost, and will for the most part, remain forever unknown.

Bibliography

Blundell, Nigel

1999 Ancient England. Prospero Books, London.

Eddy, Steve

1999 Timeless Wisdom of the Celts. Hodder and Stoughton Publishing, London.

Lavin, Patrick

1999 The Celtic World. Hippocrene Books Inc., New York.

Pennick, Nigel

1997 The Sacred World of the Celts. Inner Traditions International, Rochester.

Piggot, Stuart

1996 The Druids. Thames and Hudson, London.