# Galicia's disputed Celtic heritage



## AndrasBP

Hello,

The title of this thread is that of an article I've recently read. <<< LINK

In two of my books about European peoples and languages, and also in countless online articles and YouTube videos, Galicians are described as the "Celtic minority of Spain". 
These sources emphasize the similarity of Galician and Irish/Scottish/Breton folk music, how the Galician language "has preserved many Celtic words", and you can find videos where Scottish musicians visiting Galicia tell us that they feel really at home because of the music, the landscape and the weather.  

I'd like to focus on the language here: I've found a Wikipedia list of Galician words of Celtic origin, but most of these words seem to be shared by other Romance languages, including Spanish, Catalan, Occitan and French, so I'm not convinced that Galician is more Celtic than its sister languages.

Is Galicia's Celtic character supported by any linguistic or historical facts?


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## Penyafort

Take a look at any map of pre-Roman Iberia and you will see that Hispanic Celts occupied most of the western half of the Peninsula, the eastern half being occupied by Iberians, who most likely were not Indo-European. That is to say, inland central Castilians could perfectly claim being as Celtic by history.

Bagpipes are to be found all over Europe and beyond. In Spain alone, you have several types of bagpipe. It is true that Galicians are Asturians use it more often in their folklore -I don't know for how long it's been like this, though- but you've got _gaitas de boto_ in Aragon too, _sac de gemecs_ (wails' sack) in Catalonia or _xeremies _in Majorca, and they're at the other end of the Peninsula.

The Romance language in Spain less affected by Celts is probably Aragonese, grown on Basco-Iberian ground. All the others, and all Western Romance languages in general, have had their share of Celtic influence, whether Hispano-Celtic or Gaulish.


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## S1m0n

There is very little surviving even medieval influence in 'celtic' music; none, certainly, that would connect dark age Ireland to roman Galicia. What we think of as 'celtic music' - jigs and reels; set dances - was the popular music of 18th century Europe. Everyone who was anyone flocked to the Congress of Vienna at the end of the Napoleonic Wars, and from high society down to the common soldiers in their encampments, all were caught up in a new craze for dancing the Quadrille (aka dancing a set of quadrilles, aka set dancing, aka square dancing) When the congress broke up, the participants took the new steps back to their homes across the length and breadth of europe.
This music clung on in Ireland, Scotland, Cape Breton, Galicia, etc, not because these were celts, but because they were poor, and poor peasant cultures are more culturally conservative. They didn't travel much and didn't have much chance of learning the new dances - waltzes, etc, that supplanted the dances and music we now think of as celtic in higher society.
So I don't think the similarity of galician and Irish or scots music has much probative value in terms of kinship.


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## AndrasBP

Thank you for your insightful posts.

.

The Wikipedia page on Brittonic languages features a map which shows British Celtic settlement in Galicia in the 6th century. 
It looks dubious to me. What do you think?


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## Cossue

A Galician here.

The presence of a Britonic settlement in Galicia in the 6th-7th century is probably a well established fact. It is documented in the canons of the II Council of Braga [link], 572 CE, held at the petition of the Suevic king of Galicia Miro under the direction of a Pannonian, St. Martin of Braga. Among the attendant bishops there is a _Mailoc_ (< Proto-Celtic *_Magilākos_, I think, showing a Britonic evolution of /ā/) “Mailoc Britonensis ecclesiae episcopus his gestis subscripsi”. The Suevic kingdom was annexed by the Visigoths in 585. From that moment a Bishops of Britonia or of the Britons is present in several Councils of Toledo. Known names include _Sosa_, _Metopius_, _Bela_, which as long as I know are happax.

The second most important documentary evidence is another Suevic document preserved in several interpolated medieval copies, the _Divisio Theodemiri_ or _Parochiale Suevorum_ [link], dated in 569. It is an ecclesiastical (and probably also civil) restructuring of the kingdom which include the creation of new bishoprics; there the church of the Britons is described in a different terms to the rest:

“Ad sedem Britonorum ecclesias que sunt intro Britones una cum monaterio Maximi et qui in Asturiis sunt”

Whilst the rest of bishoprics are territorial (and their bishops has either Germanic or Latin names) the Britonic one is ethnic, and mentions a monastery Maximi. Given how particular the Celtic church was, and the almost certain impossibility for a local medieval forger to know that a Celtic bishops was also an abbot, this (and the Mailoc name) is hold as very strong evidence that this Britons of Galicia were actual Britons.

Other further evidence include toponimy (there are several places called _Bretoña_ or _Bretonia_ in Galicia, and there were more in the past; there is also one _Bretios_ < _Bretenos_).

Further reading: https://web.archive.org/web/20070806110332/http://www.britonia.fsnet.co.uk/

Latter I'll add something, but as a suggested reading I left this link for now: e-Keltoi: https://dc.uwm.edu/ekeltoi/vol6/iss1/


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## Cossue

* Material culture of Galicia at the Roman conquest (cultura Castrexa / Castro Culture): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Castro_culture

* Mention of Celtic peoples in Galicia by Classical authors and geographers (https://dc.uwm.edu/ekeltoi/vol6/iss1/10/):

For example, Pomponius Mela, a geographer from Cádiz, in what is now Andalusia, writing 2000 years ago (_De_ _Chorographia_):

“the oceanfront here has a straight bank for a considerable distance [coast of North Portugal] and then protrudes a little bit where it takes a moderate bend. At that time, drawn back again and again [Rías Baixas region in southwestern Galicia] and lying in a straight line, the coast extends to the promontory we call *Celtic* Point [Punta Nariga / Cabo Vilán].​​*Celtic peoples* – except for the Grovi from the Durius [Douro] to the bend [Rías Baixas] – cultivate the whole coast here, and the rivers Avo [Ave], Celadus [Cávado], Nebis [Neiva], Minius [Miño/Minho] and Limia [Limia/Lima] (also known as the Oblivion) flow through their territory. The bend itself includes the city of Lambriaca and receives the Laeron [Lérez < Lerice] and Ulla [Ulla] Rivers. The Praestamarci [Posmarcos] inhabit the section that juts out [peninsula of Barbanza], and through their territory run the Tamaris [Tambre < Tamare] and Sars [Sar] Rivers, which arise not far away – the Tamaris next to Port Ebora, the Sars beside the tower of Augustus, which have the famous inscription [which is a memorable monument? = titulo memorabilem]. The Supertamarici and the Neri, the last people on that stretch, inhabit the remainder. This is as far as its western shores reach.​​From there the coast shifts northward with its entire flank from Celtic Point all the way to Scythian Point. The shoreline, uninterrupted except for moderate recesses and small promontories, is almost straight until it reaches the Cantabri [Cantabrians]. On that shore, first of all, are the Artabri (actually a people of *Celtic* ancestry) [etiamnum Celticae gentis = still a Celtic people], then the Astyres [Asturians]. In the territory of the Artabri a bay [Rías Altas region of Galicia, from Coruña do Ferrol] admits the sea through a narrow mouth, but encloses it with its not-so-narrow grasp; it rings the city of Adrobrica and the mouths of four rivers. Two mouths are little known even among locals; through the other two the Mearus [Mero] and the Iubia [Xubia]  Rivers make their outlets. On the coast that belongs to the Astyres is the town of Noega […]”​
So, essentially, and according to this author, all the people that dwelt by the coasts of Galicia, from more of less Vigo in the south till the Asturians in the east, were Celtic. Of the peoples he mentioned, the Pratestamaci, Supertamarci and Neri in particular are again explicitly called Celtic by Pliny, and the inscription of individual persons of the people of the Supertamarci also usually cite themselves as _Celtici Supertamarci (__inscriptions__)_.

More later.

​


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## Cossue

S1m0n said:


> This music clung on in Ireland, Scotland, Cape Breton, Galicia, etc, not because these were celts, but because they were poor, and poor peasant cultures are more culturally conservative. They didn't travel much and didn't have much chance of learning the new dances - waltzes, etc, that supplanted the dances and music we now think of as celtic in higher society.
> So I don't think the similarity of galician and Irish or scots music has much probative value in terms of kinship.



This, totally. Also sailors moved up and down all the time, probably reinforcing their Atlantic character (nautical Galician lexicon is full of Old French and Germanic loans, including fish). In Iberia, Galicia and Asturias have been, probably, the most culturally conservative places; lexically also, they preserve a trove of substrate words; many of them have an apt Celtic etymology (lets say, _tona_, “surface, peel”, _camba_ “curved piece of a wheel”, _cheda_ < *cleta “wall of a cart”, as examples), but most are debated / have not been investigated enough.

More later.


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## se16teddy

Nobody doubts that Celtic languages were spoken in western Iberia before the arrival of the Roman Empire. But the same goes for a huge swathe of Europe. Those Celtic languages had an influence on subsequent languages of all these regions, especially on and through Latin and the Romance languages.
List of Spanish words of Celtic origin - Wikipedia





Of course it is very fashionable to be a Celt - and I am spending lots of time, and having lots of fun, studying and immersing myself in Irish language and culture at the moment. But am I really any different from my neighbours in London because at least 40% of my ancestors spoke a Celtic language (Irish or Welsh) 200 years ago?


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## Cossue

Ancient toponimy of Galicia suggested bibliography:

* Leonard Curchin (2008) “The toponyms of the Roman Galicia: new study” in _Cuadernos de estudios gallegos_, v. 55, 111. His conclusions are that 41% of the Galician place names recorded in Roman/Greek sources was *Celtic*, some 36% was Indo-European but probably not Celtic, and 14% were Latin.

* Patrick Sims-Williams (2006) _Ancient Celtic Place-Names in Europe and Asia Minor_, page 235: “This area [NW  Iberia] covers northern Portugal and north-west Spain. *Its Celticity is clear* from Maps 5.1-5.3, and is further borne out by the unlocatable names in the Barrington data which belongs in this general area”.

* Xavier Delamarre (2012) _Noms de lieux celtiques de l’Europe ancienne_, passim.

* E. R. Luján “Pueblos celtas y no celtas de la Galicia antigua”.

Names of Gallaecian populi (of whatever origin): Albiones, Cileni, Nemetati, Querquerni, Coelerni, Copori, Artabri, Neri, Arrotrebas, Seurri, Tamacani, Lemavi, Limici, Grovi...

Gallaecian / Galician Celtic place names attested in Latin authors / Roman inscriptions include for example Brigantia, Nemetobriga, Caladunum, Berisamo, Adrobrica, Arcobriga, Assegonia, Aviliobris, Abobrica, Louciocelo, Olca, Serante, Talabriga, Ocelum, Glandomirum, Durbede, Brevis, Cambetum, Coeliobriga, Miobri, Novium, Letiobri…

More later.


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## Cossue

se16teddy said:


> Of course it is very fashionable to be a Celt - and I am spending lots of time, and having lots of fun, studying and immersing myself in Irish language and culture at the moment. But am I really any different from my neighbours in London because at least 40% of my ancestors spoke a Celtic language (Irish or Welsh) 200 years ago?



Agree. Essentialy Galician Celtism was as its peak in the 19th and 20th centuty, and it is still much fun. But AndrasBP is asking:


AndrasBP said:


> Is Galicia's Celtic character supported by any linguistic or historical facts?



So, yes. Absolutely. Are Galician still Celts? No, no more that Asturians or French or Piamontese or English people. The Galicians were Celts? Yes, but certainly not La Tene Celts, IMO.


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## Cossue

Finally:

* Autochthonous personal names attested in local Roman inscriptions / attributed to Gallaecians elsewhere (mostly showing the Latin nominative). Some are *exclusive* to Galicia, other are also found among Astures and/or Cantabri and/or Celtiberians; others a also rather found among Lusitanians:

Abana/Apana, *Acelinus*, *Adalus*, *Adronus*, *Aebura*, *Aeburina*, Aetura, Aeturus, *Aidius*, *Aitanius*, Aius, Albura, *Alecius*, Allius, Alluquius, *Alona*, Ama, *Amaca*, Ambatus, *Ambollus*, Ana, Anceitus/Angetus, *Andamionius*, Andamus, Anderca, Andergus, *Antiania*, *Apanicus*, Apanus, Apilicus, Apilus, *Apolta*, Arius, Arcisus, Arcius, Ares, Arquius, Arro, *Artius*, Atia, Atius, Aucalus

*Balaesina*, Balcaius, *Balesinus*, Bibalus, *Blendea*, *Blentia*, *Bloena*, *Bobdaenus*, Boelius, *Bornus*, Boualus, Boutia, Boutius, Bracarus

Cacala, *Cadroiolō*, Caelenicus, *Caeleo*, Caesarus, *Caelicus*, *Caenicienus*, *Calabus*, *Calutia*, Camala, Camalus, *Cambauius*, Camilia, *Cancus*, Cantaber, Catura, Caturō, Celeius, Celea/Cilea, Celtiatis, Celtiatus, *Ceraecius*/*Cerecius*, *Clodama*, Cloranus, *Cloutaius*, Cloutius, Cloutus, Clutamus, *Clutimo*, *Clutosius*, Coamea/Coemia, *Coedus*, *Coloticenus*, *Colupata*, Condisa, *Conia*, *Contarus*, Coporicus, *Coraecus*, *Coralus*, Coria, *Corocaudius*, *Corolla*, *Coronerus*, *Coropolla*, *Corotures*, *Corunius*, Crocius, Cumelius, *Cundena*

Doquirus, *Doruscus*, Douaius, *Douaecia*, Douilo, *Ducria*, *Duerta*, *Durbidia*, Dutia

Elanicus, *Eminus*, *Enuinus*, *Epeicius*, Equales, *Erbutus

Goilius*

Laboena, Ladronus, *Lagius*, *Laucia*, *Laucius*, *Lauius*, Loueius/Loueus, *Louesia*, Louesius/Louessius, *Louiana*, *Luaecus*/Lubaecus

*Macilia*, Macilō, Malceinus, Mantaus, Mearus, *Mebdius*, Medamus, Meducea, Meduenus, Meduttus, Meiduena, *Melgaecus*, Meluius
*ius*, *Nantia*, *Nantius*, *Nauiolus*, *Nelius*, *Niuius*, *Nobbius*, *Nusius*

Paugenda, Peicana, *Pelistus*, Pentamus, Pentus, *Perurda*, Pestera, *Pictelancius*, *Pictelancea*, Pinarea, Pintamus, Pitilius, *Praenia*, Pusinca, *Pusincina*

Reburria, Reburrinus, Reburrius, Reburrus, Riburrinius, *Rouinus*, *Ruana

Sabalco*, *Secoilia*, *Seguia*, Seneca, Senus, *Seuiria*, *Soupus

Tacanus*/Taganus, Talabarus, Talauia, *Talauia*, Talauus, Tanginus, *Tapila*, *Taurocus*, *Taurocutius*, *Temarus*, *Tillegus*, *Tridia*/Tritia, Trites, Triteus, *Trupeisius*, Turobius

Uacceus, Uacisius, Uacus, Uaecius, *Uagonius*, *Uanilo*, *Uaucanius*, *Uecius*, *Uerotius*, *Uerobius*, *Uesuclotus*, *Uilius*, Uiriatus, Uisala, *Ulacius*, *Ulcus*, *Urtienus*, *Urtinus*

* Local god names and number of dedications and dedications in other “provinces”:

- Lug (_Lugubo Arquienobo_, plural dative dedication in a local tongue in an otherwise Latin inscription) – the pan-Celtic Lugus, although locally there is evidence that he was a trinity. 5 votive inscriptions in Galicia, 3 more in the Celtiberia.

- Nauia/Nabia (_Nabiae Elaesurranegae, Nauiae Sesmacae... _x10 – Lusitania/N. Portugal x10)

- Crougia (_Crougiai Toudadigoe, Crugia Munniaego_: x2 – Lusitania x2)

- Cossue (dative form: _Coso Oenaego_, _Coso Meobrigo_, _Coso Calaeunio_, _Coso Soaegoe_, _Coso Udauiniago_… x10 – Asturia x8 – Lusitania x2)

- Bandue (dative form_: Bandue Aetiobrico_, _Bandue Veigebreaego_, _Bandue Verubrico_… x6 – Lusitania x35)

- Berobreo (local divinity)

- Deo Vestio Alonieco (local)

- Ariounis Mincosegaeigis (local)

- Edouio (local)

- Matrinus Gallaicis “The Galician mothers” (in Celtiberia)

Well, etc. A lot more. A full repertory of autochthonous names of persons and gods from Hispania can be consulted in: J. M. Vallejo (2016) _Onomástica paleohispánica_.

* Finally, contemporary toponymy (check List of Celtic place names in Galicia - Wikipedia); there are probably thousands of pre-Latin toponyms in Galicia, but the most characteristic ones are those derived from Celtic -brixs/-brigā ‘hill, hill-fort’, as most of this at these links: Toponimia galega, and Toponimia galega.

* And Again: e-Keltoi: e-Keltoi: Journal of Interdisciplinary Celtic Studies | Vol 6 | Iss 1

Happy weekend everybody.

Edit: typos and grammar


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## AndrasBP

Wow, Cossue, that's quite a bit of research you've done there! So your username is a Celtic god too... 

I'm impressed, but I never actually intended to question whether Galicia was inhabited by Celts in ancient times.
My point was that apart from Galicia (and sometimes Asturias) there are no other areas in Europe that identify as Celtic where an Insular Celtic (Goidelic or Brittonic) language hasn't recently been spoken.

The main reason why I called the map showing British Celtic settlement in Galicia (#4) "dubious" is that I would have expected the Celtic language to survive much longer, see Brittany for comparison. I understand that Brittany is much closer to Britain and settlers in Galicia were probably less numerous, but still, I thought there should have been some more influence, a bit more than a few place names.

I'm not a professional linguist or historian, though.


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## Keith Bradford

There's a lot of misunderstanding about the Celts, as I realised when I had to translate a book on Celtic art. (Venceslas Kruta, _l'Art des Celtes_, Paris, Phaidon, 2015.  English title _Celtic art_).  Originally they seem to have come from the Balkans in late classical times and their centre of population was Austria/Switzerland.  From there the Celtic culture spread across most of France, southern Germany and the low countries, and then into eastern Spain and the British Isles.  This was followed by many cross-boundary exchanges in later centuries.

However, there is little evidence of a Celtic language, other than the names of gods and goddesses.  What some people call Celtic languages today are the Brythonic and Goedelic languages of Scotland, Ireland, Wales, Brittany, etc.  If you find traces of those in Galician, good luck, but you'll find evidence of Celtic culture in Spain mainly in pottery and metalwork.


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## ahvalj

There is a number of Celtiberian inscriptions and there exists a recent sketch of Celtiberian: Wodtko DS · 2003 · An outline of Celtiberian grammar. Galician proper had a somewhat different, Gallaecian (and above posts), substrate though.


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## Cossue

AndrasBP said:


> Wow, Cossue, that's quite a bit of research you've done there!


Ah...Yes. Maybe I overreacted; I had some pretty harsh debate on this some ten years ago, and had to bring not just bibliography and references but apparently every tiny bit of first hand materials... So, yes, I ended doing a very large research on the subject :-/

On what happened with the language of the Britons, I guess that it had the same fate that the languages of the Visigoths, Suevi... Only Basque and Romance varieties survived the commotion that was the Arab invasion of 711 (which is stating a fact rather than giving an explanation).



Keith Bradford said:


> However, there is little evidence of a Celtic language, other than the names of gods and goddesses



Well, Gaulish and Celtiberian are certainly well established Celtic languages, although their corpora are absolutely no way near as large as that of the other historically attested Celtic languages, off course. And then we have the proto-Celtic language that is being reconstructed from these languages, as an evolution of proto-indo-European. Well, this reconstructed language, the long and continued work of scholars all along the world, is essentially useful for understanding divine names, place names, personal names... of barely and brokenly attested languages as those that were spoken by, for example, the Gallaecians, 2000 years ago, and which have left a moderate number of words in modern languages, either as appellatives or as toponyms.

So, when we have a votive Roman inscription reading CROUGAI TOUDADIGOE we can suspect that it represent a evolved form from a proto-Celtic *krowkāi (dative singular, a derivative of *krowko- "heap, hill", Matasovic 2009:226) *toutatikūi (dative singular, a derivative of *towta "tribe, people", compare Gaulish Teutates, Matasovic 2009:386). Or if you have an ancient place name BRIGANTIA (< PC *brigantî- "the high one", Matasovic 2009:78), or NEMETOBRIGA (< PC *nemeto- "santuary" and "noble, privileged", Matasovic 2009:288, + brigā "hill-fort", Matasovic 2009:78) or AVILIOBRIS ( < PC *awelio- "wind" and *brixs "hill", Matasovic 2009:47 and 77); and then ancient personal names as NANTIUS, NANTIA ( < PC *nanti- "fight,  battle",  Matasovic 2009:386), CLOUTIUS, VESUCLOTI (< *wesu- "excellent", *klut- "fame", Matasovic 2009:418 and 210); and current places as _Canzobre _( < Carançoure < *Carantiobre: PC *karant- "friend, family" + -bre < -brixs "hill(-fort)", Matasovic 2009:190), or current river names as _Dubra _( < Dubria < PC *Dubro- "dark > water", Matasovic 2009:107), _Nantón_ ( < PC *nantu- "stream, valley" Matasovic 2009:283), _Deva_ ( < PC *dêwo- "god", Matasovic 2009:96). Etcetera. This, multiplied by some hundreds just in Galicia. I can go on for days. There are tens on books and pappers of local scholars reseaching this material.

And then you have tens? of scholars doing this synergic things all along Europe, and finding reasonable etymologies for thousand of words whose meaning have been lost for near a pair of millennia... Again, recommended readings: _e-Keltoi_, Matasovic's _Proto-Celtic_ _Dictionary_, Xavier Delamarre's works, Patrick Sims-Williams' works, Falileyev's works, Jürgen Untermann's works, etc...


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## Welsh_Sion

This thread should interest @Margrave if he's around.

I can only speak as a professional 1st language user and teacher-editor-translator of a Celtic language (Cymraeg/Welsh) with an MA in Celtic Studies from the University of Wales, that much of what I have seen written by birdguts to be a complete departure from the receivedideas of Celtic, both in language and culture.

The accepted version would state that Celtic origins as a distinct people are in Central Europe around the 8th century BCE. Witness the evidence of Halstadt in modern day Austria and later in La Tene in Switzerland with their eponymous cultures. These peoples, known to the Greeks as Keltoi then subsequently spread over much of Europe, but obviously not all, arriving in the British Isles (the Pretanik Islands as Pytheas of Massila refers to them some time before the late 4th century BCE). The very name 'Pretaniki' would indicate a P Celtic term (cf Mod. Welsh 'Prydain) from whence Latinised to 'Britannia' and subsequently, 'Britain'. The split into what are now known as P Celtic/Brythonic languages on the one hand (extant: Welsh, Breton, Cornish) and the Q Celtic/Goidelic languages (Extant: Irish, Manx, Scottish Gaelic) is unknown, nor the reason(s) for such a 'split'.

Now, latterly, a theory postulated by John Koch (which has some qualified support by colleagues) postulates the Celtic homeland to be Iberia and the peoples moved eastwards therefrom to cover much of Europe is doing the rounds. There is no denying Koch's academic credentials, but his viewpoint is very much (at present) a minority one.

Such a load of nonsense has been written about the Celts, their languages and cultures over the centuries - more often than not by their literate (Classical and Imperial) enemies and then subsequently by 'New Agers' who align themselves with esoteric symbolism and crackpot ideas, that it is sometimes difficult for us Celts to get in a proper word to dismiss such stupidities. The more so, as is often the case that those who produce outlandish and bogus information, not only have their own axes to grind but they rarely have any mastery of any Celtic language nor how they work.

Celtic toponyms appear all over the continent of Europe - how could they not, but to all intents and purposes are now defunct therein as living languages. And that goes for Breton too - it is in fact an insular (British if you like - in all senses of the term) which was re-planted on the north western coast of what is now France (Armorica) and is not some natural development of the Gaulish of Asterix and Obelix nor indeed Galician or other Iberians who made the journey to Roazhon (Rennes) and Nantes (Naoned).

I remain in solidarity for those of this thread who value and appreciate true, academic research as opposed to those who would seek to label myself and others as 'Semitic' and that we have 'received' a Celtic veneer thanks to migratory Iberians. And that we owe much of our Celtic culture thanks to those who left Galicia at various times (notice the conflating of timescales: everything from periods BCE to the introduction of the potato) to teach us our own language.

Are we Celts ultimately a Jewish diaspora via A Coruna? I think not. 

[The above post was, for the most part, a measured response to previous postings by birdguts which have now been deleted. They are not to refute the accepted ideas of others who make the claim for some form of Celtic languages in Iberia before and after the Roman period. However, no extant, living Celtic language exists as we so define them on the Iberian Peninsula, today, unless, there are individuals or groups within Indo-European faculties learning, Cymraeg/Welsh, say, for their own purposes.]


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## Cossue

Yeah, I very much agree. New Age (etc, etc) stories on the Celts are so, so tiresome (but also so old): all day is flat Earth's day.

On John Koch's theory, maybe I've read it differently, but I understand that he postulates the origin of Celtic language(s) at the the Western fringes of Europe, from the British Islands to Portugal, as the language of the elites of the Atlantic Bronze Age. I don't really think that he proposes an Iberian origin to the Celtic languages in this cultural complex, rather around Brittany, which was its center. What he proposes (and most don't agree - me, as an informed amateur neither, and I've read most of what he has written on the subject) is that Tartessian is the oldest attested Celtic language (what most scholars appear to agree is that there are Celtic personal names recorded in 2500 yo Tartessian inscriptions).


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## Margrave

Hi @Welsh_Sion I am back after hibernating (in summer) into my cave together with a couple of papers to be published soon. I hope you are well. You are absolutely right about the tons of nonsense published about the Celts. I find the propositions by Koch interesting, he says that the Celtic culture originated somewhere where it is now the Northern Atlantic coast of Portugal, which was the Gallaecia and part of the Galician kingdom until 1148 (Treaty of Zamora, independence of Portugal). Adding complexity to the subject, as @Cossue mentioned, academics like Leonard Churchin seem to have found traces of Indo-European toponymy in Northwest Iberian peninsula that seem not to be Celtic. It is accepted the Iberian peoples were not Indo-Europeans, this means that there was probably another migration layer from an Indo-European people, non-Celtic, before the Celts "came in" into the  scenario in the Iberian peninsula. Who were those non-Celtic Indo-Europeans? 
---
The New Age thing is really a disgrace for its fake approach to ancient spirituality. They mix every possible symbology and concepts into the same cauldron. 

The Celts had their share of spirituality and beliefs that for sure impacted on the evolution of their vocabulary. Words represent human experiences and if humans are spiritual, their vocabulary is impacted by it. I take only one word as an example: PC _*abanko_ which means _castor_ but derived to Irish _afanc_, which means a malign kind of leprechaun that lived underwater in pools and rivers. The _afanc _used to come out of their wet homes to do evil things to humans during the evenings. Here we have a rational, real experience (the castor, an animal) which became synonym of an spiritual experience (the evil afanc). 

While today we are able to discern between those two experiences, one is rational, real and the other is spiritual, intangible, it may be that in Celtic culture those two experiences were intertwined. In Galicia, there was the belief that the serpes (snakes) took with them to the Sán Andrés de  Teixido sanctuary the souls of the deceased Christians that could not go there in peregrination at least once in life, hence the Galician saying "A San Andrés de Teixido vai de morto o que non foi de vivo." (To San Andrés de Teixido one goes dead even if he has not gone there alive - sorry for my bad translation). The Galician serpes were believed then to be spiritual carriers and perhaps this is a trace from ancient rites, which could have originated the name of that land: Ophiussa in Ora Maritima: _"...much later the serpent chased away the inhabitants and gave the now empty land its name." _Therefore, when an early Medieval Galician (and probably his/her ancestors the Galaican Celts) looked to a serpe, a snake or serpent, they not only saw it as an animal but as a spiritual carrier of souls to their afterlife. I believe that once we understand a bit more this spirituality, we can better interpret etymology.


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## Margrave

@Keith Bradford it seems to me that the traces of Celtic radicals, most probably from Galaican Celtic, are present more than expected in the Galician (and Northern Portuguese) toponymy and languages, not only in names of gods and goddesses.


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## Margrave

@se16teddy  there is the old hypothesis that when the Saxons, Jutes and Angles settled and later invaded the Pritain island, they exterminated all the native Celts. This is not true. 

In Germany, some say the same about the numerous Slavic principalities that existed between the rivers Oder and Neisse, this later at the border with Poland. During the Northern Crusades the Christian Saxons invaded and exterminated all the native pagan Slavs in that huge region, pushing the German border to the East. However, recent DNA studies show that around 30% of the "Germans" living in that region, that roughly corresponds to the former Eastern Germany, have Slavic DNA. Around the same percentage (30%) have Slavic surnames. Therefore, the minority Saxon invaders did not exterminated the Slavs there bak in 900-1100AC, the Slavs are still there but were germanised to the point of forgetting their Slav ancestry. 

The same with the English. The Saxons, Angles and Jutes and alter the Vikings and Normans were minority. They conquered the land but their numerous subjects were Celts which were anglicised (germanized) to the point of forgetting their Celt ancestry. This is to get to your question of what you have in common with the English living in London. Probably they bear a huge Celtic Brittonic DNA while yours, if I understood well, is Irish and Welsh Celt.  You remember your Celtic ancestry, they have completely forgotten theirs. They think they are English but they are Celts too.


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## Welsh_Sion

Note to my friend @Margrave - *afanc* 'castor'/'beaver' is Welsh not Irish. (See GPC.)


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## Margrave

Welsh_Sion said:


> Note to my friend @Margrave - *afanc* 'castor'/'beaver' is Welsh not Irish. (See GPC.)


Hi @Welsh_Sion you are right. Thank you for pointing this out. Edit: for the  sake of correction, MW _afanc_ "beaver, water demon, dwarf", MI _abac_ "beaver, dwarf". Here we see how a real creature, the castor, was seen also a something mystic, the water demon.


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## Hulalessar

Margrave said:


> there is the old hypothesis that when the Saxons, Jutes and Angles settled and later invaded the Pritain island, they exterminated all the native Celts. This is not true.



I think it is safer to say: "This may not be true" and would add that the hypothesis is rather that they exterminated all the native Celts and/or drove them westwards or to what is now Brittany. The main reasons for the idea were/are because (a) Bede and other historians said so (b) the English language appears to show little or no Celtic influence (c) the Brythonic language became restricted to the western extremities of mainland Britain. Archaeological and genetic investigations began to throw doubt on the idea. However, the evidence is far from conclusive. No one knows for sure exactly what went on. The Anglo-Saxon settlement took place over a long period and may have taken different forms in different places.

There was a time when it was thought that race could be defined by describing the way people look. Race is though is a very slippery concept which when looked at means something, but not very much. Genetics may be more sophisticated than going by skin colour, shape and colour of the eyes and whether your hair is straight, wavy or curly, but is no more reliable in determining race and certainly not the equally slippery concept of ethnicity. The Celts got about a lot. It is probable that some of the invaders described as Germanic had Celtic DNA. So, if an "Anglo-Saxon" burial ground in the east of England shows, say, that 50% of the occupants have Celtic DNA, it does not necessarily follow that 50% of the population in the area were descended from people who were in Britain before the Anglo-Saxon settlement began.

It is interesting to note that whereas as at one time the apparent lack of Celtic influence on the English language was taken as suggesting that in most of England the Celts were replaced wholesale by the Anglo-Saxons, the genetic evidence is now taken by some as indicating that there must be a Celtic substrate to English if only we look hard enough.

No one discipline is going to produce a clear answer. Increasing specialisation has led to an absence of polymaths and forming a coherent hypothesis is not going to be easy. The conclusions reached by experts based on scant evidence often surprise me.



Margrave said:


> The same with the English. The Saxons, Angles and Jutes and alter the Vikings and Normans were minority. They conquered the land but their numerous subjects were Celts which were anglicised (germanized) to the point of forgetting their Celt ancestry. This is to get to your question of what you have in common with the English living in London. Probably they bear a huge Celtic Brittonic DNA while yours, if I understood well, is Irish and Welsh Celt. You remember your Celtic ancestry, they have completely forgotten theirs. They think they are English but they are Celts too.



We cannot be sure that the Saxons, Angles and Jutes were a minority. The best that DNA can tell you is that at some time in the past (and it may be a very long time in the past) individuals have a common ancestor. DNA cannot tell you anything about a person's ethnicity which is really what "Celt" and "English" are about today. What do Irish speakers living in the Gaeltacht have in common with the Galatians living in Asia Minor to whom St Paul sent an epistle? A Cockney is not a Celt simply because he does not self-identify as a Celt.

As suggested above, much of what is considered Celtic today is of comparatively recent origin and invented partly by the Romantics with fanciful notions of the western fringes of Europe as a zone of mists and magic and partly by nationalists intent on forging an identity distinct from their neighbours.


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## jimquk

" It is probable that some of the invaders described as Germanic had Celtic DNA."

I would add that it is quiet possible that the Brythonic population already included "Germanic" DNA in pre-Roman times, and that the genetic East-West gradient may in part reflect an original peopling of the islands from both Atlantic and North Sea coastlines.


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## Margrave

Hello @Hulalessar, thank you for your post with interesting information.



Hulalessar said:


> The Anglo-Saxon settlement took place over a long period


 The Roman Empire recalled their legions back into the Continent in 410AC. Seems like the Saxon, Anglo and Jute settlement happened between around the year 450AC  and lasted 150 years until the first half of the 7th Century. 150 years is a short time.



Hulalessar said:


> We cannot be sure that the Saxons, Angles and Jutes were a minority.


 Most probably the Germanic invaders were minority. There is an increasing awareness by the academic community that the invaders actually were in small numbers, while the Britonnic population was estimated between 2-6 million.  The logistics of migration and settlement into an island were an obstacle much harder to overcome that if the migration had happened in the Continent. The Germanic settlers were over 2  million? Hardly so, not to say this did not happen. They were 100 thousand? 300 thousand? Even so, in face of minimum 2 million Brittonics, they were undoubtedly a minority.



Hulalessar said:


> invented partly by the Romantics with fanciful notions of the western fringes of Europe as a zone of mists and magic and partly by nationalists intent on forging an identity distinct from their neighbours.


 The source of the above information is Dr. Catherine Hills, Senior Fellow, McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research, University of Cambridge



Hulalessar said:


> there must be a Celtic substrate to English if only we look hard enough.


 I agree. The thing is that many until the early 20th Century explained English words linking to their correct or supposedly correct Germanic etymology. Germanic was the language of the conqueror, it had prestige. Celtic was the language of the loosers, nobody wanted to be a looser. This happens also in Romance languages. I remember one funny case where the etymology proposed for the city of Tobar (Burgos, Spain) was linked to the Latin word "tofu" which means "stone". It elaborated about how the place was rocky and had quarries and so on. However, the word *to-bar, bar being a pre-celtic word imported into proto-celtic, means "at the river", which is exactly where Tobar is, at the banks of the Hormenzuela river. There is a general effacement of the Celtic roots in many places, including in England. Fortunately, this prejudice against anything Celtic is going away with every new scientific research.

There was no such a thing as a "Celtic DNA". The description of the Celts in ancient books range from blonde, white while others described them as having black hair. That is why I mentioned "Celtic Britonnic" DNA. Recent DNA studies in remains of individual Brittonic are pointing to very close genetic links to the Welsh people.


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## Awwal12

Margrave said:


> Even so, in face of minimum 2 million Brittonics, they were undoubtedly a minority.


That, however, would have a proportional impact only if the latter weren't put into much more unfavorable conditions for reproduction (forced from the best lands, to begin with - with many being doomed to starvation as a result), which might have been a long lasting Anglo-Saxon ethnic policy. The historical narrative tells us about a direct genocide. While it's most likely a big exaggeration, some genetic evidence seems to partly support the idea. For example, one of the R1b subclades which may constitute up to 30% of the local Y-haplogroups in England is represented almost exclusively in England and Southern Scotland but not in the Scottish Highlands, Ireland or, most notably, Wales, while in the continental Europe it's most frequent in Low Germany and Denmark (i.e. exactly the historical Urheimat of Saxons and Angles). Of course, the situation may be related to preceding migrations and/or be partly caused by other factors, but still it's a suspicious coincidence, which, if truly related to the Anglo-Saxon conquest, may mean that at least about one half of the original population was ultimately replaced by patrilineal descendants of the migrants, one way or another (more in the eastern areas, less in more remote ones).


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## Margrave

@Awwal12 the insertion of a invader DNA into existing populations is complex. I generally agree  with what you say concerning the R1b subclades. There is an interesting study - the most complete up to now - about how there was a break in DNA continuity in the Iberian peninsula 4.000 years ago (around 2.000BC) La migración masiva que reemplazó a todos los hombres ibéricos y cambió el ADN de España you can find the English version easily. This interruption was only on the patrilineal side while the matrilineal DNA stayed on. Some consider there was a great replacement of native men by the invading males, who intermarried with the native women. This may have happened in Germany too, between the Oder and Neisse rivers when the Saxons invaded there. However, the existence of around 30% of Slavic surnames in that region means that the Slavic men survived to pass their surnames along.  And I do not mean the surnames that could be adopted from local toponimy but ones like Nowotny and similar that are antroponyms. The same in England, there is a huge number of Brittonic surnames at present. Some may have been adopted from Brittonic toponimy. Other, may have survived long enough to be transformed from Brittonic forenames into surnames during the years 800AC-1200AC when it is generally accepted this transformation took place in Europe (it varies according to each country).



Awwal12 said:


> at least about one half of the original population was ultimately replaced by patrilineal descendants of the migrants, one way or another (more in the eastern areas, less in more remote ones).


This may be true or partially true There are other ways of DNA insertion less than a male population replacement. There was the (still debated) droit du seigneur and even if it did not exist, non-consensual sex where the lords imposed over native women was surely widespread since the times of Gilgamesh, where there is a first mention to it. Large scale looting, pillaging and the unforgivable abuse of defenseless women was common in war as recently as 1945. This may mean that the DNA was inserted into the population without exterminating/replacing the native men population. Still, the 30% R1b subclade is a minority. What about the remaining majority 70%?


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## Hulalessar

I cannot argue on any detail since I do not have the expertise. What I do know is that experts in the field have produced raw data but have come to differing conclusions. It is another "who was where when?" question which is likely to remain unanswered and practically guaranteed to remain contested.


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## Silvia Dee

S1m0n said:


> There is very little surviving even medieval influence in 'celtic' music; none, certainly, that would connect dark age Ireland to roman Galicia. What we think of as 'celtic music' - jigs and reels; set dances - was the popular music of 18th century Europe. Everyone who was anyone flocked to the Congress of Vienna at the end of the Napoleonic Wars, and from high society down to the common soldiers in their encampments, all were caught up in a new craze for dancing the Quadrille (aka dancing a set of quadrilles, aka set dancing, aka square dancing) When the congress broke up, the participants took the new steps back to their homes across the length and breadth of europe.
> This music clung on in Ireland, Scotland, Cape Breton, Galicia, etc, not because these were celts, but because they were poor, and poor peasant cultures are more culturally conservative. They didn't travel much and didn't have much chance of learning the new dances - waltzes, etc, that supplanted the dances and music we now think of as celtic in higher society.
> So I don't think the similarity of galician and Irish or scots music has much probative value in terms of kinship.





AndrasBP said:


> Hello,
> 
> The title of this thread is that of an article I've recently read. <<< LINK
> 
> In two of my books about European peoples and languages, and also in countless online articles and YouTube videos, Galicians are described as the "Celtic minority of Spain".
> These sources emphasize the similarity of Galician and Irish/Scottish/Breton folk music, how the Galician language "has preserved many Celtic words", and you can find videos where Scottish musicians visiting Galicia tell us that they feel really at home because of the music, the landscape and the weather.
> 
> I'd like to focus on the language here: I've found a Wikipedia list of Galician words of Celtic origin, but most of these words seem to be shared by other Romance languages, including Spanish, Catalan, Occitan and French, so I'm not convinced that Galician is more Celtic than its sister languages.
> 
> Is Galicia's Celtic character supported by any linguistic or historical facts?


it was believed for a long time that the celts originated in the United Kingdom and the settlements found in the north of Spain, mainly Galicia y Asturias. And the evident celt symbols and uses still present in those areas were the result of certain migrations from the island. Nowadays the most accepted theory is that they were born in the north of Spain and migrated to the United Kingdom, where their culture and people flourished and grew, benefitting of the isolation of an island from the influence and invasion of other cultures. I’m from Asturias and grew up among triskels, tetraskels, fireplace rituals, nature gods/goddess and many “Castro” archeological sites….. 
you cannot look for linguistic facts in the north of Spain nor in Gaelic or Irish language you could link to celtic language, mainly because celts teachings and  history was transmitted orally. 
- the actual “gallego” is very close to the portugués cause they were part of El Reino de Portugal for a while in history so, no Celtic words there
- bagpipes were possibly born in India and believed to be expanded through Europe by Romans. it appears in an ancient church in Asturias from the sXVIII

please stop using Wikipedia as a reliable font and go to official university website or history institution


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## Penyafort

Silvia Dee said:


> - the actual “gallego” is very close to the portugués cause they were part of El Reino de Portugal for a while in history so, no Celtic words there


Galicia has never been part of the Kingdom of Portugal.

There are some words from ancient Celtic languages in Galician and in all languages of the Iberian peninsula, Basque included.


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## Welsh_Sion

it was believed for a long time that the celts originated in the United Kingdom

________

I have NO idea where this theory originated nor by whom. In any case, it is anachronistic. The United Kingdom, in its present form, is only a hundred years old as of this year, 2022 CE. (With a few 'recent tweaks' regarding devolution ...)


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## pollohispanizado

Silvia Dee said:


> - the actual “gallego” is very close to the portugués cause they were part of El Reino de Portugal for a while in history so, no Celtic words there





Penyafort said:


> Galicia has never been part of the Kingdom of Portugal


From what I understand, it's the exact opposite. The Kingdom of Galicia was established--though it was maintained as a rather volatile protectorate of the Kingdom of León--at least two centuries before the Kindom of Portugal got its independence in the 12th century. (Not that this historical context means anything when it comes to which loan words made their way into the language: any Celtic loans would have come from the Roman times, when the North Hispanic variant of Vulgar Latin was coming together.)


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## Cossue

Silvia Dee said:


> - bagpipes were possibly born in India and believed to be expanded through Europe by Romans. it appears in an ancient church in Asturias from the sXVIII


In Galicia (and probably in most of Europe) there are plastic representations of bagpipers since the 12th century. My avatar, for example, is from the 13th century's Cantigas de Santa María.



Silvia Dee said:


> the actual “gallego” is very close to the portugués cause they were part of El Reino de Portugal for a while in history so, no Celtic words there


Galician and Portuguese derive from medieval Galician-Portuguese (cf. História do galego-português by Azevedo de Maia), but before it(they) was a written language it evolved from Latin in what is now Galicia, western Asturias and northwestern Portugal. In fact, in southern Galician and northern and central Portugal there are tens of places whose names derive from colonist from the North, who arrived there during the ninth and tenth centuries, following the Galicians lords who carried on the local "reconquista" and who established the County of Portugal. In central (and southern) Portugal, Galician-Portuguese displaced other Romance, Mozarab, languages: as for example, in Coimbra.

As for Celtic words there, in Galician, Portuguese, Asturian or Spanish: Josep Coromines, _Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico_. Electronic version's ISBN: 978-84-249-3654-9.



Silvia Dee said:


> you cannot look for linguistic facts in the north of Spain nor in Gaelic or Irish language you could link to celtic language, mainly because celts teachings and history was transmitted orally.



Actually the academic consensus is that both the extant insular Celtic languages and the continental extinct ones (Gaulish, Celtiberian, Lepontic) belong to the same language family. Calling this language family Celtic is quite reasonable. I won`t even reference this.



Silvia Dee said:


> please stop using Wikipedia as a reliable font and go to official university website or history institution



Yes.

(But actually Wikipedia is pretty useful, especially when the sources are clearly referenced).


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## Margrave

@Cossue hope you are well. You are absolutely right. Also, there are many medieval Galician churches where we find sculptures of bagpipes. There is the mainstream hypothesis that the bagpipes originated in Mesopotamia, it seems, why not India. It would be an oriental music instrument imported into Europe through Greece. I read somewhere (academic source) that from Galicia, precisely from Santiago de Compostela, the bagpipes were taken into several other European countries. This is because since the tomb of Santiago Mayor was uncovered around the year 900DC, the pilgrims took the bagpipes back to their countries, or so it says the source. However, there is an interesting archaeological discovery in 2003 that points to an existing musical instrument, possibly the precursor of the bagpipe, what would be native to the Celtic lands, precisely in Ireland, the Wicklow Pipe which looks like a quite primitive (and clumsy) bagpipe, but it is certainly a bagpipe. I believe (and I can be wrong) that either this Wicklow Pipe is the predecessor of the present day Celtic pipes or it was replaced by the oriental bagpipes later in early European Middle Age. This would point for a very ancient native Celtic bagpipe, perhaps sounding similar to the oriental model (or not). Wicklow Pipes - Research - Prehistoric Music Ireland
---
Concerning the Celtic language coverage in the Iberian peninsula and Celtic civilizations there, this was disputed from some in the academia back in the early 1990's, but recent research proves it existed without any doubt. This is a settled subject now. That is why @AndrasBP find related words in most of Iberian peninsula. 
---
In my personal opinion, there was never a Galician-Portuguese language. The Medieval Galician language was spoken until around the end of the years 1300's and during the 1400's from Medieval Galician evolved old Portuguese. "until the end of the 14th century it is impossible to separate linguistically Galicia from northern Portugal as far as the Douro" source: O galego-português medieval: sua especificidade no contexto dos romances peninsulares e futura diferenciação do galego e do português, por Clarinda de Azevedo Maia, em Actas do Congresso Internacional sobre o Português (Universidade de Lisboa, 1994).
---
@Penyafort @Silvia Dee @pollohispanizado the kingdom of Galicia was created by the Germanic Swabian round 406AD still as a vassal kingdom to the Roman Empire. Around 411AD, the Swabians murdered the last Roman governor (forgot his name) and became independent. It was a very important kingdom, which hosted at least one, but probably two Catholic Concilia (meeting of all bishops of the Church), part of the Actae from the one at the year 572AD (or so) is kept at the Toxos Outos cartulary in Galicia. While Galicia was a kingdom since 406-411AD, other Iberian kingdoms were created later: the kingdom of Asturias around 722AD after the heroic battle of Covadonga won by the Visigotic noble count Pelagius against the invading Arabic armies, and much later on the creation of the kingdom of Castille in 1035 Kingdom of Castile - Wikipedia . We would have then by order of precedence the kingdom of Galicia created around 406, the kingdom of Asturias around 722AD and the kingdom of Castille in 1035. Galicia precedes Asturias by around 316 years and precedes Castille by 630 years or close to it. The Medieval Galician was the language of diplomacy, arts and culture. The Cantigas de Santa Maria (1257) by the Castilian king Alfonso el Sabio, were not written in the Castilian language, but in medieval Galician.


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## Hulalessar

Silvia Dee said:


> please stop using Wikipedia as a reliable font and go to official university website or history institution


The above assumes that Wikipedia is unreliable and that university and history institution websites are. As far as universities and history institutions are concerned Nietzche's dictum that there are no facts only opinions should be borne in mind, especially when it comes to history.

Research has shown Wikipedia to be generally up to the same standard as other encyclopaedias. Facts are usually shown to be correct and criticism aimed at omissions. Omissions are pretty much what you get in any encyclopaedia article - they do not set out to be comprehensive. There is no sound reason to disdain Wikipedia any more than any other encyclopaedia. Disparaging a Wikipedia article is often an alternative to coming up with an argument in rebuttal, a bit like saying "political correctness gone mad".


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## Hulalessar

Hulalessar said:


> The above assumes that Wikipedia is unreliable and that university and history institution websites are.


This should have been:  

The above assumes that Wikipedia is not reliable and that university and history institution websites are.


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## Circunflejo

Margrave said:


> @Penyafort @Silvia Dee @pollohispanizado the kingdom of Galicia was created by the Germanic Swabian round 406AD still as a vassal kingdom to the Roman Empire.


You mean the Kingdom of the Suebi (Kingdom of the Suebi - Wikipedia) that didn't include only nowadays' Galicia but also Asturias, Leon, Northern Portugal and some other areas.


Margrave said:


> While Galicia was a kingdom since 406-411AD, other Iberian kingdoms were created later: the kingdom of Asturias around 722AD after the heroic battle of Covadonga won by the Visigotic noble count Pelagius against the invading Arabic armies,


It wasn't a kingdom since 406-411 AD because it in late VIth Century it didn't exist as a kingdom anymore.


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## Penyafort

Margrave said:


> The Medieval Galician was the language of diplomacy, arts and culture. The Cantigas de Santa Maria (1257) by the Castilian king Alfonso el Sabio, were not written in the Castilian language, but in medieval Galician.


That means some preference for Galician in lyrical poetry, not that it was _the _language of literature -or there wouldn't be any Castilian literary works prior to that.

Something similar or even more obvious happened in the Crown of Aragon. Catalan and Aragonese were used for prose, while lyrical poetry was written in Occitan until well into the 15th century.


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## Margrave

Circunflejo said:


> You mean the Kingdom of the Suebi (Kingdom of the Suebi - Wikipedia) that didn't include only nowadays' Galicia but also Asturias, Leon, Northern Portugal and some other areas.


Yes, exactly, as we can see in this Wikipedia article you pointed out, "The Kingdom of the Suebi (Latin: Regnum Suevorum), also called the Kingdom of Gallæcia (Latin: Regnum Gallæciae) or Suebi Kingdom of Gallæcia (Latin: Gallaecia suevorum regnum[1])" However, Gregory of Tours (538-593) around 140 years after the creation of the kingdom in 406, already called it the regnum Galliciensim: _"Quo defuncto, filius eius Eurichus Leuvichildi regis amicitias expetiit, dataque, ut pater fecerat, sacramenta, *regnum Galliciensim* suscepit. Hoc vero anno cognatus eius Audica, qui sororem illius disponsatam habebat, cum exercitu venit; adpraehensumque clericum facit ac diaconatus sibi praesbiterii ei inponi honorem iobet. Ipse quoque acceptam soceri sui uxorem, *Galliciensim regnum* obtenuit."_ Gregory of Tours, Libri Historiarum, VI.43 who mention also a king of Galicia: "...fretus atque Mironis *Galliciensis regis*...". Therefore, the kings were at first Suebi, but the political entity was the Kingdom of Galicia, who from a Roman province, passed through Suebi, Visigoth hands and on. This is more or less like Hispania, from a Roman province it passed to the Visigoths as a kingdom, then passed to the Arabs as a region, and so on, but the political entity remained Hispania since Roman times. The Kingdom of Galicia was at one time controlled by the Suebi, but not all time during its 1430-year existence. This tends to make me prefer to use Kingdom of Galicia, the successor to the Gallaecia Roman province.


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## Margrave

Circunflejo said:


> It wasn't a kingdom since 406-411 AD because it in late VIth Century it didn't exist as a kingdom anymore.


Well, the Kingdom of Castille (and other) remained a kingdom during around 1,430 years until the reform in the year 1837, that transformed all Iberian kingdoms and regions (except Portugal) into provinces or the like. Here you have the full title of Charles II (1661-1700) : _By the Grace of God,* King of* Castile, of León, of Aragon, of the Two Sicilies, of Jerusalem, of Hungary, of Dalmatia, of Croatia, of Navarre, of Granada, of Toledo, of Valencia, of *Galicia*, of Mallorca, etc._


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## Margrave

Penyafort said:


> Something similar or even more obvious happened in the Crown of Aragon. Catalan and Aragonese were used for prose, while lyrical poetry was written in Occitan until well into the 15th century.


You are right about the cultural importance of the Occitan language, afaik, it was used as lingua franca in many regions.


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## Cossue

@Margrave: Thanks for asking  Too much work lately, but I can’t complain given our current situation.

@Hulalessar: That’s totally on point. I responded with a yes that pretended to be a bit sarcastical, but that was actually a poor choice.



Circunflejo said:


> It wasn't a kingdom since 406-411 AD because it in late VIth Century it didn't exist as a kingdom anymore.



The Suevic kings of Galicia were actually simply called kings of Galicia by 6th century authors such as Gregory of Tours (vg ‘Mirus rex Galliciensis’, ‘Mironis Galliciensis regis’, ‘Galliciensim regnum’), who had had direct knowledge of Galician ambassadors and churchmen. The kingdom was a territorial entity, and carried on an ecclesiastical division and distribution of episcopal sees that essentially still stands today. It was annexed by the Visigoth king Leuvigild based on Germanic law: king Miro, who tried to help the rebellion of Hermenegild and saw himself surrounded by Leuvigild’s army, declared himself his ‘fidelis’ so he could leave. When Miro’s son Eburic was crowned he recognised again his personal ‘friendship’ with the Visigoth king; when Eburic was deposed (and tonsured and made a deacon, so inhabilitating him to the crown) by his brother-in-law Audeca, Leovigil attacked and annexed the kingdom becoming, legally and de facto, king of the Suevi and of Galicia.

Later Galicia, as southern Gallia, kept being a special subject of the Visigothic kingdom, as seen in the military Wamba’s law. During the conjoint rule of Witiza and Egica (694-702/703) the former ruled from Tui, in Galicia, and the 9th century Asturian chronicles say “Filium suum Uuittizanem in regno sibi socium fecit eumque in ciuitatem Tudensem prouincia Gallecie habitare precepit, ut pater teneret regnum Gotorum et filius Sueuorum” and “abebat ex ea filium adulescentem nomine Uitizanem, quern rex in uita sua in regno participem fecit et eum in Tudensem ciuitatem auitare precepit, ut pater teneret regnum Gotorum et filius Sueuorum”. This is part of the reason why Alfonso II of Asturias was called King of Galicia by many 8th century chroniclers.

@Penyafort : Yep. I don’t think that the fact that Afonso X wrote in Old Galician his Cantigas de Santa Maria is a such a big deal: many rock band all around the world sing their songs in English, because this is somehow _the_ language of rock. When Afonso commissioned and/or composed this collection he used the equivalent for his time, place and genre.


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## Circunflejo

Margrave said:


> This is more or less like Hispania, from a Roman province it passed to the Visigoths as a kingdom, then passed to the Arabs as a region, and so on, but the political entity remained Hispania since Roman times.


I don't know any political entity named Hispania during Al-Andalus.


Margrave said:


> Here you have the full title of Charles II (1661-1700) : _By the Grace of God,* King of* Castile, of León, of Aragon, of the Two Sicilies, of Jerusalem, of Hungary, of Dalmatia, of Croatia, of Navarre, of Granada, of Toledo, of Valencia, of *Galicia*, of Mallorca, etc._


Yes, the same one that the current Spanish king who has also several non præjudicando titles like archduke of Austria. I guess you'll struggle to find an Austrian claiming (or acknowledging) that there's an archduchy of Austria nowadays. Of course, that doesn't mean that it didn't exist Austria.



Cossue said:


> The kingdom was a territorial entity, and carried on an ecclesiastical division and distribution of episcopal sees that essentially still stands today.


Did I say otherwise?



Cossue said:


> Later Galicia, as southern Gallia, kept being a special subject of *the Visigothic kingdom*





Cossue said:


> During the conjoint rule of Witiza and Egica (694-702/703) the former ruled from Tui, in Galicia, and the 9th century Asturian chronicles say “Filium suum Uuittizanem in regno sibi socium fecit eumque in ciuitatem Tudensem *prouincia Gallecie* habitare precepit, ut pater teneret regnum Gotorum et filius Sueuorum”


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## Margrave

Circunflejo said:


> I don't know any political entity named Hispania during Al-Andalus.


No problem, glad to help.  "In the chronicles and documents of the High Middle Ages the terms derived from Hispania, Spania, España or Espanha, continued to be used by the Christians but only in reference to Muslim controlled areas." Usually in the early years after the Arab invasion in 711, the vast regions occupied by the Arabs were called Yspania, please check this document from the year 832, the Will of Asturian king Alfonso II: "...in qua Sancta Ecclesia Dei Genitrix obtinuerat Principatum ab antiquo ante ingressum Sarrecenorum in Yspania tempore pacis." The Chronica Gothorum Pseudoisidoriana, I, 35-41, states: "Yspania ab Ispano rege qui eam subiugauit nuncupatur."


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## Cossue

@Circunflejo: Yep. The expression 'provincia Gallecia', etc, essentially means the Roman province of Gallaecia (it is a term already used, for example, for John of Biclara, during the 6th century: "in provinciae Gallaeciae Miro post Theudemirum Suevorum rex efficitur". It didn't mean "sub-estatal entity": it meant "region".

Edit: or, as appointed by Isidore of Seville in his etymologies "Item regiones partes sunt provinciarum, quas vulgus conventus vocat, sicut in Phrygia Troia; sicut in Gallicia Cantabria, Asturia." (XIV.5: "regions are parts of provinces, and are commonly called conventus, such as Troy in Phrygia, Cantabria and Asturia in Galicia.") Also, in the same book when he gives the provinces of Spain, he names the provinces of Hispania, not mentioning Gallia Narbonensis which belonged to the Visigoth kingdom. _Provincia_, in early medieval accounts, usually refer to Roman provinces.


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## Margrave

Circunflejo said:


> Yes, the same one that the current Spanish king who has also several non præjudicando titles like archduke of Austria. I guess you'll struggle to find an Austrian claiming (or acknowledging) that there's an archduchy of Austria nowadays. Of course, that doesn't mean that it didn't exist Austria.


Well, what is clear is that the title of King of Galicia and the Kingdom of Galicia existed since minimum the years 500's the attested source being Gregory of Tours in his Libri Historiarum, and continues being mentioned as a kingdom at least until the year 1700, being the Kingdom of Galicia part of the Habsburg crown, therefore they were also kings of Galicia among other. Only in 1837 the Kingdom of Galicia was changed into a province.
Edit: The Kingdom of Galicia existed until 1833, not 1837, sorry. "The Kingdom of Galicia and the Junta continued to formally exist until the State Liberal Reform of 1833, at the time of the provincial division under the regency of Maria Christina of the Two Sicilies. Galicia regained its territorial unity for twenty-four days by the constitution of the _Junta de Gobierno de Galicia_ following a liberal armed uprising in 1846, the Mártires de Carral, but never regained the status of a kingdom." Kingdom of Galicia - Wikipedia


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## Hulalessar

I am not sure it is helpful in this discussion to argue about who controlled what where and what areas place names covered. The concept of the nation state did not apply back in the middle ages. It was all about what you controlled and allegiance was often only nominal. Henry II of England controlled more of France than the King of France. Later kings of England styled themselves kings of France up to 1801 even though they controlled no part of France after the loss of Calais in 1558. Some parts of modern France only became so in the 19th century and other parts only definitively so in the 20th. Borders in Europe have constantly shifted like blobs in a lava lamp.

The history of the Iberian Peninsula is a story of shifting alliances and does not really have anything to do with whether the administrative area of Spain today known as Galicia has something which can be called a Celtic heritage. What does a Celtic heritage involve? Ethnicity has been discussed elsewhere and may involve a number of different aspects. What is there about Galicia than can be classed as Celtic? It seems nothing really apart from the fact that, like a large part of Europe, it was once inhabited by people speaking a Celtic language. If you find something Celtic about Galicia can you also find the same thing about other parts of Spain, not to mention other countries? We could argue that England has a Celtic heritage.

When nationalist interests get involved history can involve selecting the parts that suit the agenda. Nationalism all to often involves stressing difference. We should be looking for what is held in common whilst at the same time celebrating difference. Current events show the dangers of excessive nationalism.


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## Cossue

Yes, we are wandering far away from the origin of the debate... But lets we remember that, for example, I as a Galician and Galician speaker live in a country where a certain far right party has menaced with "unnofficialicing" Galician while denying the existence of other nations is Spain different from "Spanish" as they define it... Just speaking of extreme Nationalism (edit: also a country where the public in general voted for seding a song in Galician to Eurovision, but, alas, the profesional jury had other idea).



Hulalessar said:


> Ethnicity has been discussed elsewhere and may involve a number of different aspects. What is there about Galicia than can be classed as Celtic? It seems nothing really apart from the fact that, like a large part of Europe, it was once inhabited by people speaking a Celtic language. If you find something Celtic about Galicia can you also find the same thing about other parts of Spain, not to mention other countries? We could argue that England has a Celtic heritage.



I offer these articles:

Galicians - Wikipedia
List of Celtic place names in Galicia - Wikipedia
Castro culture - Wikipedia

Curiously enough, Celtic heritage in Europe is something that should unite more than separate.


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## Circunflejo

AndrasBP said:


> My point was that apart from Galicia (and sometimes Asturias) there are no other areas in Europe that identify as Celtic where an Insular Celtic (Goidelic or Brittonic) language hasn't recently been spoken.


You know that identity questions aren't always easy to grasp. As it has been said in the thread, a Celtic language was spoken in Galicia, you can find Celtic toponyms in Galicia... but the same it's true for other places that nowadays aren't identified as Celtic. And I guess there's no way to know for sure why Galicia is more identified as Celtic than the other places.



Margrave said:


> No problem, glad to help.  "In the chronicles and documents of the High Middle Ages the terms derived from Hispania, Spania, España or Espanha, continued to be used by the Christians but only in reference to Muslim controlled areas." Usually in the early years after the Arab invasion in 711, the vast regions occupied by the Arabs were called Yspania, please check this document from the year 832, the Will of Asturian king Alfonso II: "...in qua Sancta Ecclesia Dei Genitrix obtinuerat Principatum ab antiquo ante ingressum Sarrecenorum in Yspania tempore pacis." The Chronica Gothorum Pseudoisidoriana, I, 35-41, states: "Yspania ab Ispano rege qui eam subiugauit nuncupatur."


I'm not sure I'm following you. Do you mean that if I write some name in some book it becomes an existing political entity? There are tons of book about Atlantis, would you say it's an existing political entity?



Cossue said:


> @Circunflejo: Yep. The expression 'provincia Gallecia', etc, essentially means the Roman province of Gallaecia (it is a term already used, for example, for John of Biclara, during the 6th century: "in provinciae Gallaeciae Miro post Theudemirum Suevorum rex efficitur". It didn't mean "sub-estatal entity": it meant "region".


But a region isn't a kingdom, is it?



Margrave said:


> Well, what is clear is that the title of King of Galicia and the Kingdom of Galicia existed since minimum the years 500's the attested source being Gregory of Tours in his Libri Historiarum


Yes.


Margrave said:


> and continues being mentioned as a kingdom at least until the year 1700, being the Kingdom of Galicia part of the Habsburg crown, therefore they were also kings of Galicia among other.


I think a kingdom is something more than a king bearing the title of king of some place.


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## Cossue

Circunflejo said:


> But a region isn't a kingdom, is it?


(Since it is a direct interpellation I must answer)
A kingdom is a political concept, region is geographical one, they can coexist: "in provinciae Gallaeciae Miro post Theudemirum Suevorum rex efficitur" can be translated as "in the Roman province of Galicia, Miro is made king after Theudmir"... But at that moment a province was not longer a political entity, nor was it Roman, but rather simply a geographical area: that's the reason because I say that province can be translated as region (a geographical term). On the other hand, "Galliciensim regnum" can only be translated as Kingdom of Galicia. I would stop here this debate.


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## Circunflejo

Cossue said:


> I would stop here this debate.


 Although I don't see it as a debate. I'm just trying to understand a point of view that, with my limited knowledge, I can't understand. But, of course, that's not the goal of the thread so I think it's a good idea to stop it here.


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## Hulalessar

Unfortunately far right nationalists and "ordinary" regional nationalists feed off each and conflict arises. There is a move in Catalonia to promote Catalan's status above Castilian. That just makes Vox rub its hands with glee.

The questions are:

What does "Celtic heritage" involve?

If you decide what it is and conclude that Galicia has it, does any other part of Spain have it?

If other parts of Spain have it, what significance does that have for Galicia?


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## Cossue

Are we sure about that? Vox is residual in Galicia, Catalonia and the Basque Country. Maybe they feed in the fear of the other, when this other is not your brother, sister, friend or someone you meet everyday and have other opinions. Maybe extreme/populism nationalism feed in echo chambers (I'm not excusing no one, by the way).

In Galicia we have a sempiternal unionist government and Galician is collapsing among the youngest generations, especially under the educative law passed by Alberto N. Feijóo ten year ago. Today, preschoolers are scholarized in Galician only if a majority of the group are Galician speakers, otherwise they are scholarized in Spanish till they are 6 years old. The result is that in most of Galicia there are virtually no L1 speakers among kids. My personal story: my nine years old, raised in a Galician speaking home, speaks Spanish as her first language because literally 60% is more than 40%. For context, where I live most adults use Galician as their first language, and it is almost the only language you hear among seniors. Don’t misunderstand me: Galician Popular Party is in my opinion rather plural and moderate, but so it is the leftist and "radical" BNG (Bloque Nacionalista Galego) which is currently the second largest group in the parliament. Lets hope that moderates feed off each. I personally wish luck and good judgement to Alberto Núñez Feijóo.

As for the sociolinguist question, ¿having had a Celtic revival counts? Because Celtic revival is really where modern Celtic self-identification have been forged. Our Celtic revival was launched by Romantic writers and Regionalist scholars during the middle to late 19th century and affirmed during the 1920’s. Did it reach the society? Absolutely: our then new hymn, fist interpreted in 1916 at La Habana, define Galician and “sons of the wandering Celts”, our sport clubs got names as Celta de Vigo, Céltiga, Breogán, etc… You can discuss the theoretical grounds used by those scholars, but their Celtic revival was a success and is part of our history. In the Iberian peninsula just the Asturians had a similar one.

From an exclusively linguistic point of view I would say that in large chunks of Galicia you can find arguably Celtic toponym at each step you give (but I don’t say that this makes anyone Celt around here, it is part of the landscape): Just 20 km around Boiro, for example, where I work, you have toponyms such as Monte Xiabre < Senabre < *Senā-brixs, Iñobre < Ignovre < *(p)enyo-brixs, O Xobre < *Uxso-brixs, O Grove < Ogrobre < *Oko-brixs, several Brión < *Brigiō, river Tambre < Tamar, Noia < *Nowyā… While you can find Celtic toponyms in more than half Iberia, the density in Galicia is notable, even taking into account that Galician toponymy is already very packed. For a critic overview on this subject: Búa, Carlos (2019) Toponimia prelatina de Galicia.

For the rest, I also propose the lecture of: e-Keltoi: Journal of Interdisciplinary Celtic Studies | Vol 6 | Iss 1. In any case, as I wrote before


Cossue said:


> Are Galician still Celts? No, no more that Asturians or French or Piamontese or English people. The Galicians were Celts? Yes, but certainly not La Tene Celts, IMO.


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## Circunflejo

Cossue said:


> My personal story: my nine years old, raised in a Galician speaking home, speaks Spanish as her first language because literally 60% is more than 40%.


 Do you mean that she speaks Spanish as her firsrt language at the school or everywhere? If the former, could you provide more info about it? I ask because you just talked about preschoolers and I don't know what's the system there in school and high school.


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## Cossue

Everywhere. She can speak a heavy Castilianized Galician, but that's it. And this is not a single case... is the general one. Galician is introduced in primary school (6-12 yo) in a 33%-40% time strategy... But the language they are schooled from 0 to 6 years is (in most Galician regions) Spanish, while Galician and English is reserved to complementary activities. Also, we (the people) asked and reunited 30,000 firms for a toons channel in Galician... The parliament passed a law with the 100% of agreement of PP, BNG and PSOE... but here we are, waiting for it. It's just a matter of time that Galician will engrose the official list of endangered languages.


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## Penyafort

Hulalessar said:


> There is a move in Catalonia to promote Catalan's status above Castilian.


The status of both Catalan and Castilian has been set and ruled by law since the late '70s, specially in article 6 of the Catalan _Estatut_. The move to reform it seventeen years ago by adding adjectives like 'preferential' to the wording about the usage of Catalan by the government and the media was deemed anticonstitutional, leading to one of the many causes that would give path to the rise of pro-independence feelings in the following years. Apart from that, it'd be good to know what specific 'move' you are actually talking about.


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## Hulalessar

Cossue said:


> She can speak a heavy Castilianized Galician.


That encapsulates the downside of (over)promoting regional or dying languages. I have read of complaints by native speakers of Irish, Welsh, Catalan and Navajo that learners taught within the community do not speak their language properly.

If:
    (a) you have an area A in a country B
    (b) X is spoken as a mother tongue by a minority in A but not elsewhere in B
    (c) Y is spoken by everyone in B (including A)
    (d) those whose mother is Y who live in A are required to learn X
then it is almost inevitable that X will be "contaminated" by Y, _a fortiori_ if X and Y are related and have some degree of mutual intelligibility.

Wanting to keep your mother tongue from dying out is a perfectly reasonable project. It should be enabled by government where there is demand. However, is it worth preserving a language at the expense of ending up with something of a hybrid?

According to one estimate half the people in the world are bilingual. Many of them do not have a problem with using one language in some situations and another in others, just as they do not think anything of wearing smart clothes in some situations and casual in others. I am inclined to think that if you want to preserve a minority language it is best to treat language like clothes and not be concerned with its social status. It avoids polarising positions which lead to conflict.


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## Circunflejo

Cossue said:


> Everywhere. She can speak a heavy Castilianized Galician, but that's it.


That's somewhat surprising if she's raised in Galician at home. But I get the (depressing) picture of what you call heavy Castilianized Galician.


Cossue said:


> But the language they are schooled from 0 to 6 years is (in most Galician regions) Spanish, while Galician and English is reserved to complementary activities.


That's really surprising if we bear in mind that in El Bierzo and la Alta Sanabria Galician is optatively used as teaching language up to 1 and a half hours in Educación Infantil due to an agreement between the Government of Castile and Leon and the Goverment of Galicia.


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## Penyafort

Hulalessar said:


> That encapsulates the downside of (over)promoting regional or dying languages. I have read of complaints by native speakers of Irish, Welsh, Catalan and Navajo that learners taught within the community do not speak their language properly.


What's the problem with not speaking it _properly_? Catalan has more second than first speakers, but so does English. Do those who have English as a second language speak it _properly_?

Besides, there's no such thing as ovepromotion for what's indigenous.



Hulalessar said:


> However, is it worth preserving a language at the expense of ending up with something of a hybrid?


Judging from the language we're using now, it may be. Some medieval English peasants may be turning in their graves...


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## Cossue

Circunflejo said:


> That's really surprising if we bear in mind that in El Bierzo and la Alta Sanabria Galician is optatively used as teaching language up to 1 and a half hours in Educación Infantil due to an agreement between the Government of Castile and Leon and the Goverment of Galicia@Circunflejo: Well, that's life.


That's life, man!

@Hulalessar: My language is far from dying, thanks for your concerns. Right now we are living a true Gold Musical Era not because someone is expending taxes, but because people is taking on their hands what politicians don't know how to handle [a youtube list, in case someone feel like trying].


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## Circunflejo

Cossue said:


> [a youtube list, in case someone feel like trying]


I miss the muñeira de Sabaxans (most likely the most beautiful Galician muñeira), A Rianxeira (most likely the most well-known Galician folk song out of Galicia) and Galicia Caníbal (Fai un sol de carallo) that was pretty well-known out of Galicia decades ago.


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## Cossue

Haha... I'll add them ;-)


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## Circunflejo

Cossue said:


> Haha... I'll add them ;-)


I don't like too much Vivir na Coruña but people from A Coruña may miss it too and as the play list is a trip to Galicia, it may make sense to include it although I would doubt to include it myself.

P.S.: Being a trip to Galicia, I won't suggest you to include some Galician from outside Galicia.


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## Margrave

Cossue said:


> Haha... I'll add them ;-)


@Cossue Thank you for the great music videos from Galician music.  Enjoying them now.

Alalá de Muxía
Gaiteiros da Noite
Agarrado de Vilar de Cabeiras
Galicia within ancient Brazil, with Carlos Nunhez and Ariano Suassuna
A história de Aires de Pontevedra e sua origem medieval
Alalá do Cebreiro
Aliboria - Caroi
Aliboria - Mangüeiro

We have a couple of language recovering case studies:
---
Czech language and culture: Karel IV University of Prague (1348) classes, books in Czech, governing language->(1620) Austrian Habsburg occupation imposed the Seculos Escuros: Czech language was interdicted as a governing language, Czech professors expelled from the Karel IV University, in notaries and masses, all was being Germanised>by end 1700's Czech was considered a funny dialect spoken by people in the countryside>Czech legends and tales incorporated as if they were German>Czech kingdom history facts erased from memory or Germanised too. In the 1800s, poverty because of higher taxes and more conscript for the army, cannon fodder against Napoleon, imposed by Vienna than for other parts of the Austrian empire forced the immigration of around 1 million Czechs (from 3-4 million living in the Czech Kingdom) to the US and other countries.
---
From early 1800's the Czech revival mainly by investment in children education. First all Czech school around 1820, against all odds and Vienna rejecting it, school closed in 1840. But Czech people keep believing and pressuring Vienna. Scholars recreated the language, based on the existing  Czech "dialect" and following old books from before 1620 (those that were not destroyed, burned by the Austrians), fight against Vienna to obtain more and more permits to open schools. Vienna would seldom finance it, then Czech citizens  organized into cooperatives to fund schools. The burgeoisie gave money, farmers gave part of their produce, traders donated products, which were sold in markets to raise funds. You can all it crowdfunding, nothing new here. Around 1890 the existing city theater in Prague could only have its plays performed in German. Vienna cancel the interdiction to perform plays in Czech. The Czechs mobilised and financed through crowdfunding and build the imponent and bigger Narodni Divadlo, the National Theater, you can see today. By 1890 the language was again revived and vigorous.
---
The same for Galician, a language of arts, culture in Middle Ages, interdicted since 1490 or around it in governing documents, notaries and masses. Interdicted during most of the Francoist dictatorship. Galician will not be lost, young Galicians are fighting back to preserve the language O noso idioma, o galego 1 million views (30% of the Galician population).
---
Ultimately, it is  the people that need to do it.
---
Welsh is also a success case. Galician will be the next. We must never let a language die, humanity loses much with every language that dies.
---
Saúdos dende Portugal.


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## Hulalessar

Margrave said:


> We must never let a language die, humanity loses much with every language that dies.


I certainly agree with the red. If language is considered part of culture then any loss must be lamented. Every language, if not necessarily embodying a different way of thinking, involves a different mode of expression. As to the blue, I am more equivocal. There are times when things need to be allowed to die with dignity. You need to ask what price is being paid for preservation. More importantly, when aggressive promotion is involved of regional languages not immediately threatened, are the formerly oppressed becoming the oppressors? I have no problem with genuine grassroots movements. What concerns me is demagoguery with an agenda beyond language preservation. A balance needs to be struck between the primary purpose of language as a means of communication and language as an expression of culture. All languages are equally expressive. A language does not need to be be dressed in a suit and tie to have dignity.


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## Silvia Dee

Hulalessar said:


> The above assumes that Wikipedia is unreliable and that university and history institution websites are. As far as universities and history institutions are concerned Nietzche's dictum that there are no facts only opinions should be borne in mind, especially when it comes to history.
> 
> Research has shown Wikipedia to be generally up to the same standard as other encyclopaedias. Facts are usually shown to be correct and criticism aimed at omissions. Omissions are pretty much what you get in any encyclopaedia article - they do not set out to be comprehensive. There is no sound reason to disdain Wikipedia any more than any other encyclopaedia. Disparaging a Wikipedia article is often an alternative to coming up with an argument in rebuttal, a bit like saying "political correctness gone mad".


I Edit wikipedia


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## Silvia Dee

pollohispanizado said:


> From what I understand, it's the exact opposite. The Kingdom of Galicia was established--though it was maintained as a rather volatile protectorate of the Kingdom of León--at least two centuries before the Kindom of Portugal got its independence in the 12th century. (Not that this historical context means anything when it comes to which loan words made their way into the language: any Celtic loans would have come from the Roman times, when the North Hispanic variant of Vulgar Latin was coming together
> 
> 
> Cossue said:
> 
> 
> 
> In Galicia (and probably in most of Europe) there are plastic representations of bagpipers since the 12th century. My avatar, for example, is from the 13th century's Cantigas de Santa María.
> 
> 
> Galician and Portuguese derive from medieval Galician-Portuguese (cf. História do galego-português by Azevedo de Maia), but before it(they) was a written language it evolved from Latin in what is now Galicia, western Asturias and northwestern Portugal. In fact, in southern Galician and northern and central Portugal there are tens of places whose names derive from colonist from the North, who arrived there during the ninth and tenth centuries, following the Galicians lords who carried on the local "reconquista" and who established the County of Portugal. In central (and southern) Portugal, Galician-Portuguese displaced other Romance, Mozarab, languages: as for example, in Coimbra.
> 
> As for Celtic words there, in Galician, Portuguese, Asturian or Spanish: Josep Coromines, _Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico_. Electronic version's ISBN: 978-84-249-3654-9.
> 
> 
> 
> Actually the academic consensus is that both the extant insular Celtic languages and the continental extinct ones (Gaulish, Celtiberian, Lepontic) belong to the same language family. Calling this language family Celtic is quite reasonable. I won`t even reference this.
> 
> 
> 
> Yes.
> 
> (But actually Wikipedia is pretty useful, especially when the sources are clearly referenced).
> 
> 
> Margrave said:
> 
> 
> 
> @Cossue hope you are well. You are absolutely right. Also, there are many medieval Galician churches where we find sculptures of bagpipes. There is the mainstream hypothesis that the bagpipes originated in Mesopotamia, it seems, why not India. It would be an oriental music instrument imported into Europe through Greece. I read somewhere (academic source) that from Galicia, precisely from Santiago de Compostela, the bagpipes were taken into several other European countries. This is because since the tomb of Santiago Mayor was uncovered around the year 900DC, the pilgrims took the bagpipes back to their countries, or so it says the source. However, there is an interesting archaeological discovery in 2003 that points to an existing musical instrument, possibly the precursor of the bagpipe, what would be native to the Celtic lands, precisely in Ireland, the Wicklow Pipe which looks like a quite primitive (and clumsy) bagpipe, but it is certainly a bagpipe. I believe (and I can be wrong) that either this Wicklow Pipe is the predecessor of the present day Celtic pipes or it was replaced by the oriental bagpipes later in early European Middle Age. This would point for a very ancient native Celtic bagpipe, perhaps sounding similar to the oriental model (or not). Wicklow Pipes - Research - Prehistoric Music Ireland
> ---
> Concerning the Celtic language coverage in the Iberian peninsula and Celtic civilizations there, this was disputed from some in the academia back in the early 1990's, but recent research proves it existed without any doubt. This is a settled subject now. That is why @AndrasBP find related words in most of Iberian peninsula.
> ---
> In my personal opinion, there was never a Galician-Portuguese language. The Medieval Galician language was spoken until around the end of the years 1300's and during the 1400's from Medieval Galician evolved old Portuguese. "until the end of the 14th century it is impossible to separate linguistically Galicia from northern Portugal as far as the Douro" source: O galego-português medieval: sua especificidade no contexto dos romances peninsulares e futura diferenciação do galego e do português, por Clarinda de Azevedo Maia, em Actas do Congresso Internacional sobre o Português (Universidade de Lisboa, 1994).
> ---
> @Penyafort @Silvia Dee @pollohispanizado the kingdom of Galicia was created by the Germanic Swabian round 406AD still as a vassal kingdom to the Roman Empire. Around 411AD, the Swabians murdered the last Roman governor (forgot his name) and became independent. It was a very important kingdom, which hosted at least one, but probably two Catholic Concilia (meeting of all bishops of the Church), part of the Actae from the one at the year 572AD (or so) is kept at the Toxos Outos cartulary in Galicia. While Galicia was a kingdom since 406-411AD, other Iberian kingdoms were created later: the kingdom of Asturias around 722AD after the heroic battle of Covadonga won by the Visigotic noble count Pelagius against the invading Arabic armies, and much later on the creation of the kingdom of Castille in 1035 Kingdom of Castile - Wikipedia . We would have then by order of precedence the kingdom of Galicia created around 406, the kingdom of Asturias around 722AD and the kingdom of Castille in 1035. Galicia precedes Asturias by around 316 years and precedes Castille by 630 years or close to it. The Medieval Galician was the language of diplomacy, arts and culture. The Cantigas de Santa Maria (1257) by the Castilian king Alfonso el Sabio, were not written in the Castilian language, but in medieval Galician.
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Hulalessar said:


> The above assumes that Wikipedia is unreliable and that university and history institution websites are. As far as universities and history institutions are concerned Nietzche's dictum that there are no facts only opinions should be borne in mind, especially when it comes to history.
> 
> Research has shown Wikipedia to be generally up to the same standard as other encyclopaedias. Facts are usually shown to be correct and criticism aimed at omissions. Omissions are pretty much what you get in any encyclopaedia article - they do not set out to be comprehensive. There is no sound reason to disdain Wikipedia any more than any other encyclopaedia. Disparaging a Wikipedia article is often an alternative to coming up with an argument in rebuttal, a bit like saying "political correctness gone mad".


Don’t do that: I’ve found articles in Wikipedia talking about homosexuality to be proven by science a mental disorder and, in fact, had an argument with an homophobe online about that:”if is written in Wikipedia is true”. I got so pissed off that I “edited” the mentioned “referenced” article and added:”a clear example of homosexual disorder is “that homophobe user name”. It was approved and available for the public to read for a whole month (I felt bad later on and erased it).
Please, it is not reliable. I was researching Wikipedia publications to report biased and not based publications for two years and a have. You can’t imagine what I found there and how many times that information was referenced in other forums as a reliable source


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## pollohispanizado

Silvia Dee said:


> I Edit wikipedia


That's the whole point of the site...


Silvia Dee said:


> Don’t do that: I’ve found articles in Wikipedia talking about homosexuality to be proven by science a mental disorder and, in fact, had an argument with an homophobe online about that:”if is written in Wikipedia is true”. I got so pissed off that I “edited” the mentioned “referenced” article and added:”a clear example of homosexual disorder is “that homophobe user name”. It was approved and available for the public to read for a whole month (I felt bad later on and erased it).
> Please, it is not reliable. I was researching Wikipedia publications to report biased and not based publications for two years and a have. You can’t imagine what I found there and how many times that information was referenced in other forums as a reliable source


Good to know, although homophobes have a much higher likelihood of trying to skew public opinion or legitimize their sad worldview than history buffs would. Of course, all information is presented based on our human biases, and history is written by the "winners", but that is true of all publications. You can likely still find published academic books that tout homosexuality as an illness.


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## Margrave

@Silvia Dee well, I respectfully beg to differ. It was never a protectorate. The Kingdom of Galicia was never mentioned in medieval sources as a protectorate. The same for Leon, Castille, Aragon, etc. Galicia was a kingdom, with a crown, and had their governing bodies until the Hernando and Isabel installed their Audiencia back in 1499. Even after, it remained a kingdom, like Leon, Castille, Aragon and other mentioned in the title of the monarch I mentioned before, dated from around 1700. 

@Hulalessar "You need to ask what price is being paid for preservation." Hi,  thank you, valuable insights on your posts, that make me think and learn. The Ukrainians are showing the world what is the ultimate price to keep their nation, culture and language from being russianized. I am not supporting any war, any war is a sh..t, though sometimes people must fight a war to defend democracy and the right they have to exist in freedom, like our ancestors courageously did in 1939-1945. 
---
Here is one case study on trying to make one language disappear: one of the parts state in a TV speech: "Ukrainians and us are the same people" and "there is no Ukrainian language" and "we created Ukraine in 1918". The other part states:





It is interesting to note that in this case, the invader is not only targeting civilian and military infrastructure, but also bombing churches, because to tame a nation he must destroy its culture.
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Galicia is a pacific nation, coexisting within the Kingdom of Spain, whose Constitution mentions (copy-paste): _"1. El castellano es la lengua española oficial del Estado. Todos los españoles tienen el deber de conocerla y el derecho a usarla. 2. Las demás lenguas españolas serán también oficiales en las respectivas Comunidades Autónomas de acuerdo con sus Estatutos. 3. La riqueza de las distintas modalidades lingüísticas de España es un patrimonio cultural que será objeto de especial respeto y protección." _We take from this that all law abiding Spanish citizens must protect all languages within the kingdom and not let them die or be assimilated. Therefore, the Galician law mentioned by @Cossue (I did not know about it before) could have been legally approved under Galician laws, but in spirit it is not constitutional, hence illegal. This is because this law is causing damage to the Galician language, who according to the Constitution must be "respected and protected ". In the video I posted before, a Galician girl propose her case against other Castilian speaking kids that pick on her: Galician is the language of the old, of the poor, of the countryside, and it goes. All should work together with the Galician to teach the kids to respect other languages and cultures.
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Another interesting point, that perhaps many do not know, is that Spanish as a language is never mentioned in the Constitution. The Spanish language does not exist, but there is the Castilian language, which is the governing language, like, let's say, the Russian was the governing language in Ukraine from around 1650 to 1991, the Portuguese was the governing language of Macao while its citizens spoke a Chinese dialect, Chinese is in Tibet, German was in the occupied territories from 1939-1945, and also the Latin during the Roman Empire times. 
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Language is so important for each one of our countries! To impose one language for everybody is just to eliminate cultural diversity. The beauty of cultural diversity makes us love Spain (and other multinational countries). We go visit there, to Catalunya, Galicia, Castille, Asturias, Cantabria, Andalusia, the Basque Country, different cultures, ways of life, and dishes. Let us not transform Spain into a big Paella (nothing against it, I love paella) with the same flavour everywhere. Sameness is boring.  I for me would continue loving paella, but those, including me, that also love bacalhau a galega would be sad to see it become extinct!


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## Circunflejo

Margrave said:


> the Portuguese was the governing language of Macao


You didn't need to go so far away. You didn't recognize Mirandese till 1999...


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