The healthy wyrdness of the anglo-saxons

  • Thread starter Thread starter JimG
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
JimG said:
I’m never sure whether “Celt” or “Celtic” should be pronounced with a hard “k” sound, How did the Celts pronounce it
Click to expand...
If by Celts you mean the indigenous inhabitants of these islands at the time of the Roman and then Saxon arrivals, they may well not have used the term — almost certainly they didn’t use it of themselves. In fact, as John Collis says, “the ancient sources never refer to the inhabitants of Britain as Celts, but from the beginning they are either Pretannoi or Britanni” (Collis, The Celts, 2010).

In the 18th Century a link was posited between the Celts of whom classical authors wrote, and the languages of the people we used to call Ancient Britons. This link may have been mistaken. Now “Celtic” is the word we use for those languages and for those peoples, but their link if any with the ancient Celtic peoples of continental Europe is highly controversial among historians.

Still, these insular peoples are happy calling themselves Celts, and that’s their business, of course.
 
Last edited:
Cirdan_XII said:
This is the classic interpretation based on reading of recorded history, but in recent years DNA stuidies have shown this to be at least partly untrue and that these invaders must have mixed with the indigineous population rather than killing them or driving them away
Click to expand...
Very true. In fact it was the archaeologists who started the process which led to the dismantling of the classic interpretation of the Saxon Advent, because there is no trace on the ground either of a massive genocide or of a massive exodus. Either ought to have left clear signs. On the contrary archaeologists see signs of continuity. We English are to a substantial extent pre-Saxon.
 
Last edited:
And that’s a good point, too. Probably the Britanni would have identified by their “tribe” (I don’t like the word, but it’s not easy to think of a replacement).
 
Tribal without doubt. No need to be afraid of using that word. Each tribe had its name, its ruler (who, as you know, could be male or female), its territory.

They had a common language, y Gymraeg, from the Brythonic combrogi , meaning ‘companions’. ‘Y Gymraeg’ was, therefore, the ‘language of the Companions’ …of the Brits! The oldest language in the UK by a country mile…at least, that’s what the old folk used to say when I was a nipper…and you can’t argue against facts like that!
 
A beautiful language, too. And just about holding its head above water, happily. It would be good to see proficiency in y Gymraeg growing again. When I first visited North Wales some 50 years ago there were still people who didn’t speak English there, or at least had difficulty getting by in English. I doubt if that applies today. But there’s been a deal of investment in the language, and it would be good if one day we are able to see the bulk of the Welsh population bilingual.
 
Emeraldlady said:
From curiosity, why is the word ‘tribe’ not acceptable to you?
Click to expand...
Thank you, Jharek, that’s exactly it. The word probably has a nobler sound in North America, but to an Englishman it carries perhaps a hint of “uncivilised” about it.
 
Last edited:
PickyPicky said:
perhaps a hint of “uncivilised” about it.
Click to expand...
I find it negative too. Also “clan”. I find that many old Western histories of my country tend to refer to certain families or groups as “clans”, when in our native tongue we refer to them as “Houses”. It’s quite annoying as one feels as if the author percieves the culture as backwards or primitive.
 
No one’s brow is higher than GKC’s.

P.S. re ‘a wee free man,’ no, I had to look that up; I’m not up on Terry Pratchett as he never got much recognition here. I think I first heard about him from you, actually!
 
Last edited:
tomarin said:
Perhaps US publishers found him too British?
Click to expand...
I suppose so. There is a market of some sort for British humour, though, isn’t there? Monty
Python, for instance, seems to have found an audience of some sort, and that I’d have thought, was very British. Taste is a complicated thing, though, and success or failure at comedy is as much a matter of chance as anything.
 
You could say the same thing for something like Hitchikers Guide to the Galaxy which is and was wildly popular, so yes, my theory is somewhat inconsistent at best. Since I haven’t really read any Pratchett I can’t say how or in what way it’s more British than say Neil Gaiman (who is wildly popular over here).

Monty Python is or was popular here; I don’t know if it was ever broadcast on commercial television - I know I first saw it on PBS which is non-commercial, has an established tradition of Anglophilic audiences and smaller audiences in general.
 
I should hope so by now! Although I still find the Marx Brothers funny even though they are a dated cultural artefact (and, no doubt, much too American).
tomarin said:
You could say the same thing for something like Hitchikers Guide to the Galaxy which is and was wildly popular, so yes, my theory is somewhat inconsistent at best. Since I haven’t really read any Pratchett I can’t say how or in what way it’s more British than say Neil Gaiman (who is wildly popular over here
Click to expand...
Yes, Douglas Adams is a not dissimilar writer. Incidentally you no doubt know of the pretty good dramatised version of Gaiman and Pratchett’s collaboration Good Omens, which was released last year on Amazon and is showing currently on BBC.
 
Last edited:
Yes I watched most of it and even started reading the book. But I have to say it was more out of a sense of duty than compulsion. I’ve thought about giving it another try. (I did read Coraline recently and thought it was pretty good.)
 
Last edited:
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top