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| Alesia Vercingetorix Surrenders to Julius Caesar |
I learned much about my maternal
ancestry from our family historian, Charles Peek, and was
surprised how far back into time he had been able to recover. It
seems that the McBean, later shortened Bean, ancestry began in
Scotland and Norse marriage. He traced McBean (or McBen)
as far back as the clan was recorded fighting the English (Anglo-Saxon)
with William
Wallace in the 14th century. Researching the
geographical area and other related people, it led me to find out
that Norsemen (Vikings) had settled and taken wives in
Scotland and Ireland as far back as the 8th century.
Apparently, according to DNA
and genealogical research, this mingling was not uncommon and
also occurred between Germanic Celts in Europe and Pict/Celts of
Britannia.
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| Agnes Moorehead, 1969 |
Thus, my family history is Germanic,
Pict (Scot), Welsh, and Norse. My sister married whose lineage was
Anglo-Saxon and whose great aunt was the famous British actress,
Agnes
Moorehead (1900-1974) – some may know her as Endora
in the TV show Bewitched.
Moorehead was popular in the 1940s and 1950s in England and United
States, and revived her popularity on American TV in the 1960s. She
was married twice and had no children.
My paternal side of the family is
Germanic on both sides (Lehman-Rosenbrook). Rosenbrook
was my paternal grandmother's maiden name, of which her uncle served
in the Civil War and the family arrived from Germany to the United
States in the spring of 1808 from London, England where they learned
English. A family heirloom from the Rosenbrook side of Lehman family
is the sword of Captain John D. Rosenbrook. The Lehman family
(great grandfather) came from Germany sometime before World War I,
and I know less about my paternal side than maternal side – the
Bean-Peek clan who settled in the southern portion of
the United States. Of course as I aforementioned, it was because of
the maternal side of the family who was interested in history as much
as myself. In the final analysis, I am just an American.
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| Glastonbury - Isle of Avalon, legendary site of Arthur's tomb |
Bryan
Sykes wrote an excellent book on the subject entitled:
Saxons,
Vikings, and Celts: Genetic Roots of Britain and Ireland.
This book and others will be listed at the end of this article in the
Bibliography section. He traced Celtic people from the
Pontnewydd
cave in North Wales to the tomb of The Red
Lady of Paviland and the tomb of King Arthur,
who was a real historical figure that legend overshadowed his
biography.
When people hear the name Celt or
Celtic (actually the original spelling was Keltoi or Keltic
established by the ancient
Greeks), they think of the Celtic people who fought bravely
against the Roman invasion of Britannia. The Romans could not defeat
the tribes (clans) they called the Picts,
who were Scottish people, so Emperor
Hadrian had a wall built to keep them away from
Roman-occupied Britannia. Hadrian was considered to be one
of the five “good” Roman emperors.
Recently, historians and archaeologists
have revealed how much the Norsemen (Vikings) had influenced much of
what is Europe today, especially in Scotland, Ireland, and the Isle
of Man; which gives them a common ancestral and cultural bond with
Scandinavians. While Viking raids that occurred in what is Wales
today, earlier in their history they had landed on the shores to
settle and even established a couple of settlements on the shores of
Ireland. This is not far-fetched because of their documented
exploration and settlements in Iceland, Greenland, and Nova
Scotia. Archaeologists are also investigating the possibility
that the Norsemen had traveled as far as Minnesota via the Great
Lakes. In the most northern territory of the United Kingdom there is
Orkney Island and Shetland Islands that bear evidence of this
phenomenon. It makes sense since the Vikings had explored, settled,
and traded in North America, through Europe via the great rivers
there, all the way to what is now Iraq.
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| Ulfberht Replica |
There travels eastward
enabled them to come back to Scandinavia with goods from the East,
but most importantly the fine art of sword-making from the eastern
world. Previous to that, Viking swords were plain iron and brittle, but
later they developed a technique for swords that were steel making them strong and flexible, as depicted in the video
about the Viking sword.
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| Excavated Ulfberht Sword |
This famous and mystical sword was called
the Ulfberht,
that was recreated right here on the Peninsula in Wisconsin by our
local blacksmith. It was as famous as the Saebø
(Thurmuth)
sword and Cawood
sword.
The Isle of
Man, known in history as Kingdom of Mann (Kingdom
of Isles) consists of the Hebrides
that are the islands in the Forth of Clyde region of the United
Kingdom known as Suðreyjar
that experienced great changes of
power during the 9th
through the 13 century (AD).
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| þingvellir |
Interestingly,
the Isle of Man's Parliament is called Tynwald,
derived from the Norse word, Thingvalla,
(see þingvellir)
which means 'Assembly
Place' that was when local
chieftains and people gathered to conduct important business, decide
on legal matters, and hold trials for those accused of crimes. It is
the oldest continuous parliament in the world. The
last king of Mann was Magnús
Óláfsson,
descendent of Norse-Gaelic kings who ruled the Isle of Man and other
regions of the Hebrides. I
imagine the actor of
the same name might be a descendent, if his name is not a stage name.
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| Viking Ship unearthed |
The
aforementioned Northern Isles called Norðreyjar,
were invaded by the Vikings (Norse) beginning in the 8th
century and became their stronghold, until conquered by Britain.
Norwegian
law was not abolished in Shetland until 1611
and it took the Norse language to all but disappear two hundred
years; however Norse influence remains today in their festivals. It
was on Orkney Island that in 1991 a Viking ship burial was
excavated.
In Ireland,
Vikings began their raids there around 795 AD, but no colonization
was attempted until after 837 AD. Dublin,
capital of Ireland, was founded by Norsemen after establishing a base
camp at the mouth of the Liffey
River. This extended later into Waterford where a base was
established in 914 AD.
The Vikings
could not truly conquer the Irish or the Scots, so ended up
assimilating themselves into Celtic culture; but the legacy can be
found all over the Gaelic world.
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| Numerous Celtic tribes in ancient UK, Britannia |
It was the
ancient Greeks who referred to people of that culture as Keltoi,
the original world, but Julius
Caesar around 58 BC when he
wrote about the people in Brittany (Britannia),
as Celts in
the Latin. Historical, they were a diverse culture of tribes in Iron
Age Europe, rather than just in what is now the United Kingdom. Their
cultural legacy has been left behind in Britain, Wales, Ireland,
Spain, France, southern Germany, Bohemia, Italy, Balkans, and even in
central Turkey.
Julius Caesar
was the one who initiated the legacy
description of Gallic
and Gaelic
people he called Celts as barbarians, but other cultures not Roman
were pretty much barbarians to Romans.
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| Thistle & Broom map |
The Celtic
legacy began around 500 BC from the Alpine region into areas of
France and parts of Spain. Evidence from tombs shows that they traded
with peoples of the Mediterranean.
About 400 BC,
the Celtic culture spread from eastern France into Bohemia, and after
the discovery of a site at La
Tene – as far as
Switzerland. The Roman called them Galli,
Gauls, a term used later for Celts in France. These were the people
that attacked Rome and sacked it in 390 BC. Other of the Baltic
Celts attacked Greece and sacked Delphi in 279 BC. Some of the tribes
continued across the Hellespont and founded a kingdom in central
Turkey they called Galatia.
By the 3rd
century BC, the Celts had spread north to France and the British
Isles. Roman rule and the spread of Christianity
– as well as the Anglo-Saxons - wiped out the Celtic culture. When
Rome fell in the 5th
century AD, the old Celtic lands came under Germanic rule and Gaul
was renamed France, derived from the Germanic tribe of the Franks.
Today, some of the Celtic culture remains in some of the British
Isles and Ireland.
Another
similarity between the Celts and the Vikings is that women could be
fierce warriors, like the Shield
Maiden of Viking history,
until they converted to Christianity.
The original
Celtic society were like Vikings in that they were warriors and
craftsmen, but in Celtic society the farmer was in the lower class.
They were also skilled in metal working and made beautiful jewelry
from gold, silver, copper, and bronze. Their cloaks were generally
brightly colored and wore golden torcs (neck) and bronze arm
bracelets. Warriors wore golden torcs into battle and when fighting
against Romans were considered naked in comparison to Roman soldiers.
Celtic women wore makeup, but were not protected female house maidens
like in Rome. Diodorus
Siculus wrote:
The women of the Gauls are not only like men in their great stature, but they are a match for them in courage as well.
A
tale was also written by Romans that stated that a Roman patrol came
upon a caravan of women and children, thinking they were easy prey,
they attacked or tried to stop the caravan … the women drew swords
out of the carts and commenced to protect themselves and their
children. The Roman patrol ended up retreating. Celtic women often
had scars on their arms from sword practicing with their young sons
while their husbands and older sons were out hunting or some other
business away from home.
It
was more common in Norse/Viking culture that a woman would be among
raiders in Viking ships out for plunder. These women, as
aforementioned, were called Shield Maidens.
Probably
the most
famous of Celtic women who were warriors is Queen
Boudicea,
of which recently a film
depicting her was made – with mixed reviews on historical accuracy
and believability.
Before
a battle in which they were far less protected than the Romans, the
Celtic warriors would beat their swords and spears against their
leather shields, meant to intimidate the enemy. Like the Vikings they
liked stories of battle and like telling such stories. Celtic men
wore their hair long and the nobility customarily wore mustaches.
Before battle they painted themselves with blue paint they called
woad.
The name comes from the plant
used to dye their skin. The Picts in Scotland liked tattoos, even the
women. Their cloaks were held onto their shoulders with a brooch pin,
made of bronze, gold or silver – depending upon what could be
afforded. Men wore as much jewelry to impress everyone as the women
did.
The
Druid class of Celts also could fight as warriors, but were an highly
inter-tribal brotherhood that met annually in Carnutes in Gaul to
elect a Chief Druid, so Julius
Caesar wrote.
Druids believed in reincarnation and that the universe must be kept
into balance. Animal sacrifice was made, and sometimes human
criminals or enemy warriors; sometimes burned in wicker baskets hung
from a sacred oak tree. This is only what we know of what Julius
Caesar wrote describing the Celtic people. The Picts in northern
Scotland drowned their victims and Druids would chant praising the
victims for their courage. In order to ensure that the sacrifice
victims were courageous, they were often drugged.
Druids
were historians, guardians of the tribal traditions and administered
tribal law, which made them judges when necessary. They were a
privileged member of the Celtic class and exempt from serving in the
military (although some were trained in the art of warfare), as well
as exempt from taxation. While the chieftain or king ruled the tribe,
Druids involved themselves in politics. Once the Romans figured that
out, Druid centers, specifically the central administrative part in
Carnutes, were the center of attack.
Druids had different tasks to
perform, like healing and maybe that may be why they accompanied
warriors into battle, as noticed by the Romans. The Druids were also
musically skilled and thus the Bard of Old England had its roots. It
could take as long as twenty years to be move from novice to full
Druid because they had not official written language, so everything
had to be memorize – laws, histories, magic formulae in the form of
herbal medicine, and other traditions. They were the keepers of the
culture, thus when the Romans used the tactics to attack and kill the
Druids, they began the decline
of the Celts as a cultural people with Christianity making the
final death blow. The only Latin that was spoken was retained by the
Roman
Catholic Church.
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| Gawton Stone |
Druids
used shrines were located in places that were deemed as being powers
of nature, like hilltops and grottoes, and the oak tree was the most
sacred of plants in the world of the Celt. There were sacred groves,
lakes, pools, and springs and their temples were in the open air and
amidst nature, for which they relished and held sacred. This was
because their main deity was the Mother
Goddess,
mother of all things living. Pliny
wrote in his Natural
History:
Having made preparation for sacrifice and a banquet beneath the trees, they bring hither two white bulls … Clad in a white robe, the priest [druid] ascends the tree and cuts the mistletoe with a golden sickle, and it is received by another in a white cloak. They then kill the victims, praying that the god will render this gift of his propitious to those to whom he has granted it. They believe that the mistletoe, taken in drink, imparts fertility to barren animals, and it is an antidote for all poisons …
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| Mistletoe |
NOTE:
I would like to note that some parts
of the mistletoe is poisonous, for those who would consider
partaking of that plant. This is true of several species, but like
mushrooms, one needs to be an expert to know the difference.
Particularly the leaves and berries (white), it can cause sickness
and possibly death. If someone eats mistletoe the best thing to do is
call a Poison Control center and get immediate medical attention.
There were, however, some distinct differences between Norse and Celts. Generally the Norse were taller and more stout. While the swords of Celts and Norse appear to be similar in design and ornamentation, the Norse preferred larger, heavier weapons and their shields were made of wood with metal - heavier, but handled by the stout Norse. Celts preferred going into combat light and especially the spearmen used shields made of hard-cured leather with wooden frames, almost as tall as they were for tactical reasons. Religion set them apart drastically, where as mentioned above, Celts major deity was the mother goddess, while Norse deities were primarily men, except for Valkyrie, who was a female cavalry warrior. Norse were a warrior class more deeply embedded into their culture with great warriors as their leaders. Celts had warrior leaders, of course, but the wisdom and knowledge of the Druids played heavily upon decision in the community, especially in deciding the fate of criminals. Vikings (Norsemen) did not just raid other people, but also established trade, which they had become good at. Contrary to belief, Vikings farmed as well, usually left to the women of the farm and children when the husband was off hunting, attending business, or warfare duty. Norse women were more involved in community affairs than Celtic women, although both were fierce and apt fighters, especially when it came to protecting their children and homestead.
There were, however, some distinct differences between Norse and Celts. Generally the Norse were taller and more stout. While the swords of Celts and Norse appear to be similar in design and ornamentation, the Norse preferred larger, heavier weapons and their shields were made of wood with metal - heavier, but handled by the stout Norse. Celts preferred going into combat light and especially the spearmen used shields made of hard-cured leather with wooden frames, almost as tall as they were for tactical reasons. Religion set them apart drastically, where as mentioned above, Celts major deity was the mother goddess, while Norse deities were primarily men, except for Valkyrie, who was a female cavalry warrior. Norse were a warrior class more deeply embedded into their culture with great warriors as their leaders. Celts had warrior leaders, of course, but the wisdom and knowledge of the Druids played heavily upon decision in the community, especially in deciding the fate of criminals. Vikings (Norsemen) did not just raid other people, but also established trade, which they had become good at. Contrary to belief, Vikings farmed as well, usually left to the women of the farm and children when the husband was off hunting, attending business, or warfare duty. Norse women were more involved in community affairs than Celtic women, although both were fierce and apt fighters, especially when it came to protecting their children and homestead.
For
further history of the melding of Norse among the Celts, here is a
link listing:
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