How comes we used to be Irish, and now everyone's a Celt?

[hedgehog]

It's just an amusing phenomenon. We suspect that our background includes some Firbolg, some Viking and possibly some input from the Spanish Armada. There's Celt in there too, no doubt, but being Irish covers a lot more ground.

[Maeve]

1. Well, technically the Celts covered more ground

having started in the Danube region and gradually taking over most of Europe. If they'd been organized--or more importantly, given a damn about ruling other people--they might have been an empire to match Rome.

Research into the Celtic tribes became hot a few years back, with some new research in the Danube region and a multidisciplinary approach to cultural study becoming popular. (The rise of the Celtic Tiger and the heavy use of Celtic lore in modern paganism probably contributed to the scientific interest.)

And since "Celt" has more "noble warrior" connotations than "Irish", well.... :P

BTW, the Brits may be more Viking than Anglo-Saxon genetically. The things you find in the wikipedia!

[Another Bill C.]

2. We're not Celtic any more

Trinity College in Dublin conducted a study in 2004 to determine the true origins of the Irish population. They found an unexpected result in that there was little Celtic influence in the genetic makeup of the Irish population.

To quote Brian McEvoy of the Department of Genetics, Trinity College, Dublin: "The primary genetic legacy of Ireland seems to have come from people from Spain and Portugal after the last ice age. They seem to have come up along the coast through Western Europe and arrived in Ireland, Scotland and Wales. It’s not due to something that happened 2,500 years ago with Celts."

http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/AJHG/journal/issues/v75n4/41464/41464.html

[Maeve]

3. But genetics isn't everything

The cultural influence of the Celts is more important--it seems that the Celts were more inclined to "take over" by influence rather than by conquest, leaving the pre-existing peoples unharmed. Not a Celtic "race"--a Celtic culture.

[hedgehog]

4. That's what makes me smile.

I really think being Irish is associated with being Irish Catholic and with the 700 most recent years of history including the famine while being a Celt sidesteps both issues.

[Maeve]

5. And what makes me smile is...

If the Irish are the last of the Celts, then everyone can be Irish--it's a choice, not an accident of birth!
:toast:

Just gearing up for St Patrick's Day, when everybody gets to be Irish, whether they want to be or not...:dunce:

[hedgehog]

6. I don't know about being a Celt, but you can't be Irish without knowing that

the world is going to break your heart some day. It sounds like a sentiment straight from a coffee mug, but it's true.

[Maeve]

7. Of course it is...the Irish just happen to be the ones who KNOW it!

[hedgehog]

8. Sounds like the Milesians to me.

Bunch of late arrivals as far as us Firbolgs are concerned!

[DemBones DemBones]

9. Here's another surprise: "viking" is a verb.

The Danes (and perhaps other tribes from what is now Scandinavia) went viking, i.e., they went raiding in what is now England, Scotland, Ireland, and presumably Wales, too. They didn't call themselves Vikings, others gave them the raiders use the word "viking."

At least, so Bernard Cornwell says in his books of the Saxon Chronicles, of which there have so far been three. He's written a great many historical novels prior to this series. I picked up the first of the Saxon Chronicles (don't ask me the title) and am now waiting for him to publish volume four.

Uhtred of Bebbanburg, in what's now Northumbria, is the main character. Early on, he's captured by the Danes at age 10 and raised among them. Later, after his Danish "family" is killed by rival Danes, he rejoins his own people and fights for King Alfred the Great, who eventually unifies a bunch of small countries into what was eventually known as England. Uhtred doesn't really want to fight for anybody, he wants to go back to Bebbanburg and take the castle that's rightfully his from his slimeball uncle, but things keep happening . . .

Still later -- well, if you want to read about life in the 9th century, learn how to fight in a shield wall, about how the Danes sailed and rowed their ships, you'd enjoy the books.

Also, according to Cornwell, "Viking" helmets never had horns on them. That would have made it far too easy for your opponent to grab a horn, jerk your helmet off, and do you in. So, did some people somewhere wear horned helmets or is that all myth? Or is Cornwell wrong? What IS truth anyway? :shrug:

[knight_of_the_star]

10. I know archaeologists have found some horned helmets

Usually in graves and burial sites though, almost never on actual battlefields, something like that would be horribly impractical.

[muriel_volestrangler]

13. The OED disagrees with Cornwall

ad. ON. and Icel. víking-r (whence also Norw., Sw., Da. viking, G. wiking), = OE. wícing, OFris. witsing, wising. Cf. also ON. and Icel. víking fem., the practice of marauding or piracy.
The ON. word is commonly regarded as f. vík creek, inlet, bay, + -ingr -ING3, a viking thus being one who came out from, or frequented, inlets of the sea. The name, however, was evidently current in Anglo-Frisian from a date so early as to make its Scandinavian origin doubtful; wícingscea{edh}a is found in Anglo-Saxon glossaries dating from the 8th century, and s{aeacu}-wícingas occurs in the early poem of Exodus, whereas evidence for víkingr in ON. and Icel. is doubtful before the latter part of the 10th cent. It is therefore possible that the word really originated in the Anglo-Frisian area, and was only at a later date accepted by the Scandinavian peoples; in that case it was probably formed from OE. wíc camp, the formation of temporary encampments being a prominent feature of viking raids.


-ing

a suffix forming derivative masculine ns., with the sense of ‘one belonging to’ or ‘of the kind of’, hence ‘one possessed of the quality of’, and also as a patronymic = ‘one descended from, a son of’, and as a diminutive. Found in the same form, or as -ung, in the other Teutonic langs. OE. examples are æ{th}eling ATHELING, cyning KING, lytling little one, child, flýming fugitive, hóring whoremonger; also the patronymics Æ{th}elwulfing son of Æthelwulf, Ecgbrehting, Cerdicing, Wodening, etc. (OE. Chron. anno 855), Adaming, etc. (Lindisf. Gosp. Luke iii. 38), and the gentile names Hoccingas, Iclingas, Centingas (men of Kent), with the Scriptural Gomorringas, Moabitingas, Idumingas, etc. This suffix also formed names of coins, as pending, penning PENNY, scilling SHILLING, and of fractional parts, as feor{th}ing quarter, FARTHING, teo{edh}ung, -ing tenth, TITHING: so ON. {th}ri{edh}jung-r third part, thriding RIDING (of Yorkshire).
Among words of various ages with this suffix are bretheling, bunting, gelding, golding, herring, hilding, sweeting, whiting, wilding. See also the compound suffix -LING (-l + -ing).

[greatauntoftriplets]

11. I am Norman Irish....

I have one of those Frenchified Irish names....though we lost the "de la" part of it aeons ago.

[mrgorth]

12. Norman Irish here too

My grandmom's last name was Large which was corrupted from a Norman name. Anywho, I'm also part Bavarian and have tried to do some research into where the bavarians came from and I always hit a brick wall. Seems like a celtic tribe mixed with some roman blood or something. Wondering what gods pre-Christian bavarians would've worshipped. Odin? Lugh?