Download AR3054 Lecture 5: `The Celts are war mad!` 1

AR3054 Lecture 5: ‘The Celts are war mad!’ 1
Classical sources on the Celts
Strabo (first century BC)
‘The whole race which is now called both ‘Gallic’ and ‘Galatic ’ is war-mad, and both highspirited and quick for battle, although otherwise simple and not ill-mannered. And therefore,
if roused, they come together all at once for the struggle, both openly and without
circumspection, so that for those who wish to defeat them by stratagem they become easy to
deal with (in fact, irritate them when, where, or by what chance pretext you please, and you
have them ready to risk their lives, with nothing to help them in the struggle but might and
daring)…’ (Strabo, Geography, 4,4,2)
C. Julius Caesar (first century BC)
‘Throughout Gaul there are two classes of persons of definite account and dignity. As for the
common folk [plebes], they are treated almost as slaves, venturing naught of themselves,
never taken into counsel. The more part of them, oppressed as they are either by debt, or by
the heavy weight of tribute, or by the wrongdoing of more powerful men, commit themselves
in slavery to the nobles, who have, in fact, the same rights over them as masters over slaves.
Of the two classes mentioned above one consists of Druids, the other of knights...’ Caesar,
Gallic War, 6,13] ‘The other class are the knights. These, when there is occasion, upon the
incidence of a war - and before Caesar’s coming this would happen well-nigh every year, in
the sense that they would either be making wanton attacks themselves or repelling such - are
all engaged therein; and according to the importance of each of them in birth and resources,
so is the number of liegemen [ambacti, a Celtic word, probably means armed retainers; see
7,40] and clients that he has about him. This is the one form of influence and power known to
them.’ (Caesar, Gallic War, 6,15)
Diodorus Siculus (first century BC)
‘In their journeyings and when they go into battle the Gauls use chariots drawn by two horses,
which carry the charioteer and the warrior; and when they encounter cavalry in the fighting
they first hurl their javelins at the enemy and then step down from their chariots and join
battle with their swords. Certain of them despise death to such a degree that they enter the
perils of battle without protective armour and with no more than a girdle about their loins.
They bring along to war also their free men to serve them, choosing them from among the
poor, and these attendants they use in battle as charioteers and as shield-bearers. It is also
their custom, when they are formed for battle, to step out in front of the line and to challenge
the most valiant men from among their opponents in single combat, brandishing their
weapons in front of them to terrify their adversaries. And when any man accepts the cha llenge
to battle, they then break forth into a song in praise of the valiant deeds of their ancestors and
in boast of their own high achievements, reviling all the while and belittling their opponent,
and trying, in a word, by such talk to strip him of his bold spirit before the combat. When
their enemies fall they cut off their heads and fasten them about the necks of their horses; and
turning over to their attendants the arms of their opponents, all covered in blood, they carry
them off as booty, singing a paean over them and striking up a song of victory, and these firstfruits of battle they fasten by nails upon their houses, just as men do, in certain kinds of
hunting, with the heads of wild beasts they have mastered. The heads of their most
distinguished enemies they embalm in cedar-oil and carefully preserve in a chest, and these
they exhibit to strangers, gravely maintaining that in exchange for this head some one of their
ancestors, or their father, or the man himself, refused the offer of a great sum of money. And
some men among them, we are told, boast that they have not accepted an equal weight of gold
for the head they show, displaying a barbarous sort of greatness of soul; for not to sell that
which constitutes a witness and proof of one's valour is a noble thing, but to continue to fight
against one of our own race, after he is dead, is to descend to the level of beasts.’ (Diodorus
Siculus 5,29)
‘And in pursuance of their savage ways they manifest an outlandish impiety also with respect
to their sacrifices; for their criminals they keep prisoner for five years and then impale in
honour of the gods, dedicating them together with many other offerings of first-fruits and
constructing pyres of great size. Captives are also used by them as victims for their sacrifices
in honour of the gods. Certain of them likewise slay, together with the human beings, such
animals as are taken in war, or burn them or do away with them in some other vengeful
fashion.’ (Diodorus Siculus 5,32)