"s.t.champion" wrote:
> i will admit that the
> relevance of psychology to the hallstatt period has passed me by, however -
> i've clearly missed something major here. please let me have refs.
Hi Sara,
What I had meant about psychology was in the broader context of the
tenets of Celtic art. The psychology of two Coriosolite die engravers
revealed by their working habits plotted against the chronology of
their "work in progress" allowed me to observe one or two tenets of
their art. The origin and any regional variation of those tenets, of
course, could not be estimated without further research. From your
tone, I see you were hoping for something better than this, so off the
top of my head I can suggest that some of the differences in the late
Hallstatt arts and the La Tene styles, and the rather abrupt change
could be attributed to a change in landscape. This sort of
inspirational "leap" is addressed in general terms by the psychologist
Abraham Maslow in (I don't have the book at hand for the exact ref.)
Religions, Values, and Peak Experiences.
> but I soon realized that they had been diminished by a number
> >of British archaeologists who felt the need to define their culture
> >and heritage.
>
> i don't understand this - do you mean english? british and english are
> different - and british *nationality* in its post-union form would *include*
> a number of different ethnic identities - from afro-caribbean and
> bangladeshi to those of modern celtic peoples and the english. as a person
> of scottish/irish ancestry i certainly don't 'feel the need' to define a
> 'british' culture and 'heritage' for myself, though the construction of
> 'britishness' as an idea is, of course, also academically interesting.
Gosh, I just meant archaeologists from Britain. Are Scotland and Wales
called "countries" now? That would be encouraging. I had the
impression that they were referred to as "regions" as in say, "Tibetan
Autonomous Region" ;-) after thirty three years absence my
nomenclature might be rusty.
> this doesn't stop me having an intellectual
> interest in understanding *how* ideas of 'celtic' identity have come about
> and developed in the last two centuries, and how archaeology has been used
> in the construction of those identities.
If that interest can accept the possibility that "Celticness" has been
revealed rather than just invented, then it shouldn't offend anyone.
As individuals, we all come to a greater knowledge of ourselves over
time; I don't see why cultures could not do the same. We just have to
be careful, as genocide is often in the eyes of the beholder, and we
have to see what ramifications might ensue by our ideas and actions.
> of course one of the first lessons one teaches
> archaeology students is that absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.
> however, you can see the logical problems which ensue if a scientist of any
> type tries to construct a theory based on no evidence at all. if there is
> no evidence to support a theory, then how can you proceed to elaborate it
> let alone evaluate it?
There is evidence to support the theory that the Celtic culture
traveled eastward to the Rhine and then northward, and westward. Few
exact patterns are
known, but this seems to me to be a matter of time before this is
revealed. To this end I have been speculating about the possibility of
a Celtic iconography database, and I did a few experiments in this
some years ago, but it is not an easy task. We are creating an
unrelated (conchological/malacological) database currently with
collectors, curators, and research scientists on four continents. I'm
hoping that this might inspire me a little more, but I suspect that a
metallurgical database will precede the iconography one. In time the
latter two will be linked, and this will really "kick butt" in the
furtherance of Celtic numismatics!
> in the case of my message, i simply said that there was no evidence of
> riders from the east speaking a 'celtic' language in hallstatt europe.
I believe that there is some evidence in place names for this. Doesn't
David Rankin at your university have something to say about that?
Which reminds me, I think he was struggling with the apparent
contradiction in Herodotus where the Danube is said to rise among the
Celts, but Herodotus also says that the Celts live outside the Pillars
of Heracles. We are so used to thinking the west end of the Med here,
hence Spain, but there is some evidence for eastern pillars of
Heracles as well. In Egyptian myth these pillars represent the four
limbs of Nut (the sky). The two western pillars are Isis and Nephtys,
the eastern pillars are their husbands. Herodotus might have meant (in
his poetic manner) that the Celts lived outside of the Mediterranean
basin.
> i'm trying to establish what you mean by celts - how do you identify people
> 'confidently' as celtic in the hallstatt period? if it's not by their
> language, then it must be by something else. what is this something else?
Again, when a single point is made it is weak, but the more supporting
evidence there is the greater the confidence. We have to include the
language as might be gleaned from place names, even when there are no
material remains. The element "Sego" in Spain for example. There is
also the use of iron, the cult of the horse, the use of hill forts by
what appears to be an elite minority, and the evidence of syncretism
in the mythologies of various regions. One alone would not be enough,
but as we see more and more, then the certainty grows. I will admit
that many of my colleagues leap too eagerly in attributing meanings to
certain devices. I am more circumspect in these matters. I have
received a number of acknowledgments in my interpretation of the boar
by Celticists, one even said that it was a "missing link" in his own
studies. He has written a very flattering thank you to me in his
forthcoming book.
> and it's the *evidence* for this that i'm trying to get at - not 50,000
> coins in brittany several hundred years later, which of course is not
> evidence which supports the above statement. but if you are implying that
> there is archaeological evidence for a connection between riders from the
> east in hallstatt europe and breton celtic coinage, then i'd be very
> interested to see your data.
I only meant that two decorated Celtic items were from Brittany, while
fifty thousand Celtic coins are from there. This was only to
demonstrate the paucity of some types of evidence, while other types
of evidence might abound. We have to deal with the Celts in an
interdisciplinary manner because of the lack of evidence. I was
dismayed to see how few Celtic coins came from primary deposits when I
read Colin Haselgrove's excellent book: _Iron Age Coinage in
South-East England - The Archaeological Context_
Have I been nicer this time?
Cheers,
John
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