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Swords and Weapons by
Historical Period - Celtic
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Celtic History - The Celtiberians (or Celt-Iberians)
were a Celtic people living in the Iberian Peninsula, chiefly in what is
now north central Spain and northern Portugal, before and during the Roman
Empire. The group originated when Celts migrated from what is now France
and integrated with the local Iberian people. A sign that the two populations
intermingled can be detected in the presence of Celtic elements among the
names of Celtiberian nobility.
The Celtiberian language is attested from the first century BC. Other,
possibly Celtic languages, Lusitanian, were also spoken in pre-Roman Iberia.
The Lusitanii gave their name to Lusitania, the Roman province name covering
current Portugal and Extremadura. Extant tribal names include the Arevaci,
Belli, Titti, and Lusones.
The earliest Celtic presence in Iberia was that of the southeastern
Almería culture of the Bronze Age. In the tenth century BC, a fresh
wave of Celts migrated into the Iberian peninsula and penetrated as far
as Cadiz. They brought aspects of La Tène culture with them and
adopted much of the culture they found. This basal Indo-European culture
was of seasonally transhumant cattle-raising pastoralists protected by
a warrior elite, similar to those in other areas of Atlantic Europe, centered
in the hill-forts, locally termed castros, that controlled small grazing
territories. These settlements of circular huts survived until Roman times
across the north of Iberia, from Northern Portugal and Galicia to the Basque
Country.
Celtic presence in Iberia likely dates to as early as the sixth century
BC, when the castros evinced a new permanence with stone walls and protective
ditches. Almagro-Gorbea and Lorrio recognize the distinguishing iron tools
and extended family social structure of developed Celtiberian culture as
evolving from the archaic castro culture which they consider "proto-Celtic".
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