The Menapia Quest

[Abramelin]

45 minutes ago, locomekipkachelfantje said:

I think I remember, from the Bello Gallico, that Ceasar had intercepted a message from the Helvetians, written in something resembling Greek script.

And here it is:

 

XXIX.—In the camp of the Helvetii, lists were found, drawn up in Greek characters, and were brought to Caesar, in which an estimate had been drawn up, name by name, of the number which had gone forth from their country of those who were able to bear arms; and likewise the boys, the old men, and the women, separately. Of all which items the total was:-

Of the Helvetii [lit. of the heads of the Helvetii] 263,000
Of the Tulingi 36,000
Of the Latobrigi 14,000
Of the Rauraci 23,000
Of the Boii 32,000
                                                      ———-
The sum of all amounted to 368,000

Out of these, such as could bear arms [amounted] to about 92,000. When the census of those who returned home was taken, as Caesar had commanded, the number was found to be 110,000.

[Kenemet]

18 hours ago, locomekipkachelfantje said:

Well, maybe you should read that.

The Germanic tribes invaded from the north, and eventuelly pushed the Celts to the fringes of Europe.

The Menapi, Frisii and Chauci may have been Germanised already, but I think that during Roman times they were still Celts. Or maybe better, Celtic speaking tribes.

It says "Historical Celtic groups included the Gauls, Celtiberians, Gallaeci,^[7][8] Galatians, Lepontii, Britons, Gaels, and their offshoots. "  And that includes the Germans -- the Gauls: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gauls

[Abramelin]

6 hours ago, Kenemet said:

It says "Historical Celtic groups included the Gauls, Celtiberians, Gallaeci,^[7][8] Galatians, Lepontii, Britons, Gaels, and their offshoots. "  And that includes the Germans -- the Gauls: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gauls

From your link, like I suggested:

During the Roman period the Gauls became assimilated into Gallo-Roman culture and by expanding Germanic tribes.

 

Most of Europe was once Celtic, but the Celts were pushed to the fringes of Europe or became assimilated into Germanic tribes. That's true for the upper half of Europe. The rest, broadly speaking, became Romanized.

[Abramelin]

58 minutes ago, locomekipkachelfantje said:

And that includes the Germans

Where do you get that from? I don't get that from that Wikipage. The tribes you mentioned were all and only Celtic. At that time.

Edited May 2, 2022 by locomekipkachelfantje

[Abramelin]

1 hour ago, locomekipkachelfantje said:

Where do you get that from? I don't get that from that Wikipage. The tribes you mentioned were all and only Celtic. At that time.

Here something from Britannica.com about the origin of the Germanic tribes, and how and where they spread (I only don't agree with the Cimbrians and Teutones being Germanic) :

https://www.britannica.com/topic/Germanic-peoples/Material-culture

[jaylemurph]

On 5/1/2022 at 11:35 AM, locomekipkachelfantje said:

I think I remember, from the Bello Gallico, that Ceasar had intercepted a message from the Helvetians, written in something resembling Greek script.

Edited to add:

And there's the Baudecet golden plate, with a Celtic text of a century or more BCE.

https://www.jstor.org/stable/41536783

Hence the qualifier "functionally." And it would have been a variation of the script the Etruscans used, the Old Italic script, which does look a bit like the Greek alphabet (as it evolved from it).

You find a book written in Celtic, you let the rest of the world know. Til then, the qualifier still counts.

--Jaylemurph

Edited May 2, 2022 by jaylemurph

[Abramelin]

4 hours ago, jaylemurph said:

Hence the qualifier "functionally." And it would have been a variation of the script the Etruscans used, the Old Italic script, which does look a bit like the Greek alphabet (as it evolved from it).

You find a book written in Celtic, you let the rest of the world know. Til then, the qualifier still counts.

--Jaylemurph

Sorry, but this is nonsense.

[jaylemurph]

19 minutes ago, locomekipkachelfantje said:

Sorry, but this is nonsense.

I’m not interested in debating with you about it, especially if you can’t explain yourself.

I suspect if you had a worthwhile counterview, you’d share it, but this “nun-uh” of a response is a waste of everyone’s time, including yours.

—Jaylemurph 

[Abramelin]

7 hours ago, jaylemurph said:

I’m not interested in debating with you about it, especially if you can’t explain yourself.

I suspect if you had a worthwhile counterview, you’d share it, but this “nun-uh” of a response is a waste of everyone’s time, including yours.

—Jaylemurph 

You haven't been all that eager to answer my question for you, right? But you probably forgot about it, heh. Oh, wait, you thought the Menapii were almost whiped out by the Romans, according to you, and - that's how I understand it - couldn't show up in Ireland as the Manapi. But still they did.

-

And the Helveti were not walking around with a backpack filled with books, but apparently at least a couple of them were able to read and write: the one who composed the message, and the one who it was meant for. And I like to believe a few other Helvetians had mastered the art of reading and writing too.

[jaylemurph]

8 hours ago, locomekipkachelfantje said:

You haven't been all that eager to answer my question for you, right? But you probably forgot about it, heh. Oh, wait, you thought the Menapii were almost whiped out by the Romans, according to you, and - that's how I understand it - couldn't show up in Ireland as the Manapi. But still they did.

-

And the Helveti were not walking around with a backpack filled with books, but apparently at least a couple of them were able to read and write: the one who composed the message, and the one who it was meant for. And I like to believe a few other Helvetians had mastered the art of reading and writing too.

Maybe it's language difficulties and we're using "functionally" differently. I'm not denying a /few/ folks were literate. But as a /culture/ they had no written tradition. It's not like they could put up a sign that said, "Run -- Caesar's coming!" and could expect the village to understand. They didn't write their history down as a regular part of their lives -- look at Druids, who were said to take 25 years of training to memorize all their lore. That was the norm, not writing.

And yes, they did use the Old Italic writing system. No one who knows what they're talking about doubts that.

--Jaylemurph

[Abramelin]

Just adding:

"At least a part of the Celtic population was able to read and write in Greek or Latin, but it seems they were not really interested in literature."

http://history-switzerland.geschichte-schweiz.ch/history-celtic-helvetians-switzerland.html

 

http://mnamon.sns.it/index.php?page=Esempi&id=61&lang=en

 

[jaylemurph]

10 hours ago, locomekipkachelfantje said:

Just adding:

"At least a part of the Celtic population was able to read and write in Greek or Latin, but it seems they were not really interested in literature."

http://history-switzerland.geschichte-schweiz.ch/history-celtic-helvetians-switzerland.html

 

http://mnamon.sns.it/index.php?page=Esempi&id=61&lang=en

 

"Then let us be two fools who agree, then, rather than two fools who argue."

--Jaylemurph

[Piney]

10 hours ago, locomekipkachelfantje said:

Just adding:

"At least a part of the Celtic population was able to read and write in Greek or Latin, but it seems they were not really interested in literature."

http://history-switzerland.geschichte-schweiz.ch/history-celtic-helvetians-switzerland.html

 

http://mnamon.sns.it/index.php?page=Esempi&id=61&lang=en

 

I would say it was just the warrior and religious caste. Not the farmers and craftsmen and only if the member of the warrior caste cared enough to want to be able to write and read.

[Abramelin]

6 minutes ago, Piney said:

I would say it was just the warrior and religious caste. Not the farmers and craftsmen and only if the member of the warrior caste cared enough to want to be able to write and read.

Maybe I've seen too many Brittish and American movies about ancient Rome, but many times it were the wealthy, the priests, the politicians, and higher ranked in the army who could afford to have their kids taught reading, writing, foreign language(s), science and philosophy by Greek or other slaves.

I assume the socalled common Roman people and  farmers and so on, were nearly or totally illiterate.

[Nobu]

On 5/3/2022 at 12:18 PM, jaylemurph said:

Maybe it's language difficulties and we're using "functionally" differently. I'm not denying a /few/ folks were literate. But as a /culture/ they had no written tradition. It's not like they could put up a sign that said, "Run -- Caesar's coming!" and could expect the village to understand. They didn't write their history down as a regular part of their lives -- look at Druids, who were said to take 25 years of training to memorize all their lore. That was the norm, not writing.

And yes, they did use the Old Italic writing system. No one who knows what they're talking about doubts that.

--Jaylemurph

I once read a book by a Jesuit that had two sentences that absolutely floored me but wasn’t the main point he was trying to make. He mentioned in passing about having to wade past tribal manuscripts that the church acquired from the former defunct Roman Empire in order to find the original diary he was looking for (of a saint I believe).

I remember stopping and saying “huh? Tribes could write?”

Id let someone lop off a toe in trade if I could spend just 24 hours in the Vatican private library 

[Abramelin]

From the Wikipage about the Irish Cauci:

"From the early 19th century, comparative linguists, notably Lorenz Diefenbach, identified the Cauci with the Germanic Chauci of the Low Countries and north-western Germany, a parallel already drawn by earlier antiquarian scholarship.^[2] Proponents of this view also pointed to the fact that the Manapii (Μανάπιοι), who in Ptolemy's map border the Cauci to the south, likewise bear a name that is almost identical to that of another continental tribe, the Belgic Menapii in north-eastern Gaul.

This correspondence appeared to testify to population movements between the two regions. The linguistic aspect of this hypothesis was most recently (1917) developed by Julius Pokorny,^[3] although the Cauci-Chauci association is not universally accepted.^[4] This early scholarship also drew attention to apparent parallels among Celtic or Celticized peoples of the Iberian peninsula, specifically a leader of the Lusitani named Kaukainos (Καυκαῖνος), and a city called Kauka (Καύκα) (modern Coca), inhabited by Kaukaioi (Καυκαῖοι), among the Vaccaei, a prominent Celtic tribe of the Iberian Peninsula that spoke a Hispano-Celtic language.^[5]

With regard to possible descendants of the Irish Cauci, Pokorny and Ó Briain^[6] respectively favoured the obscure medieval septs of Uí Cuaich and Cuachraige, though in neither case has a connection been demonstrated."

-----

From the links I posted before, I get that the Frisii and Chauci both raided the Atlantic coasts of Europe. Most probably they didn't use dugout canoos or 'curraghs' for that job.

The Morini were sailors too, and the Veneti were excellent sailors.

It would be no surprise that most of these tribes ended up in Scotland, England, Wales and Ireland. And maybe even in Iberia.

Especially tribes like the Frisii, Chauci, Menapii and Morini could have had other reasons to go on the move, aside of the invading Romans: the low countries were often struck by floods that must have drowned many of them.

The Cimbri and Teutones from what's now Denmark went on the move for the same reason and caused the Romans in Europe a severe headache.

Edited May 5, 2022 by locomekipkachelfantje

[Abramelin]

On 2/21/2022 at 2:45 PM, locomekipkachelfantje said:

This means that the Dutch province of Zeeland (that's also the islands on the map) was the territory of a Celtic tribe.

Now why do I find this interesting? Near one of these islands votive altars were found dedicated to a goddess, Nehalennia.

If you start Googling, you'll find out many have tried to translate the name of this goddess, using Germanic, ancient Frisian, and even Semitic ( here: Punic/Phoenician).

If Mongan, the author of the book is right, then we'll have to look for a translation using (P-) Celtic.

According to an online course in modern Irish Gaeilge (Gaeilge for Absolute beginners) this name could mean somthing like goddess of the islands. In Irish G. Bandia Na hoileáin, (day nuh HIL-aw*-in). Of course this is using modern Irish Gaeilge (Gaelic). I'd like to know how goddess of the islands would read im socalled 'primitive Irish'.

The original inscription on the altars reads (in Latin): DEAE NEHALENNIAE.

And if the translation of the name is something about islands, then it must be the islands of Brittain and Ireland. Where the altar of Nehalennia was located at the Dutch coast had no islands back then.

 

[Abramelin]

8 hours ago, Nobu said:

I once read a book by a Jesuit that had two sentences that absolutely floored me but wasn’t the main point he was trying to make. He mentioned in passing about having to wade past tribal manuscripts that the church acquired from the former defunct Roman Empire in order to find the original diary he was looking for (of a saint I believe).

I remember stopping and saying “huh? Tribes could write?”

Id let someone lop off a toe in trade if I could spend just 24 hours in the Vatican private library 

I'm pretty sure it's this guy you're looking for:

https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/a-place-in-the-country-an-irishman-s-diary-on-edmund-hogan-the-greatest-topographer-of-them-all-1.3298860

[jaylemurph]

13 hours ago, Nobu said:

I once read a book by a Jesuit that had two sentences that absolutely floored me but wasn’t the main point he was trying to make. He mentioned in passing about having to wade past tribal manuscripts that the church acquired from the former defunct Roman Empire in order to find the original diary he was looking for (of a saint I believe).

I remember stopping and saying “huh? Tribes could write?”

Id let someone lop off a toe in trade if I could spend just 24 hours in the Vatican private library 

So many questions!

Why on Earth would the Romans have tribal documents? And why would it subsequently give them to the "church"? And which church? I presume you mean the Catholic Christian church, which wasn't even really a thing until well after the Western Roman Empire fell. The Orthodox church would be even less likely to bother about these manuscripts. The Arians, maybe? They were, by and large, the Christian church of the Germanic tribes in the period we're talking about, but sure as **** the catholics would (and did) burn everything associated with the Arians, not keep them around.

The Vatican Library, by the way, hasn't had a secret archive for centuries. Everything in their library is accessible to bona fide scholars. All you have to do is prove association with a institute of higher learning and talk with them about the topic. They were going to let me in, and my project was literally about how the catholic church destroyed it competitors and lied about it for centuries.

--Jaylemurph

[cormac mac airt]

13 minutes ago, jaylemurph said:

So many questions!

Why on Earth would the Romans have tribal documents? And why would it subsequently give them to the "church"? And which church? I presume you mean the Catholic Christian church, which wasn't even really a thing until well after the Western Roman Empire fell. The Orthodox church would be even less likely to bother about these manuscripts. The Arians, maybe? They were, by and large, the Christian church of the Germanic tribes in the period we're talking about, but sure as **** the catholics would (and did) burn everything associated with the Arians, not keep them around.

The Vatican Library, by the way, hasn't had a secret archive for centuries. Everything in their library is accessible to bona fide scholars. All you have to do is prove association with a institute of higher learning and talk with them about the topic. They were going to let me in, and my project was literally about how the catholic church destroyed it competitors and lied about it for centuries.

--Jaylemurph

So what became of your project? 
 

cormac

[Abramelin]

57 minutes ago, jaylemurph said:

The Vatican Library, by the way, hasn't had a secret archive for centuries.

Not to nitpick, but Nobu mentioned a "private library", not a secret archive/library.

There's a difference.

 

[jaylemurph]

6 hours ago, cormac mac airt said:

So what became of your project? 
 

cormac

COVID. The Library closed with no re-open date; with no solid date for research residency, the grant funding it fell through, and I can't afford open-ended jaunts to Rome on my own.

It was for my dissertation, which I did finish, and is under contract for publication with a small university press.

And Abe: I assumed Nobu meant the Vatican Secret Archive; if they didn't, then I fully deserve to be called *******. I will ritually flagellate myself to  make up for it.

--Jaylemurph

[Abramelin]

On 5/5/2022 at 4:50 AM, Nobu said:

I remember stopping and saying “huh? Tribes could write?”

Irish tribes are called "clans". It could have been about a clan or clans from early medieval times.

Edited May 13, 2022 by locomekipkachelfantje

[rashore]

21 minutes ago, locomekipkachelfantje said:

Irish tribes are called "clans". It could have been about a clan or clans from early medieval times.

So at what point to the Celtic tribes stop being called tribes and start being called clans?

[Abramelin]

35 minutes ago, rashore said:

So at what point to the Celtic tribes stop being called tribes and start being called clans?

Or when did they start calling themselves clans? I think 'clan' is the Gealic word for 'tribe'. 'Tribe' is the Angry-Saxon word for 'clan'. In Dutch it is 'stam'.

Edit:

It's a bit more complicated:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clan

Edited May 13, 2022 by locomekipkachelfantje