Download or read book The Word Celt (Classic Reprint) written by Joseph Dunn and published by . This book was released on 2015-07-04 with total page 102 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Excerpt from The Word Celt Probably the earliest mention of the word Celt with which most readers are familiar occurs in that classic phrase where, in the introduction to his 'Commentaries on the Gallic War, ' Caesar, speaking of the division of all Gaul into three parts, says that the native name of the group of peoples who occupied the centre of Gaul between the Seine, the Marne and the Garonne is a Celtic word. The word is found long before Caesar's time, however. In fact, as early as the end of the sixth century, B.C., we find, for the first time in history, the word in a derived form, in the Greek writer Hecataeus of Miletus, who uses it in a geographic sense. In his 'Voyage around the World, ' of which only fragments have been preserved, he says, speaking of Marseilles, that it is near Celtica, and he also says that Nyrax, wherever that may have been, is a Celtic city. There are two very different applications of the word Celt in the ancient writers: as the name of a tribe in Gaul, and as the general name for all the Celts of the Continent. Apparently, the ancients never applied the name to the inhabitants of the British Isles, Since each tribe had its own name, it is probable that the word Celt was originally nothing more than the name of one of these tribes, but, just why it was given to that particular group of people that Caesar speaks of, we have no way of knowing. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works."