Modern conception of the Celtic peoples was one of the first modern historians to note the connection between Celtic peoples. Before the
Roman Empire and the rise of
Christianity, people lived in Iron Age Britain and Ireland, speaking languages from which the modern
Gaelic languages (including
Irish,
Scottish Gaelic and
Manx) and
Brythonic languages (including
Welsh,
Breton and
Cornish) descend. These people, along with others in
Continental Europe who once spoke now extinct languages from the same
Indo-European branch (such as the
Gauls,
Celtiberians and
Galatians), have been retroactively referred to in a collective sense as the
Celts, particularly in a wide spread manner since the turn of the 18th century. Variations of the term "Celt", such as
Keltoi, had been used in antiquity by the
Greeks and the
Romans to refer to some groups of these people, such as
Herodotus' use of it in regards to the Gauls. The modern usage of "Celt" in reference to these cultures grew up gradually. A pioneer in the field was
George Buchanan, a 16th-century Scottish scholar,
Renaissance humanist and tutor to king
James IV of Scotland. From a
Scottish Gaelic-speaking family, Buchanan in his
Rerum Scoticarum Historia (1582), went over the writings of
Tacitus who had discussed the similarity between the language of the Gauls and the ancient Britons. Buchanan concluded, if the Gauls were
Celtae, as they were described as in Roman sources, then the Britons were
Celtae too. He began to see a pattern in place names and concluded that the Britons and Irish Gaels once spoke one
Celtic language which later diverged. It wouldn't be until over a century later when these ideas were widely popularised; first by the Breton scholar
Paul-Yves Pezron in his
Antiquité de la Nation et de la langue celtes autrement appelez Gaulois (1703) and then by the Welsh scholar
Edward Lhuyd in his
Archaeologia Britannica: An Account of the Languages, Histories and Customs of the Original Inhabitants of Great Britain (1707). By the time the modern concept of the Celts as a people had emerged, their fortunes had declined substantially, taken over by
Germanic people. Firstly, the
Celtic Britons of
sub-Roman Britain were swamped by a tide of
Anglo-Saxon settlement from the fifth century on and lost most of their territory to them. They were subsequently referred to as the
Welsh people and the
Cornish people. A group of these fled Britain altogether and settled in Continental Europe in
Armorica, becoming the
Breton people. The
Gaels for a while actually expanded, pushing out of Ireland to conquer Pictland in Britain, establishing
Alba by the ninth century. From the 11th century onward, the arrival of the
Normans, caused problems not only for the English but also for the Celts. The Normans invaded the Welsh kingdoms (establishing the
Principality of Wales), the
Irish kingdoms (establishing the
Lordship of Ireland) and took control of the
Scottish monarchy through intermarrying. This advance was often done in conjunction with the
Catholic Church's
Gregorian Reform, which was centralising the religion in Europe. . The Tudors played up their Celtic background, while accelerating Anglicisation. The dawning of
early modern Europe affected the Celtic peoples in ways which saw what small amount of independence they had left firmly subordinated to the emerging
British Empire and in the case of the
Duchy of Brittany, the
Kingdom of France. Although both the
Kings of England (the
Tudors) and the
Kings of Scotland (the
Stewarts) of the day claimed Celtic ancestry and used this in
Arthurian cultural motifs to lay the basis for a
British monarchy ("British" being suggested by Elizabethan
John Dee), both dynasties promoted a centralising policy of
Anglicisation. The Gaels of Ireland lost their last kingdoms to the
Kingdom of Ireland after the
Flight of the Earls in 1607, while the
Statutes of Iona attempted to de-Gaelicise the Highland Scots in 1609. The effects of these initiates were mixed, but took from the Gaels their natural leadership element, which had patronised their culture. Under Anglocentric British rule, the Celtic-speaking peoples were reduced to a marginalised, largely poor people, small farmers and fishermen, clinging to the coast of the North Atlantic. Following the
Industrial Revolution in the 18th century, greater multitudes were Anglicised and fled into a diaspora around the British Empire as an industrial proletariat. Further de-Gaelicisation took place for the Irish during the
Great Hunger and the Highland Scots during the
Highland Clearances. Similarly for the Bretons, after the
French Revolution, the
Jacobins demanded greater centralisation, against regional identities and for
Francization, enacted by the
French Directory in 1794. However,
Napoleon Bonaparte was greatly attracted to the romantic image of the Celt, which was partly based on
Jean-Jacques Rousseau's glorification of the
noble savage and the popularity of
James Macpherson's
Ossianic tales throughout Europe. Bonaparte's nephew,
Napoleon III, would later have the
Vercingétorix monument erected to honour the Celtic Gaulish leader. typically in a republican fashion, to refer to the majority of the people, contrary to the aristocracy (claimed to be of
Frankish-Germanic descent).
Dawning of Pan-Celticism as a political idea Following the dying down of
Jacobitism as a political threat in Britain and Ireland, with the firm establishment of
Hanoverian Britain under the liberal, rationalist
philosophy of the Enlightenment, a backlash of
Romanticism in the late 18th century occurred and "the Celt" was rehabilitated in literature, in a movement which is sometimes known as "Celtomania." The most prominent native representatives of the initial stages of this
Celtic Revival were
James Macpherson, author of the
Poems of Ossian (1761) and
Iolo Morganwg, founder of the
Gorsedd. The imagery of the "Celtic World" also inspired English and Lowland Scots poets such as
Blake,
Wordsworth,
Byron,
Shelley and
Scott. In particular the
Druids inspired fascination for outsiders, as English and French antiquarians, such as
William Stukeley,
John Aubrey,
Théophile Corret de la Tour d'Auvergne and
Jacques Cambry, began to associate ancient
megaliths and
dolmens with the Druids. attended the first Pan-Celtic Congress in 1838. In the 1820s, early pan-Celtic contacts began to develop, firstly between the Welsh and the Bretons, as
Thomas Price and
Jean-François Le Gonidec worked together to translate the
New Testament into Breton. acting as a lynch-pin between the different parts; "trapped" within another state (France), this allowed them to draw strength from kindred peoples across the Channel and they also shared a strong attachment to the
Catholic faith with the Irish. Across Europe, modern
Celtic Studies were developing as an academic discipline. The Germans led the way in the field with Indo-European linguist
Franz Bopp in 1838, followed up by
Johann Kaspar Zeuss'
Grammatica Celtica (1853). Indeed, as German power was growing in rivalry with France and England, the Celtic Question was of interest to them and they were able to perceive the shift towards Celtic-based nationalisms.
Heinrich Zimmer, the Professor of Celtic at
Friedrich Wilhelm University in
Berlin (predecessor of
Kuno Meyer), spoke in 1899 of the powerful agitation in the "
Celtic fringe of the United Kingdom's rich overcoat" and predicted that pan-Celticism would become a political force as important to the future of European politics as the much more established movements of
pan-Germanism and
pan-Slavism. Other academic treatments included
Ernest Renan's
La Poésie des races celtiques (1854) and
Matthew Arnold's
The Study of Celtic Literature (1867). The attention given by Arnold was a double-edged sword; he lauded Celtic poetic and musical achievements, but effeminised them and suggested they needed the cement of a sober, orderly Anglo-Saxon rule. A concept arose among some European philologists, particularly articulated by
Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel, whereby the "care of the national language is a sacred trust", or put more simply, "no language, no nation." This dictum was also adopted by nationalists in Celtic nations, particularly
Thomas Davis of the
Young Ireland movement, who, contrary to the earlier Catholic-based "civic rights" activism of a
Daniel O'Connell, asserted an
Irish nationalism where the
Irish language would become hegemonic once again. As he claimed a "people without a language of its own is only half a nation."
T. E. Ellis, the leader of
Cymru Fydd was a proponent of Pan-Celticism, stating "We must work for bringing together Celtic reformers and Celtic peoples. The interests of Irishmen, Welshmen and [Scottish] Crofters are almost identical. Their past history is very similar, their present oppressors are the same and their immediate wants are the same. The main intellectual organ of the Celtic Association was
Celtia: A Pan-Celtic Monthly Magazine, edited by Fournier, which ran from January 1901 until 1904 and was briefly revived in 1907 before finally ending for good in May 1908. Its inception was welcomed by Breton
François Jaffrennou. In total, the Celtic Association was able to organise three Pan-Celtic Congresses: Dublin (1901),
Caernarfon (1904) and
Edinburgh (1907). Each of these opened with an elaborate
neo-druidic ceremony, with the laying of the
Lia Cineil ("Race Stone"), which drew inspiration from the
Lia Fáil and
Stone of Scone. The stone was five foot high and consisted of five granite blocks, each with a letter of the respective Celtic nation etched into it in their own language (i.e. – "E" for Ireland, "A" for Scotland, "C" for Wales). At the laying of the stone, the Archdruid of the Eisteddfod,
Hwfa Môn would say three times in Gaelic, while holding a partly unsheathed sword, "Is there peace?" to which the people responded "Peace." The symbolism inherent in this was meant to represent a counterpoise to the
British Empire's assimilating
Anglo-Saxonism as articulated by the likes of
Rudyard Kipling. The response of the most advanced and militant nationalism of a "Celtic" people;
Irish nationalism; was mixed. The pan-Celts were lampooned by
D. P. Moran in
The Leader, under the title of "
Pan-Celtic Farce". More enthusiastic was
Lady Gregory, who imagined an Ireland-led "Pan-Celtic Empire", while
William Butler Yeats also attended the Dublin meeting.
Ruaraidh Erskine was an attendant. Erskine himself was an advocate of a "Gaelic confederation" between Ireland and Scotland.
David Lloyd George, who would later to go on to be the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, delivered a speech at the 1904 Celtic Congress.
Breton Regionalist Union founder
Régis de l'Estourbeillon attended the 1907 congress, headed the Breton faction of the procession and placed the Breton stone on the Lia Cineill.
Henry Jenner,
Arthur William Moore and John Crichton-Stuart, fourth Marquess of Bute likewise attended the 1907 congress. Erskine made an effort to set up a "union of Welsh, Scots and Irish with a view to action on behalf of
Celtic communism". He wrote to
Thomas Gwynn Jones asking for suggestions on Welshmen to invite to London for a meeting on setting such a thing up. It is unknown if such a meeting ever took place. John de Courcy Mac Donnell founded a Celtic Union in Belgium in 1908, which organised the fourth Pan-Celtic congress as part of the
1910 Brussels International Exposition. The Celtic Union held further events up to the fifth Pan-Celtic congress 1913 in Ghent/Brussels/Namur. In Paris, 1912, the "La Ligue Celtique Française" was launched and had a magazine called
La Poétique, which published news and literature from all around the Celtic world.
Rhisiart Tal-e-bot, former President of the
European Free Alliance Youth is a member. The rejuvenation of Irish republicanism during the post-war period and into
The Troubles had some inspiration not only for other Celtic nationalists, but militant nationalists from other "small nations", such as the Basques with the
ETA. Indeed, this was particularly pertinent to the secessionist nationalisms of Spain, as the era of
Francoist Spain was coming to a close. As well as this, there was renewed interest in all things Celtic in the 1960s and 1970s. In a less militant fashion, elements within
Galician nationalism and
Asturian nationalism began to court Pan-Celticism, attending the
Festival Interceltique de Lorient and the
Pan Celtic Festival at
Killarney, as well as joining the International Section of the Celtic League. Although this region had once been under
Iberian Celts, had a strong resonance in Gaelic mythology (i.e. –
Breogán) and even during the Early Middle Ages had a small enclave of Celtic Briton emigrants at
Britonia (similar to the case with Brittany), no Celtic language had been spoken there since the eighth century and today they speak
Romance languages. During the so-called "Galician crisis" of 1986,
21st century Following the
Brexit referendum there were calls for Pan-Celtic Unity. In November 2016, the
First Minister of Scotland,
Nicola Sturgeon stated the idea of a "Celtic Corridor" of the island of Ireland and Scotland appealed to her. In January 2019 the leader of the Welsh nationalist
Plaid Cymru party,
Adam Price spoke in favour of cooperation among the Celtic nations of Britain and Ireland following Brexit. Among his proposals were a Celtic Development Bank for joint infrastructure and investment projects in energy, transport and communications in Ireland, Wales, Scotland, and the Isle of Man, and the foundation of a Celtic union, the structure of which is already existent in the
Good Friday Agreement according to Price. Speaking to RTÉ, the Irish national broadcaster he proposed Wales and Ireland working together to promote the indigenous languages of each nation. Blogger Owen Donavan published, on his blog
State of Wales, his views on a Celtic confederation, "a voluntary union of sovereign nation-states – between Ireland, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales. The Isle of Man would presumably be a candidate for inclusion too. Cornwall and Brittany could be added as future members if they can attain a measure of self-government." He also considered a Celtic Council, a similar co-operation that was proposed by Adam Price. Journalist Jamie Dalgety has also proposed the concept of a Celtic Union involving Scotland and Ireland but suggests that lack of support for Welsh independence may mean that a Gaelic Celtic Union involving may be more appropriate. Bangor University lecturer and journalist, Ifan Morgan Jones has suggested that "a short-term fix for Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland might be a greater degree of cooperation with each other, as a union within a union." he also suggested that "If they could find a way of working together in their mutual interest, that’s a fair degree of combined influence, particular if the next General Election produces a hung parliament." ==Anti-Celticism==