The first episode of our series on the Ancient
Celts covered the early origins, as well as culture, religion, political structure, and
economy of the peoples. In this second episode we will discuss the armies of the Celts, their
weapons, armors and tactics, the expansion of these Ancient people, and their invasions
of classical Rome and Greece. We are not saying that you should go into
the battles naked like the Ancient Celts, but for the battles that you have to participate
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Celtic culture had assimilated its way across a staggering amount of Europe. This is exemplified
by modern day countries as far apart as Portugal and Ukraine, which both have provinces named
âGaliciaâ - land of the Gauls. Warfare played a huge role in this continental spread,
which begs the question, what made the Celts such effective fighters? The stereotypical
image of the Gallic warrior perpetuated by Greco-Roman writers is that of a savage, ferocious
in spirit, but primitive in equipment and strategy. However, the full story is much
more complex. For one thing, Gaulish arms and armour were
highly advanced for their time. The Celts were master ironworkers who were able to arm
their warriors with longswords, and spears with specialized tips for either thrusting
or throwing, making the average Gaul deadly in melee and ranged combat. For protection,
the Gallic fighters bore a long oakwood shield, with a hard iron boss for blunt-force bashing. Most warriors wore agen and port type helmets,
featuring a brimmed iron dome, and a pair of wing-like cheekguards. There is also evidence
that the Gauls were the inventors of chainmail, based on surviving pictorial evidence of a
type of metal cuirass, made of tightly linked iron rings, the earliest historical example
of such technology. The Romans were so impressed by Gallic metallurgy, that the Legionaryâs
helmet, his Lorica Hamata armour, and even his Gladius and Spatha swords, were all adapted
from Celtic or Celtiberian designs. So, Roman armour as we know it today actually owes its
iconic form in huge part to the innovations of the Celts. However, among the Celts themselves, body
armour was rare, mainly reserved for select high-ranking nobles, while most warriors went
into battle wearing just shirts, trousers, or in some cases, nothing at all. The naked
warrior is one of the most enduring legends of Celtic history. Historical evidence suggests
a significant amount of Celts did fight nude, either for religious purposes or to inspire
fear in their enemies. Surviving depictions of bare skinned Celtic combatants in both
artwork and historical record suggest that while the majority of Gauls did not fight
naked, the practice was fairly normalized. The use of the iconic the war-chariot also
bares mentioning, as they were used both as versatile mobile missile units, and also as
basic transport vehicles, quickly ferrying warriors from one theatre of battle to another. For all their arms and armour, the principal
advantage of the Gallic army was their ability to utterly terrify their foe. Both Roman and
Greek records report on the petrifying nature of the Celts, claiming that before any engagement,
they would roar and brag, performing ritualistic war-dances while bellowing a deafening sound
out of their boar-headed war trumpets. Put yourself in the shoes of a superstitious plebeian
fresh off an ancient olive farm or slums of Rome, and you can appreciate the supernatural
terror that a mob of screaming, dancing, horn-blaring muscle-men must have had. In terms of battle tactics, the Celts kept
things fairly simple. Skilled javelin throwers would soften up enemy formation, while chariot
and cavalry riders would be used to flank and harass. For the most part, a Gallic victory
banked entirely on a disorganized blood-drunk charge, the impact of which was usually enough
to rout the enemy formation, making it easy to slaughter them piecemeal. Ancient Celtic warfare may have lacked the
discipline of a Legion or Phalanx, but it wasnât primitive or basic. To the Gauls,
war was a way of life, and their dynamic formula of inspiring terror in their enemies and fearlessness
among themselves was what saw their armies come to dominate not just the majority of
continental Europe, but also take them right up to the doorstep of a young Roman Republic. From about 450BC, Gallic Northern and Central
Europe became overpopulated, and many enterprising Celtic war leaders led their retinues southwards
to Italy, which the Celts knew to be a bountiful land of olives, figs, and wine. According
to the Livy, they first entered the peninsula as early as 600BC, when a multi-tribal band
of immigrants led by the King Bellovesus of the Bituriges crossed the Alps, and made war
on the northern cities of the Etruscans, a culturally sophisticated, but politically
independent network of city-states whose heartland was in modern day Tuscany. Upon driving the
Etruscans out of the Po Valley, the Gauls founded the settlement of Mediolanum, the
modern city Milan. Other waves of migration followed, and by 400BC, various Gallic tribes
had established themselves as the masters of a chunk of Northern Italy that stretched
from the Alps to the Adriatic Coast. Indigenous Ligures to the west and Veneti to the east
eventually became culturally assimilated by their Celtic neighbours. The Gauls were on
the rise, but they were not the only growing power in Italy. In 400BC, the city of Rome was a smallish
city-state of some 25,000 living in humble homes of brick and timber, long ways to go
to the eternal city of marble it later became. Nevertheless, in the last 100 years the Romans
established hegemony over all the cities of Latin league, overthrew their monarchy, and
emerged as a dynamic Republic. In 396BC, the brilliant Roman commander, Marcus Furius Camillus,
conquered the Etruscan city of Veii, establishing a foothold for further northwards expansion,
putting Rome on the collision course with the Celts. Modern historians are split on how the first
Gallo-Roman war broke out. Some claim that a Gallic tribe invaded Rome on behalf of Dionysus
I, the tyrant of the Greek city of Syracuse, who wanted to knock the Romans down a peg
for supporting his rivals in Messina. Others claim that the warlike Celts needed no incentive
to invade Rome, and did so simply for glory and plunder. According to Dionysius of Halicarnassus
the seeds of conflict were sown when the King of the Etruscan Clusium, Lucumo, engaged in
a dalliance with a married woman. Her aggrieved husband, an influential merchant named Aruns,
went north to the Gauls of the Po Valley, seeking to use them as his instrument of revenge
by convincing them to attack Clusium. Arunsâ call was answered by King Brennus
of the Senones, who was happy to make war on Clusium, coveting its riches and fertile
lands. The people of Clusium were alarmed by the Gallic horde, and called to the Romans
for aid. In response, the Roman senate sent a trio of ambassadors to serve as neutral
mediators. When the ambassadors asked Brennus why he made war on Clusium, he tersely replied
âfor the same reason Rome conquers her neighboursâ. Tensions soon flared, and an armed quarrel
broke out between the representatives of the Clusians and Senones. In the heat of the moment,
one of the Roman ambassadors slew a Senone warrior. Brennus was infuriated by the breach
in diplomatic conduct, and sent envoys to Rome, calling for the extradition of all three
ambassadors, but his demands were refused. Thus the Gauls declared a blood-feud upon
the Romans, and advanced southwards to settle the score. The military tribunes of Rome quickly mustered
an army and marched out to meet their foe. In the fifth century BC, Rome was centuries
away from fielding the professional legion: Wealthier citizens armed themselves in the
style of the Greek Hoplite, but the majority fought with various destandardized weapons
and little protection. They made their stand on the river Allia. It was the first time
the Romans had faced the Gauls in battle, and never before had they stared into the
face of such ferocity. The blair of the carnyx, the relentless screaming, and the disturbing
nakedness spread terror among the Latins. The battle itself was brief, from the withering
hale of Gallic javelins, to the shock of the charge that followed, the army of the Republic
broke. Many Romans drowned in the deep waters of the Allia, or were cut down. After his decisive victory, King Brennus led
the Senones to Rome, and put the city to the torch. It was the first time the eternal city
had ever been sacked, and it would take 800 years for any other foreign army to ever do
so again. According to later Roman historians, a surviving core of senators and able-bodied
citizens were able to retreat to the citadel on the Capitoline hill to mount a defense,
watching helplessly while the rest of the city was thoroughly pillaged. The Senones
twice tried to take the Capitoline, first with a frontal assault which was repulsed,
and second with a night-time infiltration, which was famously foiled by the honking of
the Sacred Geese of Juno. After many months of impasse, both sides had
become emaciated by starvation and plague. The Romans resolve broke first, and they agreed
to pay the Senones a sum of 1,000 pounds of Gold to make them leave. Here, Roman historian
Livy claims that the Gauls weighted the measuring scales to cheat the Romans out of more tribute
than had been agreed upon. When the Romans protested, Brennus threw his own sword onto
the scale, bellowing: âvae victisâ: woe to the vanquished. According to Diodorus of
Sicily, it was at exactly this moment Marcus Furius Camillus arrived with a relief army.
He defiantly threw his own sword on the scales, and declared: ânon auro, sed ferro, recuperanda
est patriaâ - We defend Rome not with gold, but with iron. He then attacked the Gauls,
and drove them out of the city. These traditional recantings of the Senonesâ
war are likely the result of Roman propaganda. Livy and Diodorus authored their accounts
centuries after the sack happened, and were probably trying to salvage some honour out
of a particularly dark chapter of Roman history. In particular, Camillusâ last-minute heroics
were likely a complete fabrication. Simply put, the true summary of the events is probably
as follows: Gauls crushed the Romans, looted their city, blockaded the Capitoline hill,
got paid, and went home. This simplistic take is plausible, because the Gauls were a simple
war party that probably sought nothing more other than to obtain plunder and return to
their families. It would take a generation for Rome to recover
from the devastation brought upon it by the Senones, while conversely, Gallic influence
in Italy grew ever stronger. Throughout the 4th and early 3rd centuries BC, Celtic war-parties
regularly plundered into the Roman hinterlands, while Gaulish mercenary groups became a staple
contingent of many anti-Roman factions, such as the Greek Tyrants of Sicily, and a certain
up-and-coming Carthaginian thalassocracy. Rome would not be the only classical civilization
the Gauls would make war on. Let us now shift our focus eastwards, to the land of Philosophers
and Hoplites, and talk about the Celtic invasions of the Ancient Greek world. Gallic war parties
had entered the northern Balkan Peninsula in the early 4th century BC, where they would
spend the next century in sporadic warfare with the Illyrians, Thracians, Paeonians and
other local native peoples. In 335BC, some Gauls had made it to Macedon, which at current
was ruled by a young and enterprising Alexander. Yes, that Alexander. The Celts were always
ready to respect a worthy warrior, and showed great admiration for the Macedonian King,
daring not to invade Greece while he ruled. Alexander would go on to conquer most of the
known world, only to die prematurely in Babylon, leaving his massive Empire to be divided up
into squabbling Kingdoms ruled by his former generals. This changed things, for in the
eyes of the Celts, Greece was now a divided land ruled by lesser men, a viable target
for loot and plunder. In 298BC, the Gallic chieftain Cimbaules led
a war party that pillaged its way through Thrace and Macedon, only to be stopped in
its tracks by the army of the Diadochi King Cassander on the slopes of mount Haemus. Nevertheless,
during this expedition the Gallic Serdi established a foothold in Thrace, founding the settlement
of Serdica on the site of the modern day Sofia. The next Celtic wave would arrive in 281BC,
when a horde of 85,000 men, mostly of the Boii and Volcae tribes, split into three contingents
and simultaneously invaded Paeonia, the rest of Thrace, and Macedon. During this expedition,
a war chief known as Bolgios faced down the army of Ptolemy Keuranos, current king of
Macedon, and son of the founder of the Ptolemaic dynasty in Egypt. In the battle that followed,
the Macedonian King himself was thrown from his war elephant and hacked to pieces by Gallic
warriors. These initial successes increased the appetite
for further incursions into Greece, and a year later, a Chieftain known as Brennos began
calling for another southwards expedition. According to legend, Brennos called for an
assembly of Gallic Chieftains, and presented before them a group of Greek captives, who
were weak in body. He juxtaposed them with his finest, most well-built warriors, using
this as proof that the Greeks were a weak people compared to the Gauls, and could be
easily overrun. By 279BC, Brennos had successfully assembled a massive tribal coalition. Ancient
sources claim his army amounted to a mind-boggling 150,000 warriors, but modern estimates give
us a more realistic figure of 50,000. Brennosâ pillaged through undefended Northern Greece
unimpeded. Some stories claim that, when questioned on the sacrilegious nature of looting the
temples, Brennosâ pithily remarked: âThe Gods, being rich, ought to be generous to
menâ. Unbeknownst to the Gauls, a coalition of Aetolians,
Boeotians, Athenians, Phocians, Corinthians and other cities had gathered an army of 40,000,
many of whom were trained Hoplites. They decided to make their stand at the narrow coastal
pass of Thermopylae, which was becoming a running theme at this point in ancient history.
Meanwhile, a fleet of Greek triremes also docked in the nearby Malian gulf, ready to
rain death upon their landward foe. Brennosâ host soon arrived, and the battle
was committed. The Celts funneled right into the narrow pass and barreled into their Hoplite
enemies with typical Gallic fearlessness. Ancient Historian Hieronymus of Cardia gave
a harrowing account of the melee: âThey rushed with the rage, fury and blind courage
of a wild beast. They hacked with swords and axes, pierced with darts and javelins. Their
fury only died with life itself. Some warriors even plucked out the weapons that had struck
them, and hurled them back at the Greeks.â Nevertheless, the disciplined Greek Phalanx
held the pass, while their navy pelted the Celts with a hail of missiles. Brennos was
eventually forced to retreat, having lost thousands of his warriors, while the Greeks
only suffered 40 casualties. Brennos pillaged and burned his way across
Aetolia in an attempt to break up the united Greek army by forcing the Aetolian contingent
to rush back to defend their homes. This worked, but the Celts were nonetheless driven off
by the returning Aetolian warriors. Following this, Brennos made a final gambit, rearing
his army eastwards for the sacred Oracle of Delphi, hoping that seizing the riches of
Apollosâ temple would salvage the expedition. Here, the united Greek force reconstituted
itself and made a final stand. The Gauls were crushed, losing over 16,000 men in the battle
and the ensuing retreat. In the eyes of the Greeks, it was a victory delivered by Apollo
himself, who saw fit to punish the temple-defiling barbarians. Most of the surviving Celts retreated
back to Thrace, while a completely dishonoured Brennos commited suicide. The Gallic invasion of Greece was a failure,
but it had one significant consequence. Before the march on Delphi, a contingent of the Gallic
horde, composed mainly of warriors from the Tectosages, Trocmii, and Tolistobogii tribes,
had peeled off from the main invasion force and crossed the Dardanelles into Anatolia.
Unlike Brennosâ main force, which had come to Greece to raid and plunder, this group
had come to settle. They built forts on the rugged hills of central Anatolia, and established
permanence for themselves in the region by serving as mercenary shock-troops in the many
wars being fought in the region between various Hellenic rulers. The region of Asia Minor
these Gauls inhabited became known as Galatia, and the people who lived in it the Galatians.
Remarkably, even though they were surrounded by foreign peoples, and isolated from the
rest of the Gallic world, there is evidence that the Galatians of Anatolia retained their
Celtic language and culture as late as the 6th century AD. In 279BC, the Celtic world was at its greatest
extent. Spread out over a massive territory that overlapped the borders of modern nations
as diverse as Ukraine, Czechia, Austria, Switzerland, Bulgaria, Turkey, Italy, France, Britain,
Portugal and Spain. This was the golden age of the Celts, but like all golden ages, it
was not to last. Brennosâ defeat in Greece had proven something important: a well-trained,
well-armed professional army, fighting as a single disciplined body, was fully capable
of resisting the howling terror of the Gallic horde. This was a stark reality that the Gauls
would soon learn well, as back in Italy, a certain Latin Republic was on the mend, and
ready to take her revenge upon the barbarians who had once laid her so low. The Roman conquests were coming and if you
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K&G: "Ancient Historian Hieronymus of Cardia gave a harrowing account of the melee; They rushed with the rage, fury and blind courage of a wild beast. They hacked with swords and axes, pierced with darts and javelins. Their fury only died with life itself. Some warriors even plucked out the weapons that had struck them, and hurled them back at the Greeks."
Correct quote: "On they marched against their enemies with the unreasoning fury and passion of brutes. Slashed with axe or sword they kept their desperation while they still breathed; pierced by arrow or javelin, they did not abate of their passion so long as life remained. Some drew out from their wounds the spears, by which they had been hit, and threw them at the Greeks or used them in close fighting."
Great video- thanks!