In this section of chapter one, Professor Kahl takes up (pp. 51 - 64) the murky history of Celtic occupations of parts of present day Italy, Greece and Turkey. The focus of this presentation is to highlight Greek and Roman descriptions of these events as a struggle by self-described civilized forces against Celtic barbarism, represented by tribes, who at first conquored and settled in these areas, but who were subsequently defeated by both Greek and Roman armies.
Kahl stresses that the centuries-long struggles against Celtic invasion - ending in Roman victory - assumed mythic proportions, with the Celtic (Galatian) tribes in the role of the archetypical enemy.
From what I can tell, the Celtic / Roman struggle was not much different from other invasions from northern Europe by clans, seeking either plunder or agricultural lands in warmer climes. Kahl certainly recognizes the similarities but calls attention to the apparently (to Kahl) unique mythic imagery assigned to the Celts by Roman (Pliny) and Greek-speaking (Plutarch) historiagraphers.
Interestingly, though not remarked upon by Kahl, some of the ancient commentators, writing during Roman hegemony, displayed sympathy for the Celts.
Livy, a native of Padua (Patavium), who could be described as passionate about Rome, was of a Gallic family; Livy may have acquired his knowledge of Celtic epics from his own family's oral traditions. (Markale, p. 50, see below.)
Plutarch's sympathy for the Celts is found in a passage Kahl cites, in which a Celtic king ia given a speech that justifies his people's invasion and occupation of Italy on the same grounds which the Romans used to justify their own violent acquisition of lands already occupied by others.
The romantic image a thousand years later, of Celts as grand losers in shadowy, epic battles across Britain is part of English, Irish and even Scottish folklore. Here is an example - a paragraph that is fun to read - which purports to explain the impetus for ancient Celtic invasions / migrations, which are then linked to sagas of kingdoms won and then lost in the British isles:
"The Gauls in Illyria were becoming restless. As believers in an all-governing dynamism, they were anxious to be on the move again. The Celts looked upon the present as a mere function of the future, as a continual process of evolution. The legends of Brittany,Wales and Ireland all serve to illustrate this theme.The mark made by trhe Celts on the ancient historians is no more than a manifestation of their asnti-historic desire to deny the present and create the future, if only in the imagination.This singular attitude is inherent both in the capture of Rome and the expedition to Delphi; and was later responsble for the Twelfth Century Round Table Romances of Christian Europe, a cycle of magical adventures to match the aspirations of a fallen race which refused to accept that it had died." (The Celts: Uncovering the Mythic and Historic Origins of Western Culture, by Jean Markale [Rochester VT: Innte Traditions International, 1993 (1976: Les Celts et la Civilisation Celtique, p. 66.])
The epic nature of sweeping invasions and occupations, combined with ambiguous tellings and retellings - to say nothing of the final defeat and destruction of peoples who are linked with the foundation of Western Europe - all this gives momentum to romantic imagery.
T.G.E. Powell, inclined against romance, states that it must have been not their religious notions but "visions of rich plunder" which sent the Gauls into northern Italy, as well as some "special misfortune" which drove the Celts to "descend upon Macedonia in midwinter." (See The Celts [Thames and Hudson,1958, 1994], pp. 18, 19.)
Kahl has little interest in the romance but does want to call attention to that part of the Celtic myth, which was developed by ancient historian / propagandists, in the service of imperial Roman hegemony.
Kahl argues that the epic struggle for supremacy in Italy between Celts and Romans occasioned the visual representation of Celts as the archetypal Enemy.
For this argument to persuade, an explanation of the sympathetic treatment by Plutarch and Livy must be offered.
Kahl does cite Livy but as an apologist for Rome, who uses "twisted logic" (p. 52) to denigrate the Celts, when Roman emissaries break the peace "as if they were Celts". Kahl cites Livy 5:35 but the closest statement by Levy for this characterization that I can find is at 5:36, where Livy describes the Roman ambassadors, as a "peaceable enough mission, had it not contained envoys of a violent temper, more like Gauls than Romans." (See Titus Livius (Livy), The History of Rome, Book 5, Rev. Canon Roberts, Ed., posted at perseus.tufts.edu.)
This seems to me straightforward enough and does not warrant Kahl's conclusion (Kahl, p. 52) that Livy is asserting "that it is barbarians who are lawless and Romans who keep the law--even when they do not." Kahl's conclusion is made more dubious since Livy goes on to describe how the Roman ambassadors abused their diplomatic credentials by taking up arms on the spot and killing a Celtic chieftain, an event which the Celts justly complained of before the Roman senate, but to no avail.
The Celtic king, Brennus the Second is said to have laughed out loud when he saw the gods at Delphi represented in human form. Can Celtic history / myth / romance become grist for a re-imagined context for Paul's Galatians letter?
For this argument to persuade, an explanation of the sympathetic treatment by Plutarch and Livy must be offered.
Kahl does cite Livy but as an apologist for Rome, who uses "twisted logic" (p. 52) to denigrate the Celts, when Roman emissaries break the peace "as if they were Celts". Kahl cites Livy 5:35 but the closest statement by Levy for this characterization that I can find is at 5:36, where Livy describes the Roman ambassadors, as a "peaceable enough mission, had it not contained envoys of a violent temper, more like Gauls than Romans." (See Titus Livius (Livy), The History of Rome, Book 5, Rev. Canon Roberts, Ed., posted at perseus.tufts.edu.)
This seems to me straightforward enough and does not warrant Kahl's conclusion (Kahl, p. 52) that Livy is asserting "that it is barbarians who are lawless and Romans who keep the law--even when they do not." Kahl's conclusion is made more dubious since Livy goes on to describe how the Roman ambassadors abused their diplomatic credentials by taking up arms on the spot and killing a Celtic chieftain, an event which the Celts justly complained of before the Roman senate, but to no avail.
The Celtic king, Brennus the Second is said to have laughed out loud when he saw the gods at Delphi represented in human form. Can Celtic history / myth / romance become grist for a re-imagined context for Paul's Galatians letter?
We are not there yet.
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