Seven Celtic Nations

Every Scottish child knows the story of how the thistle came to be honored as Scotland's national flower. During one of Scotland's warring feuds with its continental neighbors, Norse invaders landed on the coast under cover of darkness. As the barefoot landing party advanced, their painful cries from stepping on unseen thistles alerted the Scottish defenses, who rallied and drove the invading force back to the sea.

Every Scottish child knows the story of how the thistle came to be honored as Scotland's national flower. During one of Scotland's warring feuds with its continental neighbors, Norse invaders landed on the coast under cover of darkness. As the barefoot landing party advanced, their painful cries from stepping on unseen thistles alerted the Scottish defenses, who rallied and drove the invading force back to the sea.

Ireland's earliest Celtic settlements can be traced to about 4,000 BCE. Later, other waves of Celtic peoples migrated from the European continent, some seaking a newer, more fertile place, others to escape the northward advancing Roman armies. Stones from the soil are as much a part of Irish life and history as the soil itself. Stones built houses, walls, castles, weapons, monuments, and tombs. Standing stones were precisely placed to mark soltices and to track movements of the moon and stars. A popular belief is that every stone in Ireland has a tale to tell; and in the telling and retelling from one generation to the next, many tales that might have sprung from myth or legend have evolved to a level where they have become as real as the stones themselves.

From the first evidence of migrating tribes, stone tool, and elaborate burial chambers, present-day Cornwall began to form about 6,000 BCE. 21st Century Cornwall still resonates with tales of kings and commoners, giants and wee folk, pirates and mermaids. This is, after all, the land of King Arthur (who was born, lived, and fought his last battler on Cornish soil). Nowhere in Cornwall is one more than twenty miles from the sea or a short walk from antiquities. For centuries mining and fishing sustained the Cornish. Like other major fishing communities in the British Isles, outstanding examples of Cornish knitting survive as witness to the needs of daily life on land and at sea.

The sea and its sustenance were vital to the daily life of coastal Celtic peoples, especially in Brittany, the wind-swept northwest corner of France. Brittany became a permanent part of France in 1532. Today one can walk the paths of Celtic ancestors along the rugged Atlantic coastline, be refreshed by the milder climate of the wooded river valleys, and take in a Breton festival complete with crepes, cider, and Celtic music. A lingering sense of magic enlivesn Brittany, where ancient stone structures rise from the land and the sea and the megalithic is never far from the modern.

Galicia, on the Atlantic coast in northwestern Spain, was Finis Terrae (end of the world) to Romans. To escape Rome's invading armies, many Galician Celts migrated northwards. Those who eventually settled in Britain and Ireland found the mild climate there to be much like their continental homeland. Present-day Galicia is made up of five Spanish provinces. One can still visit ancient Celtic ruins, many of which are massive stone structures bearing inscriptions yet to be deciphered.

The people of Wales are descended from a mixture of Iberian seafarers, Bronze Age folk skilled in metal working and pottery, and Celtic tribes driven northwards out of Europe by the Romans. In this melting pot, rich with legend and mysticism, was born the land of Wales and the people who called themselves Welsh, or "Cymry," the brotherhood.

The people of Wales are descended from a mixture of Iberian seafarers, Bronze Age folk skilled in metal working and pottery, and Celtic tribes driven northwards out of Europe by the Romans. In this melting pot, rich with legend and mysticism, was born the land of Wales and the people who called themselves Welsh, or "Cymry," the brotherhood.

The Isle of Man, only 33 miles long and 13 wide, lies in the Irish Sea almost equidistant from England, Scotland, and Ireland. Prehistoric ruins, chambered tombs, ancient castles, and crude crosses carved from local stone bear witness to the ebb and flow of civilization on the island. It is thought that the island was named for the Celtic god of the sea, Manannan. Overrun from time to time by its powerful neighbors, the Isle of Man has been successively Irish, Scandinavian, Scottish, and English. Today it is politically independent of them all.