[JimSEA]

It is a suprising assertion about which I have been having a friendly argument with Blam. He believes the Chinese First Emperor was possibly Celtic and I disagree. However, he has given me high quality references to convince me something with the Indo-Europeans in general and the Celts or perhaps more accuratly, the Proto-Celts happened that has yet to be fully understood. That is rather exciting. I would highly recomend The Mummies of Urumchi by Elizabeth Wayland Barber who is a textile expert. It conflicts with J. P. Mallory's In Search of the Indo-European however, Mallory was vague about the eastern spread of people although he spend time on the Kurgan movements. I am convinced, as an interested and non-professional observer, that there is a lot to be discovered between the Caucus and China and much of it may involve the Kurgan. In short, I don't know if it is Celtic or not but Barber is convincing.

[blam]

"I would highly recomend The Mummies of Urumchi by Elizabeth Wayland Barber who is a textile expert. It conflicts with J. P. Mallory's In Search of the Indo-European however, Mallory was vague about the eastern spread of people although he spend time on the Kurgan movements. "

Victor Mair recruited many experts on this investigation of the Tarim Mummies, Barber is just one of those and wrote a very good book (The Mummies Of Urumchi) about the textiles. JP Malloy and Victor Mair wrote the excellent book The Tarim Mummies that covers the work of all the recruited experts, a required read for this subject. (They cover everything, excellent)

A well-designed Thames-and-Hudson book, The Tarim Mummies presents a thorough background on the migration of people and languages into the Tarim basin area. Like Barber's, it also includes a chapter on textiles. But the main source of interest will be Chapters 5 (The Mummies Themselves) and 10 (Who Were the Mummies?).

[Jacob Kell]

"It is a suprising assertion about which I have been having a friendly argument with Blam. He believes the Chinese First Emperor was possibly Celtic and I disagree."

Isn't blam Celtic himself? I have said that the Tocharians were mediterranean or largely mediterranean in racial type, like maybe the Iranians. I got that from surfing the newsgroups at groups.google.com. I wouldn't be surprised; however, if even back then the area was one big melting pot where different ethnic strains intermingled. Including, among others Tocharians and Iranians. Who can say for certain?