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	What is a Barbarian?
The word Barbarian comes from the Greek barbaros, which simply meant "foreign". If a Greek could not understand a vistors language he was labeled a Barbarian. The word Barbarian was also reserved for foreigners who had customs dissimilar to the Greeks or Romans, especially those whose manners who were not refined in the same way, or who lived under a political system not as complex or "sophisticated". Anyone viewed as an outsider by the Greeks or Romans was automatically a "Barbarian". It is mistake to view a barbarian as one who was especially savage in his methods of warfare. Savagery was the order of the day, and the Greeks and Romans were as savage and barbaric as any who invaded them. The way the Christians were used as entertainment in the Roman Coliseum was as savage as anything before or since. But since the Romans wrote the history we read, it is their Celtic invaders who are labeled the "barbarians".

What is a Barbarian?

The word Barbarian comes from the Greek barbaros, which simply meant "foreign". If a Greek could not understand a vistors language he was labeled a Barbarian.

The word Barbarian was also reserved for foreigners who had customs dissimilar to the Greeks or Romans, especially those whose manners who were not refined in the same way, or who lived under a political system not as complex or "sophisticated". Anyone viewed as an outsider by the Greeks or Romans was automatically a "Barbarian".

It is mistake to view a barbarian as one who was especially savage in his methods of warfare. Savagery was the order of the day, and the Greeks and Romans were as savage and barbaric as any who invaded them. The way the Christians were used as entertainment in the Roman Coliseum was as savage as anything before or since. But since the Romans wrote the history we read, it is their Celtic invaders who are labeled the "barbarians".