Archaeologists Find Celts in Unlikely Spot: Central Turkey

NYT ^ | 12/25/2001 | JOHN NOBLE WILFORD

[a_Turk]

In storybook histories, the ancient city of Gordion is remembered only as the seat of King Midas, he of the golden touch, and the place where Alexander the Great struck a famous blow in legend and metaphor. Challenged to separate the strands of an impossible knot, the Gordion knot, the conqueror cut through the problem, in the manner of conquerors, with one authoritative swing of his sword.

After Midas and Alexander, Gordion languished on the fringes of history, and until recently archaeologists had taken little notice of its Celtic past. Yes, European Celts — the Gauls of Roman times and the forerunners of Bretons, Welsh, Irish and highland Scots — once migrated as far east as what is now central Turkey and settled in and around post-Alexander Gordion, beginning in the early third century B.C.

Archaeologists say they have now excavated artifacts and architectural remains dispelling any lingering doubt that the Celts were indeed there, as a few classical texts had recorded in passing. These people called themselves Galatai, a Celtic name for tribal warriors, and became known to the Romans as Galatians. Their Christianized descendants were advised by the apostle Paul, in the New Testament, that "whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap."

The remains of Galatian Gordion, archaeologists conclude, reveal that the Celts, although they came as mercenary soldiers, bringing along their wives and children, were looking beyond warfare and pillage. They put down deep roots, revived Gordion and created an ambitious, thriving society.

Above ruins of ordinary mud-brick houses, they erected a monumental public building of cut-stone blocks that was surrounded by a massive stone wall. Inside a workshop were clay loom weights used in weaving, a possible clue to Celtic influence. Not far away, excavators found a stone sculpture of a human with faces in two directions, which replicates double-faced or "Janus" figures from Celtic sites in central Europe.

But the most decisive discovery was a grisly one: clusters of broken- necked skeletons and decapitated heads of children and adults, some of them mixed with animal bones. Ancient Celts had a reputation for ritual human sacrifice, but not the contemporary Greeks and Romans or any of the indigenous people of Anatolia, the central plateau region of Turkey.

In the current issue of Archaeology, a magazine of the Archaeological Institute of America, Dr. Mary M. Voigt of the College of William and Mary, a leader of the excavations, and her colleagues wrote, "Such practices are well known from Celtic sites in Europe and are now documented for Anatolian Celts as well."

Dr. Ronald Hicks, an archaeologist and specialist in Celtic prehistory at Ball State University in Muncie, Ind., agreed that this appeared to be the strongest evidence yet for a permanent Celtic presence in Gordion.

"That certainly has the Celtic look," said Dr. Hicks, who is not involved in the project. "One of the Roman complaints about the Celts was that they still practiced human sacrifice. They said the Gauls were known for lopping off heads of men in battle, tying them to their belts and bringing them back to display for all their friends at home."

Dr. Oscar White Muscarella, an archaeologist at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, called the discoveries "an extraordinary accomplishment." For the first time, he said, "we are able to see and hold in our hands what the Galatians did and can now talk about Galatians in Anatolia."

The excavations of Galatian Gordion are part of research at the site, 60 miles southwest of Ankara, being led by the University of Pennsylvania Museum in conjunction with the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto. Dr. Voigt's co-authors of the magazine report are Jeremiah R. Dandoy, a retired businessman who has become a zooarchaeologist, and Page Selinsky, a doctoral candidate in anthropology at the University of Pennsylvania.

Gordion's Galatian period had been neglected, Dr. Voigt explained in an interview, because archaeologists had their eyes on bigger prizes. They dug through the layers of Galatian ruins to get to the city as it was in Alexander's time, 332 B.C., and the even earlier city of Midas, ruler of Phrygia, probably in the eighth century B.C.

Dr. Voigt said archaeologists were also put off by the seeming impossibility of finding anything distinctive to confirm the Galatian presence in the city. How do you establish the ethnicity of an ancient population, especially if the people were warriors who traveled light, carrying with them little of their own material culture, and lived off the land?

"Historically, we knew they were at Gordion," Dr. Voigt said, "but we didn't know anything definitive about their way of life."

In one of the few sketchy accounts, the Roman historian Livy noted that a king in Anatolia hired Celts as mercenaries to re-enforce his own army. They arrived in 278 B.C., 20,000 of them, including provisioners and merchants as well as their families, in a caravan of 2,000 baggage wagons. But by this time the Celts had become somewhat Hellenized.

For an unknown number of years since leaving their homeland, somewhere in central Europe near the headwaters of the Danube, the Celts had passed through the Balkans and paused in Greece to sack Delphi. In battle, they stood naked before the foe. Along the way, they learned Greek and inscribed some of their possessions in that language. Their ceramics and other household wares were in the Greek style.

"It used to be hard to detect the Galatians at Gordion," said Dr. Keith DeVries, a University of Pennsylvania archaeologist and former director of the Gordion excavations. "There was not a single artifact that was absolutely demonstrable as Celtic. Some began to think the literary sources must be misleading us."

Livy described Galatian Gordion as a trading center and a fortified settlement in the early second century B.C., a judgment now supported by archaeologists. Artifacts like a small bone lion, probably used as inlay, suggested the Galatians enjoyed some affluence. Traces of a few substantial buildings — with tile roofs, many rooms, paved floors, stone benches and generous courtyards — seemed to attest to a city with a social and political hierarchy. This was more than a simple crossroads farming settlement, as some scholars once suspected.

[LostTribe]

>Peoples migrated just as far then as they do now

Agreed. There is a powerful tendency for historians, archeologists and anthropologists to isolate peoples by space, as well as time, and assume they never traveled farther than the horizon. That way its easier to make silly assumptions which justify ridiculous conclusions about what they did, and thought, and traveled, etc.

In fact, while travel has never been as easy as it is today, traders and warriors and others from many cultures have always traveled widely.

[PaulKersey]

> its easier to make silly assumptions which justify ridiculous conclusions about what they did, and thought, and traveled, etc

Probably the silliest assumption is that Jesus stayed in Nazareth and pounded nails from age 12 to 30. There is absolutely no evidence this is true, but many sweaty bible thumpers insist it is a fact. There is far more "evidence" that he traveled during that time than that he stayed at home.

[Cleburne]

Huh, aint that sumpin'. How nice to think that at least a wee bit of the Bible was addressed directly to people of my ethnic group. I would assume that by the time of Paul the Celts of Galatia had abstained from human sacrifice. They didn't realize such things were to be confined to the colliseum...

[LostTribe]

>What's your opinion?

Thanks for asking. I think this is a fascinating confirmation that even more Celts were found near the place the Lost Tribes of Israel disappeared. While this Celtic find is somewhat later than the 610-620 BC date which is often used for first appearance, this location is also farther West than the Caucasus Mountains and their southern foothills, and the time difference could be accounted for by simply considering "migration time". This is more powerful ammunition that the Lost Tribes of Israel and Celts are the same people.

Please click on my Profile for more info.

[PaulKersey]

>it was Galatians converted to Christianity

It was the Apostle Paul who went to the Galatians in response to Jesus admonition in Matthew 10:6 (and elsewhere in Matthew) to "... go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel." Does that mean the Galatians were the Lost Sheep of the House of Israel???

[LostTribe]

>Does that mean the Galatians were the Lost Sheep of the House of Israel???

Yes, and more.

The Lost Tribes of Israel, who were the old Northern Kingdom (aka the House of Israel), were the Galatians (and Corinthians, and Phillipians, and Ephesians, etc....), were Celts. They became the root stock of Europe and its colonies, including the United States of America.

[a_Turk]

abstained from human sacrifice

Not that I would ever do it, I'd pull a fast one like Abraham and put an end to it. Sacrificing what is dear, dearer, dearest to you. Something rare and special like a virgin (yes even back then) to show your love for the diety. What could mean more to the tribal lord but his firstborn? What better sacrifice to convince the God(s) of our worthiness for rain and fertility? Bunch of romantic bullshit. Long live the reform of Abraham.

[DensaMensa]

This is an interesting but often confusing article. Disregarding the nonsense about these people being "barbarians" (compared to what, the bloody ROMANS?), the author does a good job of placing some Celts in the region west of the Caucasus mountains, quite far east and south of central Europe, but not as far east as others have placed them even earlier BC, in Northern Iraq. I would have felt better about the article if the author had not diverted into claiming that beheading ones enemies is a sign of "ritual sacrifice".

Defining Celts as "politically and socially primitive barbarians" is the claptrap of Roman and Greek historians, not exactly independent observers. Then he conceded, about these Celts "...can hardly be attributed to a marginal, and politically, socially and economically unsophisticated people." ... "The fact that their politics survived to be incorporated into the Roman empire would indicate the existence of highly developed social structures bound together by shared value systems."

The author fell into the mindless copying trap of having the Celts wandering from West to East. If he evaluated their "wanderings" from East to West he would demonstrate a more insightful understanding the topic.

[a_Turk]

The Lost Tribes of Israel, who were the old Northern Kingdom (aka the House of Israel), were the Galatians (and Corinthians, and Phillipians, and Ephesians, etc....), were Celts.

According to Greek lore, Ephesus was founded by the Amazons. Probably no connection between Amazons and Celts, what would you say?

[a_Turk]

Defining Celts as "politically and socially primitive barbarians" is the claptrap of Roman and Greek historians, not exactly independent observers.

Well, anymore I am rather honored to be called a barbarian by such. I used to bother me, but no longer.

I knew that this was not news, but I thought I'd post it anyway, that perhaps there were some who had not known of this.

This same article was posted a day later by someone (a Greek) who added "Ellas go Bragh" to the title. Now, even the Celts are Greek...

[Cleburne]

Well you know we all have a little Irish in us...I'm still waiting to hear about the Celts in Japan and Southeast Asia though.

[LostTribe]

>According to Greek lore, Ephesus was founded by the Amazons. Probably no connection between Amazons and Celts, what would you say?

I would say there is probably no connection between Amazons and Celts. Further, if that is what the Greeks say then those Greeks are full of prunes.

[DensaMensa]

>anymore I am rather honored to be called a barbarian by such

Me too. It's the pot calling the kettle black, or worse.

[Mortimer Snavely]

There's a more detailed article about this in Archaeology magazine.

[DensaMensa]

>There's a more detailed article about this in Archaeology magazine.

Do you have a link?

[Mortimer Snavely]

Here ya go: Celtic Sacrifice

The print magazine article itself has some good photographs of human remains in situ.

[DensaMensa]

Thanks for the link!

>the archaeological evidence for a large Galatian presence at the site was not overwhelming until our discovery of grisly evidence of rituals involving humans. The broken-necked bodies and decapitated heads at Gordion cannot be attributed to any local Anatolian group, but are characteristic of European Celts.

I can hardly believe the shabby logic in this excerpt. IOW, this has to be a Celtic site because Celts do what we think was done here, and to whom we think it was done, and for the reasons we think.

Excuse me???? Is this the genius on which modern archeology is built?

[Mortimer Snavely]

I'd have said, "We haven't seen this anywhere else except in Celtic sites."

[imperator2]

You seem to be an Archeologist (not). What is your level of training in the field Master degree or PhD. Somehow, I suspect neither. You are certainly entitled to make a fool of yourself.

[DensaMensa]

PhD. The logic I see offered in that article would not work in a serious High School class. (That does not mean they were not really Celts, but the authors logic in proving it is scarey.)