Celts in Egypt

[lurker4now]

The Celts who burst onto the Hellenistic world in the 280's and 270's bc were,as we have seen,largely absorbed into the armies of the contending dynasts of Asia Minor,but the renown of the Celt as a fighting man was already well known in the eastern Mediterranean.It is hardly surprising,therefore,to learn of Celts in Egypt as early as 274 BC serving in the army of Ptolemy II Philadelphos.In all porbability they were recruited from the horde that broke into Asia Minor in 278,but that they may have arrived in Egypt some time before is not impossible.They soon proved to be unreliable allies.Believing that Ptolemy was caught in an impossible position between his half bother Magas in the west and Antiochos I in the east,they rebelled,buoyed on by the prospects of the wealth to be gained by looting the cities and sanctuaries of Egypt.They had,however,misjudged the situation:Ptolemy reacted swiftly,driving some 4,000 of the mercenaries onto an island in the Sebnnytic branch of the Nile,where,Pausanius tells us "They perished by hunger and each others swords."
This was by no means the end of the Celtic presence in Egypt.It was normal in third-century Egypt for troops,no longer needed for active service,to be settled and given land to cultivate,usually in the Fayum.These cleruchs ('sleepers') were,in theory,expected to retain their military skills and to be immediately available when called upon.Among the cleruchs living in the Fayum was a detachment of Celts whose presence is demonstrated by wooden shield,preserved in the dry desert conditions.in 217 BC,when Egpt was threatened by the Seleucid king Antiochos III,Ptolemy IV called the 'sleepers' to his defence.Among the 50,000 or so troops who where eventually amassed where 6,000 'Gauls and Thracians',of who 2,000 of unspecified nationality,were newly recruited.Some of the cleruchs who took part were,according to Polybius,the sons of the original settlers.It is tempting to think that the small terracotta of a resplendent Gaul found in Egypt proclaims Gaulish successes at this time.
Gauls still retained their identity throughout the second century BC and their presence is recorded from time to time:they helped besiege the rebel town of Abydos in 186-5 and were among the garrison resident at Hermopolis Magna towards the end of the century.Whether these detachments had families in the Fayum and returned there when not on military duty is difficult to say,but that other communities existed is implied by funerary stelae naming Gauls and sometimes depicting Celtic shields,found in the necropoli of Alexandria.One wonders whether the old fighters living in the desiccating atmosphere of the Fayum oasis in the mid-third century told their incredulous childern stories of the fertile Danube plain or the pine-clad slopes of Mount Parnassos remembered from the time when they had camped in its shadow waiting to pillage Delphi.

-Barry Cunliffe

[Crimson Guard]

wishful thinking!

[lurker4now]

crimsonguard said:

wishful thinking!

you cant be serious archaeological evidence,ancient classical reference exists

btw Cunliffe credentials:
Since 1972, Professor of European Archaeology, Oxford University (Fellow of Keble College). (Previously Professor of Archaeology, University of Southampton, 1966-72 and Assistant Lecturer, Department of Classics, University of Bristol, 1963-66.) Studied Archaeology and Anthropology at Cambridge: BA (1962), MA (1965), PhD (1966), LittD (1977).

now refute any of it and also while you are add it post your credentials

[amksa]

bullshit.. the "celt argument" was a French colonial invention, because of the numerous Menhir found in North Africa, but the true is that's irrelevant.

[Crimson Guard]

Look friend,My credentials are as a reader,and know enough to know that your friend Barry Cunliffe is full of it.

That book which I had read back in 1994 or 1995,was filled with nothing more than biased anecdotes.He's a as biased or crakpotted as they come,he's some sortve British/celticphile ,and glorifies them so greatly it becomes comical,but to a British or WASP person it would quite the read.


Lets look at what he "thinks"(I saved this link back in 2001):

www.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,3604,497953,00.html

Cunliffe calls the Ancient Greek and Roman historians and their work prejudiced and ignorant,lol.So nope I do not take this guy seriously as he has no respect ,but does use them as sources when it suits his fancy.


<<Prof.Cunliffe who made the most extraordinary claim is that the Gaelic, Welsh, Cornish, Galician and Breton languages are not the last vestiges of a tongue carried by Celtic invaders from northern India, but were local languages which grew from the aboriginal population.>> Now thats crazy


Cunliffe is the guy that beleives that Stone Henge was built around 3000BC by native british(who according to the way he thinks mustve just happend to grow outve the ground from their and made their way south and east),that created a more civilized and more highly advanced way of life then the Mediterrean World.He pushes the notion that the Mediterrean people copied from the already more advanced Atlantic British peoples...(meanwhile these same advanced people had no form of writing,lol)



Truth is Stone Henge and the megalithic structures where built by the Neolithic people outve the Middle East and North Africa(ie Meditterrean) who where also building great gigantic stone buildings.

He clearly has something against the Southern Europeans and Mediterreans and their influence and dominence over European culture/ History and history in general,is at odds with is rubbish advanced Britain who should be the center of attention not the Greeks and Romans.

So do not talk to me about this doofy professor and his credentials,His ideas and theories are unsound.

As for this topic,the Celts where not in Egypt,unless they where used in small numbers as mercenaries or Auxiliaries brought in by either Romans or Greeks at some point,this is not an organized United invasion of them from asia minor,thats pure rubbish.

"Next youll be telling me about the Celts that invaded Japan" HAHAHAHAHA!

[lurker4now]

amksa said:

bullshit.. the "celt argument" was a French colonial invention, because of the numerous Menhir found in North Africa, but the true is that's irrelevant.

Its not an invention like it or not their exists ancient texts.how are you going to refute they didnt exist in Egypt produce something worthy.

[lurker4now]

crimsonguard said:

Look friend,My credentials are as a reader,and know enough to know that your friend Barry Cunliffe is full of it.

That book which I had read back in 1994 or 1995,was filled with nothing more than biased anecdotes.He's a as biased or crakpotted as they come,he's some sortve British/celticphile ,and glorifies them so greatly it becomes comical,but to a British or WASP person it would quite the read.


Lets look at what he "thinks"(I saved this link back in 2001):

www.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,3604,497953,00.html

Cunliffe calls the Ancient Greek and Roman historians and their work prejudiced and ignorant,lol.So nope I do not take this guy seriously as he has no respect ,but does use them as sources when it suits his fancy.


<<Prof.Cunliffe who made the most extraordinary claim is that the Gaelic, Welsh, Cornish, Galician and Breton languages are not the last vestiges of a tongue carried by Celtic invaders from northern India, but were local languages which grew from the aboriginal population.>> Now thats crazy


Cunliffe is the guy that beleives that Stone Henge was built around 3000BC by native british(who according to the way he thinks mustve just happend to grow outve the ground from their and made their way south and east),that created a more civilized and more highly advanced way of life then the Mediterrean World.He pushes the notion that the Mediterrean people copied from the already more advanced Atlantic British peoples...(meanwhile these same advanced people had no form of writing,lol)



Truth is Stone Henge and the megalithic structures where built by the Neolithic people outve the Middle East and North Africa(ie Meditterrean) who where also building great gigantic stone buildings.

He clearly has something against the Southern Europeans and Mediterreans and their influence and dominence over European culture/ History and history in general,is at odds with is rubbish advanced Britain who should be the center of attention not the Greeks and Romans.

So do not talk to me about this doofy professor and his credentials,His ideas and theories are unsound.

As for this topic,the Celts where not in Egypt,unless they where used in small numbers as mercenaries or Auxiliaries brought in by either Romans or Greeks at some point,this is not an organized United invasion of them from asia minor,thats pure rubbish.

"Next youll be telling me about the Celts that invaded Japan" HAHAHAHAHA!

wow you you never stop amazing me.


"organized United invasion of them from asia minor,thats pure rubbish."

i guess you cant read english because no one ever says anything of the sort.

[Crimson Guard]

He doesnt have to say it directly,thats the way it comes off when you read in between the lines..Anyway your professor is junk,and this topic is B.S!

[Baladi]

The Celts serving as mercenaries around Ptolemic Egypt is plausible. Celts would not be the only foreigners within Ptolemic Egypt that settled on land and cultivated it. Plenty of Syrians,Greeks,and even Jews lived in Fayyum alongside indigenous Egyptians. Military settlement was not just in he Fayyum either but extended as far south as modern day Aswan.

[Ponto Hardbottle]

Yes okay. How many of those mercenaries, Europeans, and West Asians actually stayed in Egypt or intermarried or even had issue as they say legally? Maria Callas was born in the States but she and her parents returned to Europe. In Europe during the Second World War, the French has lots of Senegalese troops. Did they settle there, intermarried or produce lots of Senegalese children? Probably not. The Vandals lived in North Africa for a long time but eventually they left.

[amksa]

it would be more credible to talk about a presence of Celts in Carthage, Celts in Egypt sounds very dubious.

[Baladi]

Yes okay. How many of those mercenaries, Europeans, and West Asians actually stayed in Egypt or intermarried or even had issue as they say legally? Maria Callas was born in the States but she and her parents returned to Europe. In Europe during the Second World War, the French has lots of Senegalese troops. Did they settle there, intermarried or produce lots of Senegalese children? Probably not. The Vandals lived in North Africa for a long time but eventually they left.

Don't think you can compare Ptolemic Egypt with modern day Europe. Macedonian Greeks and other foreigners were allowed to own land across Egypt and were also allowed to intermarry with local Egyptians except in places like Naucratis.

Migration into Egypt from Western Asia to Europe started as far back as the Late Dyanstic period when Ahmose II ordered Carian mercenaries and Greeks mercenaries to come to Egypt.


Even going as far back as the pharaonic period mercenaries such as Libyans,Nubians,and Caanite came to Egypt and were sometimes rewarded with tracts of land to live on. This was a common policy that continued even towards the Islamic period.


The Romans forbade their own soliders from intermarrying to settling the land. As did the early Islamic caliphates under the pact of Umar.

[lurker4now]

baladi said:

The Celts serving as mercenaries around Ptolemic Egypt is plausible. Celts would not be the only foreigners within Ptolemic Egypt that settled on land and cultivated it. Plenty of Syrians,Greeks,and even Jews lived in Fayyum alongside indigenous Egyptians. Military settlement was not just in he Fayyum either but extended as far south as modern day Aswan.

its not plausible its definitive.
no one ever said they where the only hired guns there.

[lurker4now]

crimsonguard said:

He doesnt have to say it directly,thats the way it comes off when you read in between the lines..Anyway your professor is junk,and this topic is B.S!

Ptolemy IV called the 'sleepers' to his defence.Among the 50,000 or so troops who where eventually amassed where 6,000 'Gauls and Thracians',of who 2,000 of unspecified nationality,were newly recruited.Some of the cleruchs who took part were,according to Polybius,the sons of the original settlers.

they were there.i dont know what lines you read but the way it comes off to me is that celts where used in egypt along with other hired guns.

[lurker4now]

holyjesus said:

Yes okay. How many of those mercenaries, Europeans, and West Asians actually stayed in Egypt or intermarried or even had issue as they say legally? Maria Callas was born in the States but she and her parents returned to Europe. In Europe during the Second World War, the French has lots of Senegalese troops. Did they settle there, intermarried or produce lots of Senegalese children? Probably not. The Vandals lived in North Africa for a long time but eventually they left.

what are you talking about? this isnt even part of the discussion.two people on this thread have both made claims that the Professor with a phd is making up lies about celts being in egypt lol are you one of them?