Gaul is a historical name used in the context of
Ancient Rome in references to the region of
Western Europe approximating present day
Netherlands and
Germany on the left bank of the Rhine
.
.
Gauls under
Brennus defeated
Roman forces in a battle circa 390 BC. The peak of
Gaulish expansion was reached in the
3rd century BC, in the wake of the
Gallic invasion of the Balkans of 281-279 BC.
During the 2nd and
1st century BC, Gaul fell under Roman rule.
Gallia Cisalpina was conquered in 203 BC,
Gallia Narbonensis in
123 BC. Gaul was invaded by the
Cimbri and the
Teutons after
120 BC, who were in turn defeated by the
Romans by
101 BC.
Julius Caesar finally subdued the remaining parts of Gaul in his campaigns of 58 to 51 BC. Roman control of Gaul lasted for five centuries, until the last Roman rump state, the
Domain of Soissons, fell to the Franks in
AD 486. During this time, The
Celtic culture had become amalgamated into a
Gallo-Roman culture and the
Gaulish language was likely extinct by the
6th century.
There have been attempts to trace Keltoi and Galatai to a single origin. It is most likely that the terms originated as names of minor tribes * Kel-to and/or Gal(a)-to- which were the earliest to come into contact with the
Roman world, but which have disappeared without leaving a historical record. The name is sometimes linked to the name
Gael,[by whom?] which is, however, derived from Old
Irish Goidel (derived, in turn, from Old
Welsh Guoidel "
Irishman", now spelled Gwyddel, from a Brittonic root *Wēdelos "), and cannot be directly related.
Josephus claimed that the Gauls were descended from
Gomer,
the grandson of Noah.
Hellenistic etiology connects the name with
Galatia (first attested by Timaeus of
Tauromenion in the 4th c. BC), and it was suggested that the association was inspired by the "milk-white" skin (γάλα, gala, "milk") of the Gauls (
Greek: Γαλάται, Galatai, Galatae)
.
. They are rather derived from the
Germanic term walha, an exonym applied by Germanic speakers to
Celts, likely via a
Latinization of Frankish *Walholant "Gaul", literally "
Land of the
Foreigners/Romans", making it partially cognate with the name
Wales), the usual word for the non-Germanic-speaking peoples (Celtic-speaking and Latin-speaking indiscriminately).
Concerning the peoples that inhabited these regions - and the relationships between their material culture, genetic relationships (the study of which has been aided, in recent years, through the field of archaeogenetics), and linguistic divisions rarely coincide.
It seems as if they derived many of their skills (like metal-working), as well as certain facets of their culture, from
Balkan peoples. Some scholars think that the
Bronze Age Urnfield culture represents an origin for the Celts as a distinct cultural branch of the Indo-European-speaking peoples . The Urnfield culture was preeminent in central
Europe during the late Bronze Age, from ca. 1200 BC until 700 BC. The spread of iron-working led to the development of the
Hallstatt culture (ca. 700 to
500 BC) directly from the
Urnfield. Proto-Celtic, the latest common ancestor of all known
Celtic languages, is considered by some scholars to have been spoken at the time of the late Urnfield or early
Hallstatt cultures.
The Hallstatt culture was succeeded by the
La Tène culture, which developed out of the Hallstatt culture without any definite cultural break, under the impetus of considerable
Mediterranean influence from the Greek,
Phoenician, and
Etruscan civilizations. The La Tène culture developed and flourished during the late
Iron Age (from 450 BC to the Roman conquest in the 1st century BC) in
France,
Switzerland,
Austria, southwest Germany,
Bohemia,
Moravia,
Slovakia and
Hungary. Farther north extended the contemporary
Pre-Roman Iron Age culture of northern Germany and
Scandinavia.
By the
2nd century BC, France was called Gaul (
Gallia Transalpina) by the Romans. In his
Gallic Wars, Julius Caesar distinguishes among three ethnic groups in Gaul: the
Belgae in the north (roughly between Rhine and
Seine), the Celts in the center and in
Armorica, and the
Aquitani in the southwest, the southeast being already colonized by the Romans. While some scholars believe that the Belgae south of the
Somme had Germanic elements. One of the reasons is political interference upon the
French historical interpretation during the
19th century. French historians adopted fully the explanation of
Caesar who stated that Gaul stretched from the
Pyrenees up to the Rhine in the north. This fitted the French expansionist aspirations of the time under
Napoleon III. In the north of (modern) France, the Gaul-German language border was situated somewhere between the Seine and the Somme.
Northern Belgic tribes like the
Nervians, Atrebates or
Morini appear to be
Germanic tribes who migrated from the Germanic hinterland and adopted
Celtic language and customs, as all of the names of their leaders and towns are
Celtic.
- published: 31 Jul 2010
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