Early History Of The Celts Essays - Celtic Studies, Celts

Early History Of The Celts Essays - Celtic Studies, Celts Early History Of The Celts INTRODUCTION The Ancient Celts were not an illiterate people, but they transferred their knowledge orally. They had an alphabet of twenty letters called Ogham. Each letter was named after a tree from the land where they lived. Ogham was used on standing stones, primarily on graves and boundary markers. The primary sources of information about the Celts are, in that light, the texts written by the Romans who were in touch with them and Christian monks, who lived in Irish monasteries in the Middle Ages. Caesar, Livy and Tacitus, wrote about their contemporaries who lived in a way different than themselves and therefore were considered barbarians, but even though they did not have a positive attitude towards them, they still left some useful information about Celtic society, religion, way of life, and so on. One of the problems that arise from this is that many things in these writings are romanised, e.g. Caesar interprets Celtic gods and calls them by the names of their Roman equivalents: They worship as their divinity, Mercury, in particular, and have many images of him, and regard him as the inventor of all arts, they consider him the guide of their journeys and marches, and believe him to have great influence over the acquisition of gain and mercantile transactions. Next to him they worship Apollo, and Mars, and Jupiter, and Minerva; respecting these deities they have for the most part the same belief as other nations: that Apollo averts diseases, that Minerva imparts the invention of manufactures, that Jupiter possesses the sovereignty of the heavenly powers; that Mars presides over wars. The second type of sources are the books written from 6th - 13th century on by Christian monks in Ireland and Celtic Britain. These books were written several centuries later, so the oral tradition might have changed and much of the information was under Christian influences. The Celts were one of the most significant and powerful peoples in Europe from fourth until first century BC, and their culture one of the most influential. From then on they had a turbulent history, and their legacy continues to live even today. The following pages will be an attempt to MAIN PART Today, Celtic is a family of languages of the Indo European group. The Celts are, by definition, all the people who spoke or speak one of the Celtic languages. A unifying Celtic language existed probably somewhere between 1200 and 750 BC, in the Bronze Age, when Urnfield culture was at its peak. This people spoke a language that would later develop into Celtic. Their ur- Celtic developed in two dialects, first Goidelic (or Q Celtic) and later Brythonic (or P Celtic). The P/Q differentiation came from the diverse pronunciations of an Indo European sound /kw/. In Goidelic it became /k/, in Brythonic /p/. Goidelic transformed into the languages spoken in Ireland, Isle of Man and Scotland; Brythonic into Welsh, Cornish and Breton. The next period of Celtic history is connected with Hallstatt culture, which existed approximately from 700 to 500 BC. The later Iron Age phase of Celtic culture is called La Tne, after a site in western Switzerland and dates from 5th to 1st century BC. The Celts almost certainly began to expand to the British Isles during this period. Their influence extended from what are now France, Spain, and British Isles to the shores of the Black Sea from the Ukraine to Turkey. When the Romans came to these territories, they ended the La Tne culture, but in the places they did not occupy, like as Ireland and Scotland, the La Tne culture prospered until about 200 AD. The word Celt comes from Keltoi, the name that Greek writers gave to these people. To the Romans, the Continental Celts were known as Galli and Galatae, or Gauls and they called those in Britain Pritanni. In the 4th century BC the Celts invaded the world in possession of the Greeks and Romans, conquering northern Italy and sacking Rome, while also conquering Macedonia and Thessaly. They raided Rome in 390 (or 387), conquered southern Italy between 282 and 272, sack Delphi in 279, and the Gauls came to Asia Minor in 278/277. After the height of

Art for Life essays

Art for Life essays The reintroduction to the arts in the curriculum has been a slow process with many detours along the way. It has also been compared to Gardners theory of multiple intelligences in this way: Three important truths are woven together in Gardners characteristically perceptive trope. First is the encouraging fact that, now, schoolteachers, college professors, administrators, artists, critics, art historians, aestheticians and others, are combining their talents and techniques in an effort to strengthen American art education. Second is the discouraging fact that these par-ties, like those in any new ensemble, are having difficulty in achieving harmony. And third is the practical truth that their own judgment as to what works best will not be the final arbiter of their success. (Moore, p.5) Throughout history, art has brought people together and was considered a great contribu-tion, but my research brought me to this statement: What I want to stress here is not how we are connected to the past, but how strongly we are disconnected. For practical purposes current art instruction doesnt involve a fixed curriculum, a hierarchy of genres, a sequence of courses, a coherent body of knowledge, or a unified theory of practice. (Elkins, p.38) Elkins shows his concern for the lack of stability and instruction in schools regarding art based programs. The arts should be an integral part of the school curriculum from kindergarten through high school graduation. Children should be exposed to original ways of thinking and imagina-tion. They should be allowed to study sculpture, painting, journalism, dance, any for of self-expression that involves creative thinking. However, society has been reduced to relying on computer games and television for their entertainment. Children no longer sit down with cray-ons and paper to draw their rendition of a giraffe in the jungle. Instead, tel...

Teach Me a Piece Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Teach Me a Piece - Essay Example In the later years, artists who were inspired to compose music with influences from Patton referred to him as their founding father. This paper will give a discussion on how the piece â€Å"High water everywhere† was constructed in terms of lyrics, the importance of the piece to me and audience at large and the social situation of the pieces composition. The discussion will also include the appropriate readings of the piece, and conclude with the important issues from the reading. The piece â€Å"High water everywhere†, has been constructed in two parts, the first part of the piece has seven verses, while the second part has six verses. The lyric is a lamentation of the flood calamity that had affected the whole of Mississippi. The lyrics continue on to address the aftermath of the flood, and what people ought to do to save one another from more harm. Patton, talks of how he wants to move to various places around the state, but those places too, had been affected by the flood that hit Mississippi. The melody in the song is smooth, since the piece itself had a theme of consoling the individuals faced by the calamity. The lyrics make the listeners of the piece emotional as it features a real story about peoples suffering. Patton sang solo while playing a guitar (Springer 60). The piece is important to me due to a number of reasons. I respect Patton from the start because he pioneered the development of a new genre of music better known as delta blues. Pattons creativity aided in the development of a novel genre of music, which had never been witnessed before. The piece is also important since it has embedded history in a form of melody. The piece managed to ease the pain experienced by victims of the Mississippi floods. The piece is one of the songs in the 1920s that took to heart a social situation. Most artists, during the 1920s, composed songs whose themes addressed issues of love and the general art of seduction. I am intrigued with Patton because