| ||||||||||||||||||||||||
Product Details
Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
|
|
Share your thoughts with other customers:
|
||||||||||||||||||||||
|
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
fascinating overview of a warrior people who rose and then disappeared,
By Robert J. Crawford (Balmette Talloires, France) - See all my reviews (TOP 1000 REVIEWER) (REAL NAME)
This review is from: The Celts (Paperback)
This is an excellent popular history of an ethnic group that entered history and then exited once they converted to Christianity. The author does a splendid job of plumbing the mystery of their power, their culture, and where they went.
The book begins with their attack on ancient Rome, one of the only adversaries that actually sacked the capitol. This occurred in the 4th C BC, when Rome was barely more than a strong city-state Republic. Indeed, the Romans developed much of their original military science in opposition and fear of the Celts. The description serves to evoke how they appeared to the Romans, as fierce, nearly inhuman barbarians who collected the severed heads of their adversaries - to wear around their waists and then to display in niches in their homes as they rotted. I could picture the way the screamed as they entered battle, painted in brilliant colors and hairy and naked. Genuine barbarians whose minds and culture will never be understood. The author then backtracks to look at their origins in prehistory, when they emerged with the Indo-European peoples approximately three millenia ago. The treatment is scholarly and extremely detailed, distinguing between the various tribal peoples that became Germanic, Italic, and many others. While the author speculates that one of their earlier capitals may have been the mythic Atlantis - which he situates as a prosperous state occupying modern Denmark and southern Sweden - he is clear that this is essentially speculation. Nonetheless, he argues that at the time, it was one of the most advanced bronze age cultures in a far warmer age, which has been underestimated by comparison with the mediterranean cultures that flowered later. I found his thesis intriguing enough to want to read further. After an environmental catastrophe around 500 BC, he reports, the Celtic peoples split into innumerable warrior tribes (from their origin as the Hallstatt people) and emigrated south, which brought them to Britain, Ireland, Gaul and then to Italy. They then dominated a vast geographical area, which if united would have been one of the greatest empires of antiquity. It is here that their culture evolved into what is recorded only sketchily in the classical sources, in particular the la Tene trading culture, which incorporated Greek and Germanic technologies into their crafts. Herm also extensively describes what is known of their religion, crafts, and political organization, acknowledging that very little is known for certain. While fierce, Herm reports, the great flaw of the Celts is that they united against their adversaries only after it was too late. This happened time and again, and this lack of unity is what led to their eventual absorption into other cultures. Here we see them beaten by the great Roman generals, first Caius Marius and then Julius Caesar. Herm records their withdrawal into Britain and then Ireland, Wales, Bretagne, and Scotland, where their culture virtually disappeared once they accepted Christianity. (He acknowledges that their acceptance of it in Ireland is a complete mystery, without martyrs, which ten became a great cultural force as Irish monks emigrated to Western Europe.) The book ends with a wonderfully quirky analysis of the Arthur legends, which he argues exemplify the entire history of the Celts. According to Herm, the honor and warrior code of Arthur's knights, along with the Druid wise man Merlin, reflect the ancient mores and culture of the barbarian Celts. They are then christianized, essentially becoming absorbed in a new mix of people. This is truly fascinating. I found this book a wonderfully interesting intellectual journey, though of course I am outside of the mainstream and do not claim any academic expertise in judging it. What it did was inspire me to read more, which is one measure of success in my view. Warmly recommended.
6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
An excellent work,
By Greg (Boston, Massachusetts) - See all my reviews
This review is from: The Celts (Paperback)
Gerhard Herm's The Celts is an excellent introduction to the history and culture of the celts. Often overlooked, or looked at from the viewpoint of the Romans and Greeks, this book looks at a people from their own writings and from archaeological evidence and comes up with a fascinating portrait into a people's evolution over millenia.
However, the writing style, while professional, often gets very dry and for that reason alone one star is taken away.
3.0 out of 5 stars
Popular History of An Ancient People,
By
This review is from: The Celts (Paperback)
I'm a big fan of cultural trends like "vampires" and "harry potter" because it helps me identify idiots whose opinions I wish to avoid. Don't get me wrong, I like True Blood as much as the next guy, but people who get obsessed with projects like 'Twilight" and "harry potter" are demonstrating a real lack of intelligence and cultural imagination. The internet has made the world of knowledge so available and accessible, and yet... Twilight. I don't begrudge pigs their slop, but that slop is not for me.
This is not to say that I'm not interested by the world of myth and fantasy. Quite the opposite. For a little over a year I've been mildly obsessed by the pre-historic world of the indo europeans- that group of people who spawned the Greeks, the Romans, the Germans, the Celts, the Spanish, the English, the Slavs and the Hindus. I've read books, had discussions, attended museums, etc. etc, etc. I imagine I'm motivated by the same emotions that drive the Twilight fans: a desire for a lil magic in the day to day world. It's hard to find good source materials when it comes to these indo europeans cultures- the field is filled with crack pots, kooks and psuedo-academic bs.... That's why I was kind of into The Celte, by Gerhard Herm. Herm also wrote a cool book about the Phoenicians. He is a German author, who wrote in the 70s. These books were hugely popular and sold millions of copies. Today the "celts" are largely equated with Ireland, but they were actually a prolific indo european culture that dominated Spain, France, the low countries and of course... the British Isles. The Celts were conquered by the Romans and absorbed into the Empire- unlike the Germans, the continental Celts did not maintain a separate identity outside of the Roman Empire. The Celts in the British Isles maintained their separate identity well into the Christian period. In Ireland, they lasted long enough to create their own alphabet. Who were the Celts? Well, they were fearsome warriors- not quite as fearsome as the Germans, but they liked to cut off their enemies heads and put them up on the walls of their huts. They liked to fight in the nude. They had their own religion and their own religious leaders (the Druids) whose practices are shrouded in mystery. Herm makes analogies to the Brahmin class in India to explain the function of Druids in Celtic culture. It's an analogy founded in base supposition, but you know what: it works for me. The most interesting parts of the Celts are the chapters were Herm delves into Celtic mythology. These stories were written down by Christian monks in the 11th century, but the similarities between their stories and other indo eurpoean mythos (like the Rig Veda) are pretty amazing. The Celts sound like indo europeans through and through, and what's more, they are "our" Indo Europeans, to the point where we have sports teams named after them. Pretty cool stuff, and the book costs like thirty cents on Amazon. More interesting then vampires, I hope you'd agree.
Share your thoughts with other customers: Create your own review
|
|
Tags Customers Associate with This Product(What's this?)Click on a tag to find related items, discussions, and people.
|
|
This product's forum
Active discussions in related forums
Search Customer Discussions
|
Related forums
|
