Celtic Christianity was Polygamous

[rockfox]

h/t Frank for early and late medieval irish mating practices

In Ireland, as elsewhere in Europe, much work has been done on the history of the institution of marriage. This, too, has emphasised the contrast between marriage according to the canon law and an older secular model. The early Irish law tracts disclose an approach to marriage completely at odds with the later canonical ideal. They allow for polygamy and concubinage, and for divorce available to both sexes on a number of grounds. At first, there appears to have been genuine polygamy, including provision for a ‘chief wife’ who was accorded special privileges. In later centuries, polygamy was serial, with spouses being divorced and replaced in rapid succession. As in Western Europe generally older customs of secular marriage were tenacious and long survived the coming of Christianity. Although Ireland was Christianised early, traces of older marriage customs survived until very late. The historian Donncha Ó Corráin has written that, Irish dynasties, as the laws and other sources conclusively prove, were polygamous from the earliest period until the collapse of the Gaelic System; while Kenneth Nicholls has commented with pardonable exaggeration that,

“‘In no field of life was Ireland’s apartness from the mainstream of Christian European society so marked as in that of marriage. Throughout the medieval period, and down to the end of the old order in 1603, what could be called Celtic secular marriage remained the norm in Ireland and Christian matrimony was no more than a graft onto this system.

But this wasn't just about polygamy, but also close marriage...

The seventh-century source, the ‘Second Synod of St. Patrick’, records that the *Romani* — a faction of the Irish clergy advocating greater conformity to Roman Catholic practices — attempted to insist upon ‘what is observed amongs us, that they be separated by four degrees’, i.e. that men should not marry their first cousins (the fourth degree kinswoman). The nativists protested that they had ‘never seen nor read’ such a rule (Bieler 1975: 197 xxix; Hughes 1966: 131).

Basically, the Irish mated within the clan, often very close. I don't believe cousin marriage was prohibited in the OT, but the RCC sure was keen on eliminating it. Probably because it's purpose was to "curtail the outflow [from the clan] of property through bridal dowry" and thus it represented a source of strength for the clan and the RCC was keen to eliminate any power groups outside of itself and it's client kings.

from where do clans come from?

The conquest of the Western Roman Empire by Germanic tribes during the medieval period probably strengthened the importance of kinship groups in Europe. Yet the actions of the church caused the nuclear family — consisting of a husband and wife, children, and sometimes a handful of close relatives — to dominate Europe by the late medieval period.

“The medieval church instituted marriage laws and practices that undermined kinship groups…. The church … restricted marriages among individuals of the same blood (consanguineous marriages), which had historically provided one means of creating and maintaining kinship groups….

“European family structures did not evolve monotonically toward the nuclear family, nor was their evolution geographically or socially uniform (Greif, 2006, chap. 8).** By the late medieval period, however, the nuclear family was dominant. Even among the Germanic tribes, by the eighth century the term ‘family’ denoted one’s immediate family and, shortly afterwards, tribes were no longer institutionally relevant. Thirteenth-century English court rolls reflect that even cousins were as likely to be in the presence of nonkin as with each other. The practices the church advocated (e.g., monogamy) are still the norm in Europe. Consanguineous marriages in contemporary Europe account for less than 1 percent of the total number of marriages, in contrast to Muslim and Middle Eastern countries where such marriages account for between 20 and 50 percent per country (Alan H. Bittles, 1994). Among the anthropologically defined 356 contemporary societies of Euro-Asia and Africa, there is a large and significant negative correlation between the spread of Christianity (for at least 500 years) and the absence of clans and lineages; the level of commercialization, class stratification, and state formation are insignificantly correlated (Andrey V. Korotayev, 2003).”

I didn't mention it in this thread but in one of the links in my original post it was stated that a clan would be held responsible for the criminal actions of one of its members.

Marriage is the tie that binds. It is no surprise that it plays a huge role in forming clans and tribes. More from HBD chick...

so we see a spectrum of “clannish” societies ranging from the very individualistic western societies characterized by nuclear families and, crucially, very little inbreeding (cousin marriage, for instance) to very tribal arab or bedouin societies characterized by nested networks of extended families and clans and large tribal organizations and having very high levels of inbreeding (specifically a form of very close cousin marriage which increases the degree of inbreeding). falling somewhere in between these two extremes are groups like the chinese whose society is built mostly around the extended familiy but in some regions of china also clans — or the medieval scots (especially the highland scots) whose society for centuries was built around the clan (h*ck, they even coined the term!). these “in-betweener” groups are, or were, characterized by mid-levels of inbreeding (typically avoiding the very close cousin marriage form of the arabs).

Furthermore, not only do the degrees of extended family-ness/clannish-ness/tribal-ness in societies seem to be connected to the degrees of inbreeding in those societies, the degrees of “clannism” also seem to be connected to the degree of inbreeding — the more inbreeding, the less civicness, the less democracy, the more corruption, and so on.

To moderns, the downsides there are all self evident. But what we don't see are the downsides to our system. Or we do, we just don't realize what we're looking at. Consumerism, depression, suicide, unemployment, single motherhood, criminality, loss of culture, susceptibility to propaganda and control, losses of freedom, predatory markets and governments, slavery to the system....these are all symptoms of our hyperindividualistic social system. That list doesn't justice to the immense human suffering entailed in those little words. The clan controls it's own destiny and looks after it's own. There is a freedom there.

And that freedom is a historic truth...

so what about those ditmarsians, eh? they’re kinda cool! they are right around the corner from the frisians who were also pretty clan-like, especially with lots of feuding. what they had in common, of course, was that the two groups resided in marshy areas which could not be manorialized (er, well, there was no point to manorialize those regions since you couldn’t really conduct agriculture there — not with medieval technology anyway). about the ditmarsians [pgs. 199-200]:

“The marshes of Friesland (in the Netherlands), as well as the northeastern corner of Germany and southern Denmark, formed another region of peasant liberty against seigneurial power. As already noted, in 1240 Bartholomaeus Anglicus remarked on the exceptional freedom of the inhabitants of Frisia, who appeared to live without lords. Just east of Frisia and slightly north along the North Sea coast, at Stedingen, peasants revolted against the archibishop of Bremen and the count of Oldenburg beginning in 1200. They refused to pay oppressive dues (tributa) and, according to the ‘Rasted Chronicle,’ sought to defend their ‘liberty’ against all claims of lordship. They were eventually subjugated but only with great difficulty. It required the proclamation of a crusade against these ‘heretics’ by Gregory IX to bring an end to their decades of successful resistance. The Stedingen peasants were decisively defeated at the Battle of Altenesch in 1234.

Today we are all atomic individuals, tossed about by the winds of change, served up on a platter to any who would predate upon us, and taxed to the benefit of foreigners. And we haven't only materially suffered, we've completely lost our sense of who we are.

Lastly this little completely off topic yet historically insightful bit

As Ben Franklin noted, “Britain was formerly the America of the Germans.”

 

[rockfox]

 

[rockfox]

Another gem from @Frank S....

Charlemagne, also known as Charles the Great, was the founder of the Carolingian Empire, best known for uniting Western Europe for the first time since the fall of the Roman Empire....

Once in power, Charlemagne sought to unite all the Germanic peoples into one kingdom, and convert his subjects to Christianity....

In his personal life, Charlemagne had multiple wives and mistresses and perhaps as many as 18 children. He was reportedly a devoted father, who encouraged his children’s education....

In his role as a zealous defender of Christianity, Charlemagne gave money and land to the Christian church and protected the popes. As a way to acknowledge Charlemagne’s power and reinforce his relationship with the church, Pope Leo III crowned Charlemagne emperor of the Romans on December 25, 800, at St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome.

There are few larger figures in European history than Charlemange.

It is becoming abundantly clear that from a historical perspective there is nothing unEuropean or unChristian about polygamy, nor does it hold back people from building great civilizations or being strong conquerors. This refutes the common claim that it was monogamy that made Western Civilization great. To the contrary, WesternCiv was built and preserved by polygamists.

I'm beginning to wonder if the talk of monogamous German tribes was nothing more than Roman propaganda at a time they were agitating to give the Gaul's citizenship. Because everywhere I look the Germanic/Teutonic peoples had some level, often significant, of polygamy.

 

[rockfox]

The polygamous practices of the Germanic peoples (400-1000 A.D.):

Most historians agree with Wemple about the existence of sexual double standards in Germanic society. James Brundage concentrates a portion of his study on the sexual double standards. When writing about the customary marriages of the Germans, he states “These unions were not necessarily sexually exclusive; married men commonly maintained one or more concubines in addition to their wives. The concubines were usually servant or slave girls, and the children of these unions could claim no share in their father’s estate.” Brundage’s book covers sexual relations from the “Ancient world” to modern times. He makes no judgment about the value of women in society, simply pointing out that double standards did exist in Germanic society. These double standards were clearly not, however, a Germanic invention. Vern Bullough also notes that sexual double standards existed. “A wife was expected to be chaste, but she had no control over her husband, and the marriage could be easily dissolved if he wanted. Concubinage was widespread and polygamy was not unknown.” Katherine Fischer Drew notes that the Lombards created laws regulating inheritance for children born of the father’s extramarital unions. According to Jordanes, a sixth-century Germanic historian, Theodoric the Great, King of the Ostrogoths and the Romans from 488 to 526, was the son of a concubine....

Most historians agree that the Germans were a polygamous society, and even Tacitus admits that men of the nobility often had more than one wife....

The Visigoths had concubines. The Visigothic code was one of the only codes that specifically referred to concubines....

If you will recall before, the English attempted to impose monogamy on the Irish church. Yet in the same time period they had clerics of their own practicing polygamy!

King Æthelred in the tenth century explained the chronic problems within the clerical orders, which continued despite the laws, after reiterating that clergy was not supposed to marry. “5.2 But some are guilty of a worse practice in having two or more [wives], and others, although they forsake their former wives, afterwards take others while these are still alive--a thing which is unfitting for any Christian man to do.”

If any choose to dig further into that document, I'd suggest looking at the primary sources. It's a thesis by a modern feminist and she makes many assertions unsupported by evidence in an attempt to soften or explain away the ancient practice of polygamy and her biases drip off every page.

So what I'm finding is that basically all the non-Roman European peoples were polygynous until the Roman Empire or later Roman Catholic Church changed things. However many people think the ancient Germanics were monogamous. The common source for this is Tacitus....

Their marriage code, however, is strict, and indeed no part of their manners is more praiseworthy. Almost alone among barbarians they are content with one wife, except a very few among them, and these not from sensuality, but because their noble birth procures for them many offers of alliance.

A couple problems here though.

First, he implicitly states they were almost the only barbarian tribe that was monogamous. He was speaking here of the nations in Germany; but that leaves out a number of other Germanic peoples in Europe, which by inference were polygamous.

Second, he states there were exceptions. "Almost none" with exceptions being those of noble birth for alliances.

Third, this oft heard quote may not tell the whole story. The first source above states

Servants and slaves in Germanic society were the source of concubines and polygamy.

She cites for that Tacitus and Gregory of Tours. I could not find anything to corroborate that in Tacitus. But Gregory of Tours mentions several different instances of Kings/nobles who took slaves as concubines. It would not be controversial to say the Roman sources sometimes exaggerated the truth or overlooked things. Given the other sources, I don't think we can say with any confidence the Germanics were monogamous, much less the whole of European peoples. Actually we can't, the nobles being free to marry multiple women is not just a form of polygamy, it indicates an acceptance of it by the general society (just not general practice). Later shifts to monogamy weren't because society found it objectionable, but because the foreign church did.

But you won't get any of this kind of information from the usual discussion which simply points to Tacitus as justification for sweeping statements of the European (or German) peoples absolute monogamy.


Slightly OT but relevant to the issue of marriage is that the consent of the parents was required for marriage (page 131)

Most Germanic codes punished women for marrying without parental consent.

for which she quotes the laws of Burgundy, Visigoths, Lombards; with laws sometimes requiring a fine or elimination of inheritance rights or even the return of the girl.

 

[rockfox]

Evidence that English commoners practiced sororal polygyny (marrying sisters) right up to the modern era...

The colonial Natal government infuriated poor English settlers by not allowing for a marriage custom which they were used to in rural England. The custom was similar to one lawful among Zulu people. During this time some early white English traders took on Zulu culture and married many Zulu wives. Post 1994, the South African Constitution attempts to be more inclusive on traditional and customary marriage, says UJ historian Dr Nafisa Essop Sheik.
Round about 1860 English settlers in Natal were furious with the colonial government there. They said there were not enough women in the territory.
They had arrived on ships in the harbour town of Port Natal, now known as Durban (Map of Southern Africa). The harbour town was on the coast of Natal, now known as the province of KwaZulu-Natal in South Africa. Most were very poor and from rural areas in England. They had been kicked off the land they were working during England's industrialisation. Most were assisted in their journey to South Africa by schemes of the Natal colonial government.
The settlers brought large families: one wife and ten or more children. This was typical for poor, agricultural societies where women and children form the main labour force of a family unit. Their wives often died in childbirth and many children died as infants. Usually the wife had a sister who lived with the family and helped to look after the children. Most settlers were English and fell under the jurisdiction of the official church of England, the Anglican Church. Some came from Germany and other parts of the world.
Done in rural England, but not in Natal
The settlers had a point, says Dr Nafisa Essop Sheik, researcher at the Department of Historical Studies at the University of Johannesburg.
"There weren't enough women among the settlers. And they died at an alarming rate in childbirth in Natal."
If his wife died, the settler wanted to marry his late wife's sister.
"The settler needed someone to look after the children, bring them up and do the household tasks. Often the sister already lived inside the household and was very fond of the children. It was a comfortable arrangement for everyone. This way the settler could marry someone readily available," she says.
This form of marriage, where a widower marries his late wife's sister is called sororate marriage. Some settlers had already married this way in Natal in private ceremonies. After all, where they were from in rural England, they could do it.
In Germany sororate marriage was allowed by law. In Natal, levirate marriage, which was very similar, was allowed under customary law for Zulu people.
"But the settlers discovered, when they tried to solemnise these sororate marrriages that the Anglican Church forbade it. The Church saw sororate marriage as 'unChristian'. It also forbade levirate marriage, where a widow's brother-in-law marries her, described in the book of Leviticus in the Bible. Levirate marriage was seen as an 'uncivilised Jewish' custom," says Essop Sheik.
Levirate marriage is a way for a large family in an agricultural society to keep going economically after the death of the husband and father. Zulu people commonly practised levirate marriage for these reasons.

While this is technically like levirate marriage, notice these sisters they are marrying already lived with them; not with their fathers. In other words, they practiced sororal polygamy with 1 legal marriage and would only marry the sister when the first one died.

This also means that, while it was on the down low w.r.t. the church, the local community was in on it. Why else would a father let a sister go live with her brother-in-law? Remember this was the same time period people were building sitting rooms to keep on eye on young courters. This was likely due to large families combined with high incidence of wives dying in childbirth. Marrying sisters was insurance against that to ensure the children would still have a mother (who was kin, avoiding the step-mother problem) while providing extra work in raising the children.

But I'm betting this wasn't just a backup plan, she was a full wife and child bearing mother the whole time. Hence why they had no problem taking second wives from amoung the Zulu's. It's just that they were new to the country so there were no sisters to get. That and Zulu wives were obviously not family. It's also entirely possible that the 'sister' back in England wasn't a full sib; but was just called a sister despite being from a different family; just as we call them sisterwives today. This was before birth certificates mind you.

This would also explain their opposition to sororal/leverite marriage despite the OT; those are just backdoor polygyny.

 

[rockfox]

They had been kicked off the land they were working during England's industrialisation.

This also explains how polygyny was lost in England. They broke up the rural peasant culture, ending it's practices. All across England there are now empty pastures where peasant villages once stood. At most you might find the skeletal walls of an old church.

The thing you have to realize about English industrialization is it destroyed the family. Child labor became common and drove down the price of labor so much that men couldn't support a family, even had a hard time finding work. Families would have to send all their children to the factories to work. The children would live in big dormitories away from family for long periods of time. Hard to marry off two daughters to a man in such circumstances much less be able to support them.

These are the skeletons upon which the foundations of modern life lie.

In agricultural societies where women do the vast majority of the subsistence work in the fields, polygamy enables men to have economically viable households, to become prosperous and to be sure their sons will carry on the family traditions.

Yet another reason they outlawed polygyny.

 

[PeteR]

Evidence that English commoners practiced sororal polygyny (marrying sisters) right up to the modern era...



While this is technically like levirate marriage, notice these sisters they are marrying already lived with them; not with their fathers. In other words, they practiced sororal polygamy with 1 legal marriage and would only marry the sister when the first one died.

This also means that, while it was on the down low w.r.t. the church, the local community was in on it. Why else would a father let a sister go live with her brother-in-law? Remember this was the same time period people were building sitting rooms to keep on eye on young courters. This was likely due to large families combined with high incidence of wives dying in childbirth. Marrying sisters was insurance against that to ensure the children would still have a mother (who was kin, avoiding the step-mother problem) while providing extra work in raising the children.

But I'm betting this wasn't just a backup plan, she was a full wife and child bearing mother the whole time. Hence why they had no problem taking second wives from amoung the Zulu's. It's just that they were new to the country so there were no sisters to get. That and Zulu wives were obviously not family. It's also entirely possible that the 'sister' back in England wasn't a full sib; but was just called a sister despite being from a different family; just as we call them sisterwives today. This was before birth certificates mind you.

This would also explain their opposition to sororal/leverite marriage despite the OT; those are just backdoor polygyny.

Excellent post and quote... and, it is just more evidence of something I already pointed out... the Celts had Hebraic roots... likely pieces of the 'lost/exiled ten tribes' of the northern house of Israel... Yair Davidy's research would strongly evidence what this is saying..

 

[rockfox]

Previously we discussed how polygamy wasn't just common in Ireland but in the English countryside as well. More proof of that...

Prosecuting Polygamy in Early Modern England
Texts and Contexts in Legal History: Essays in Honor of Charles Donahue, ed. John Witte, Jr., Sara McDougall, and Anna di Robilant, 2016John Witte, Jr.
John Witte, Jr.
Already in Anglo-Saxon times, England condemned polygamy as a serious moral offense. But until 1604, it was left to church courts to punish polygamists using spiritual punishments. In 1604, however, Parliament enacted the Polygamy Act that made polygamy a capital crime, punishable by secular courts. Both individual victims of desertion or double marriage as well as church or state officials could initiate indictment of parties for polygamy. Other interested parties also had standing to press polygamy claims. Thousands of polygamy cases came before the criminal tribunals of England, not least the famous Old Bailey, which heard more than 500 such polygamy cases under the 1604 Act. Convicted parties faced punishments ranging from fines and short imprisonment, to transportation to a penal colony or execution orders, though almost all those convicted for a capital felony successfully pled benefit of clergy. The vast majority of polygamy cases were brought against men, and they were punished far more severely than women if convicted. The 1604 Polygamy Act-while eventually replaced by Acts of Parliament in 1828 and 1861 that made felony a non-capital crime-was a model for the common law world. This chapter analyzes the Act and samples several cases of prosecution for polygamy.

In other words before 1600 the church left polygamy alone and it was common. It's interesting they clamped down on poly in England the same time they did in Ireland. 'Transportation to penal colony" would explain how the practice came to South Africa as noted above.

Apparently our English ancestors had no problem with polygamy and flourished with it. The state had other ideas.

 

[cnystrom]

I always hear Europeans cast as being monogamous and monogamy as a key part of Western Civilization. It turns out, neither of these is true.

Not sure why what you write means that the "monogamy only" did not come from Western Civ.

Western Civ comes from the collision of Greco/Roman culture and Judeo/Christian culture as spread by the Roman Empire and the Catholic Church.

To start, pre-Catholic law Celtic peoples of the British Isles were polygynous...

The pre-Catholic Celts were pre-Western Civ.

 

[cnystrom]

The Greco-Roman legacy is a major part of WesternCiv, but it's not part and parcel to it; being but one of many influences.

It is/was the primary influence. That is why Latin is still taught to school children in classical education.

And were the Germanic tribes really 'not civilized'? I think that's more Roman propoganda.

But not relevant. They were not a part of Western Civ until the Romans and Catholics arrived.

I have a suspicion that the type to use the WesternCiv argument against polygamy is likely to arbitrarily define monogamy into the conception of WesternCiv. But given the history of the Celts, and Luther's opinion on polygamy, I'd have to say such a definition would necessarily also be Catholic. And WestCiv isn't limited to Catholics.

What is "the WesternCiv argument against polygamy"? Demonstrating that "monogamy only" comes from the Greco/Roman branch of WesternCiv and not the Judeo/Christian influence is a pro-polygamy argument.What is the anti-polygamy argument you are referring to?

And WestCiv isn't limited to Catholics.

Actually it is. When the Church broke up in the East- West schism it formed Western Civilization. That is where the term "West" comes from. The West part became the Catholic Church and East is, of course, the Eastern Orthodox Church, which is not a part of Western Civilization.

 

[cnystrom]

Another gem from @Frank S....This refutes the common claim that it was monogamy that made Western Civilization great.

Is this the anti-polygamy argument? I do not know how common this argument is, but I never thought it a very good argument.

Like this:

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/darwin-eternity/201109/why-we-think-monogamy-is-normal

"The ancient Greco-Roman and medieval European leaders who embraced anti-polygyny laws were heavily invested in the business of war, and their own social status and indeed survival often depended on their ability to maintain large, well-funded armies. And the imposition of monogamy produced bigger, better armies, because monogamous groups can grow larger than polygynous ones."

On the surface that seems kind of stupid. Why can monogamous groups grow larger than polygynous ones? It seems to me that the opposite would be true.

 

[rockfox]

Western Civ is one of those ideas which isn't hard and fast, there are multiple opinions of what it is and what it is made up of.

Western Civilization isn't synonymous with the RCC. It stopped being all Roman after the Reformation, the RCC never completely held sway before and as I've shown above, it wasn't even fully monogamous yet at that point either. And its literal practice incorporated a whole lot of pagan ideas and practices.

Yes the RCC and GrecoRoman Civ are key influences of Western Civ. But they are not the only ones. The pre-Chrisitan Celtic and Germanic legal traditions greatly influenced English common law. Nor was Roman/Judaic culture the only cultural influence, again Germanic and Celtic culture was the foundation which was influenced by the Mediterranean cultures. We still to this day engage in many of their religious celebrations. Furthermore the polygamous Celtic church is credited with nursemaiding Western Civ through the early medieval period. And to speak of Western Civ only in terms of the RCC and GrecoRoman culture is to give short shift to the European peoples; you can't separeate culture/civilization from the people who make it up.

What I'm demonstrating from history in this thread is that several common ideas about monogamy are untrue, namely the myths that:

• Europeans are historically monogamous
• Civilization requires monogamy
• Christianity was historically monogamous

Why can monogamous groups grow larger than polygynous ones? I

IIRC the argument was Kings could grow bigger armies because men won't fight unless they have a woman to fight for, which requires monogamy. It sounds nice but the history of Islam disproves it. Polygamy was actually the strength of the clans in the Isles, which allowed them to hold off the feudal armies for so long and retain their culture for a very long time. But in a way it is true because eliminating polygamy was the strength of kings as it broke the power of local tribes, enabling the kings to seize greater wealth and power and fully implement the feudal system and eventually the post-Westphalia order. But that is not the only path to success.

What is "the WesternCiv argument against polygamy"? Demonstrating that "monogamy only" comes from the Greco/Roman branch of WesternCiv and not the Judeo/Christian influence is a pro-polygamy argument.What is the anti-polygamy argument you are referring to?

The general idea is for monogamists to claim that civilization requires monogamy, that without it you can't get the support of the large population of males (via the motivation of having wives) to build a civilization, fight war, etc. They'll point to monogamous WesterCiv and all its blessings and imply we'd loose that without monogamy, never would have gotten it without monogamy. But it's not true. There have been many polygamous civilizations, even European ones. And Western Civ wasn't entirely monogamous, not until a very late date.

 

[rockfox]

Let's personalize this for a moment. A good chunk of modern Europeans are descendants of these polygamous Celts. While we classically think of the Irish, Scottish and Welsh as Celtic, and that is the portion mined for information in this thread, that culture was much broader than that. So who were the Celts?

To give you some idea, here is their historic territory:



To put them into greater historical context: the Celts are the western Germanic Tribes; whereas the Scandinavians and Germanic peoples are eastern Tribes. Go far enough back and all descend from the same Indo-European stock. As time passed, cultures changed and peoples intermixed into new ethnicity and so most of these peoples, while descendants of Celts, have lost that distinction...

There's no easy answer, because nowadays and since a couple of centuries ago, the world “Celtic” is being used as synonym of Iron Age Western Europeans. The truth is that many peoples usually deemed as Celtic never used this name. For example, the ancient inhabitants of the British Isles never called themselves as such, and neither did their conquerors, the Romans. However, they shared undeniable cultural and genetic links with mainland tribes, and many of them were namely Celts.

The earliest historical records written by Greeks talk about the “Keltoi”, the barbarians from the north. They had intense relations and confrontations with them.

Julius Caesar, the conqueror of Gaul, told us in his Commentaries on the Gallic Wars that Gaul was divided in three parts, and the central one was occupied by “those who called themselves Celts”. Romans called them Gauls, and this name became extensive to all the other peoples including Aquitanians and Belgians.

There are many records and historical mentions of Celts, Celtici and Celtiberians in the Iberian peninsula as well.

It's worth noting that many names known today from historical sources were mostly exonyms. That means, names used by the writers of their sources to identify other peoples. And these names had probably nothing to do with these People's real names.

For example, we have testimonies of Belgians who refused to be called Gauls.

So, proper Celts were those of central Gaul (roughly nowadays France) and many tribes of Spain/Portugal. But taken this term in the broader sense, it includes most Western Eurooeans except Germanic tribes, Italic peoples and Iberians.

There were Gallic tribes who expanded eastwards conquering parts of Asia Minor, nowadays Turquey. They were mentioned in the Bible as the Galatians. Today they're blended with other peoples and are simply Turks.

Most Britons (especially, Scots, Welsh, Cornish and Irish) consider themselves Celtic. Most French, especially Bretons (from Bretagne) and the northwestern peoples of Spain and Portugal do as well.

However, you'll hardly find a Celtic nation that has kept itself “pure”. Anglos, Saxons, Jutes, Frisians, Danes and Normans added their genes to Britons. Franks blended with mainland Gauls, Romans did the same before, with those Gauls and the Iberian ones. Other Germanic tribes conquered most of Western Europe creating new nations. Visigoths and Moors did the same in Iberia, etc, etc.

So far as I know the Celtic peoples of Asia Minor are lost to history; probably subsumed into the Turkic peoples. It's not usually talked about but Paul's letter to the Galatians was to this group, making it the only NT scripture written to Germanics (maybe there are others? Some of the cities mentioned in Revelations may have been Gallic). The Drama of the Lost Disciples claims though that it was written to the people of Gaul proper and not to the group that settled in Asia Minor.

 

[rockfox]

@Frank S posted this link which documents that polygamy was legal under English civil law until 1604.

Already in Anglo-Saxon times, England condemned polygamy as a serious moral offense. But until 1604, it was left to church courts to punish polygamists using spiritual punishments. In 1604, however, Parliament enacted the Polygamy Act that made polygamy a capital crime, punishable by secular courts. Both individual victims of desertion or double marriage as well as church or state officials could initiate indictment of parties for polygamy. Other interested parties also had standing to press polygamy claims. Thousands of polygamy cases came before the criminal tribunals of England, not least the famous Old Bailey, which heard more than 500 such polygamy cases under the 1604 Act. Convicted parties faced punishments ranging from fines and short imprisonment, to transportation to a penal colony or execution orders, though almost all those convicted for a capital felony successfully pled benefit of clergy. The vast majority of polygamy cases were brought against men, and they were punished far more severely than women if convicted. The 1604 Polygamy Act -- while eventually replaced by Acts of Parliament in 1828 and 1861 that made felony a non-capital crime -- was a model for the common law world. This chapter analyzes the Act and samples several cases of prosecution for polygamy.

This puts some more flesh on the bones about the legal situation for polygamy in the British Isles. Previous sources made it sound like polygamy was legal in Ireland but illegal in England prior to 1600. 1604 is probably no coincidence but a case of Parliament normalizing marriage law between Ireland and England now that they'd fully conquered Ireland.

So prior to 1604 polygamy in Ireland was legal under both Civil and Religious law but in England was legal under Civil law but illegal under religious law. After 1604 it was made illegal under Civil law in both places making the religious status moot.

Old Baily was the Crown court for England and Wales. Reading between the lines, it would seem that either enforcement in England was rather varied and not enforced outside of the main influence around London (hence why it hung around for another 2 centuries) or it was very common in these old Briton areas (and hence a lot of cases). I tend to suspect it is a case of the former though as England was long under Christian influence by this point and I'd have suspected most of the polygamy still around to have been farther north.

 

[Victorious]

Great point!

Never considered the difference in skin tones possibly from the servant wives.

How else did Abshalom get stick in a tree by the hair? That wasn't Asian hair. He had a 'from if some ppl guess right.

 

[Victorious]

How else did Abshalom get stick in a tree by the hair? That wasn't Asian hair. He had a 'from if some ppl guess right.

Afro, not from