| To other peoples, the Gauls seemed to be extraordinarily large, sometimes alarmingly so.
One description puts the Gauls as of "lofty stature, well-muscled, terrible from the sterness of
their eyes, and of great pride and insolence." The Greeks and Romans were struck by the pale skin of
the Celts which flushed when they were angry, and by their masses of red-gold hair. Ample beards and
moustaches were common, particularly among the Celtic leaders, so much so that many Roman
writers noted that the Celts, when eating, were forced to strain their food through their facial
hair. Strabo, the Greek geographer and historian who lived in the first century BC, said of the
Celts, "The whole race is madly fond of war and quick to battle." And as has been noted by many writers,
the Celts were often imprudently bold and impulsive in warfare, a trait which led them to some
startling victories - which often were not then properly utilized - and to some even more
resounding defeats, upon which the Romans usually did capitalize. |
| Much has been written about the blondness of the Celts but this now seems to be an
error, or at least overdone as an observation. Before going into battle Celts habitually washed
their hair in lime and set it up to dry in spikes. This practice had the utility of making each
warrior seem taller yet, and incidently of keeping his hair out of his eyes. The effect of the
lime used was to bleach the hair from brown to red-gold and from blond to very-blond. There
seems to be no doubt that on average the Celts were large people, but most of the reports refer to
the warriors, who would obviously be the tallest and strongest of the Celtic population; nothing
suggests that a normal bell curve of size/weight did not exist. However,
numerous references are also made about Celtic women being "both as large and as terribly frightening as
were their husbands." Thus we come back to the conclusions that the Celts were large, frightening,
impulsive, yet loyal, friendly at times, and always truthful. This is a strange mixture of traits
that must be studied in depth before any reasonable explanation can be had. |
| But we are scarcely at the beginning of the contradictions about our ancestors who are
so often demeaned by historians as "barbarians." Although the Celts were 'hearty
eaters,' they frowned on obesity. If the girth of any young man exceeded a standard measurement,
he was fined, even ostracized and ridiculed. Celtic parents, concerned with the ability of their
children to survive a hazardous life and rigorous climate, dressed them lightly so that they
would become acclimated to the cold. This practice provoked a higher rate of basal metabolism in the
children. Their bodies burned food more rapidly, thus creating more internal heat and
requiring deeper breathing for greater oxygen intake. More oxygen intake acted to cleanse their
bodies of pathogens. The Celtic mindset, then, was the exact opposite of the ingrained and
instinctive Mediterranean reaction to cold climate. The Celts accepted basic natural conditions
of their lives without question and adapted to them, while the Mediterraneans often cavilled
and sought to escape, exposing a greater and more general philosophical difference of worldview:
the Celts lived within Nature and saw it as good, while the Romans saw Nature as
an alien exterior force to be modified, controlled, tamed, even adulterated, and often to be
avoided entirely. |
| The libido, certainly one of the major determinants of human behavior, boldly accents
this white/black difference between the Celtic and Roman philosophies. There is no record of
pornography
among the Celts, it was entirely a Roman development. Dio Cassius, a Roman historian of the 2nd
century AD, tells of a Celtic wife who, when accused of infidelity by a Roman matron, responded,
"We fulfill the needs of Nature in a much better way than do you Roman women, for we consort
openly with the best men, whereas you let yourselves be debauched in secret by the vilest."
Promiscuity among Celts was in reality carefully regulated polygamy in which 'perfect individual
freedom' did not exist. Celtic men, at times women also, were allowed more than one mate,
but the unwritten laws, mediated by the Druidic priests, surrounding these relationships
were very meticulously detailed. Celts had a very strong sense of rights and duties, both familial
and tribal and at all levels of Celtic society. For instance, the rights of the several Celtic
children in a polygamous situation were carefully considered and would be, if necessary,
determined by a Druid. In comparison, the Mediterranean attitude regarding amourous liasons was
that any breaking of the rules of generally accepted morality made the encounter more exciting,
and thus more desirable per se. Longer term consequences were thus sacrificed to the thrill of
the moment. The Celtic Gods, then, were real, Otherworldly yet omnipresent, and thus had to be
considered seriously in all actions taken. The Romans, on the other hand, suspicioned that their gods
were theatrical fabrications of the story-teller's art, gods whose existence was no more secure
than public gullibility and acceptance of the political power struggle du jour, gods so humanized that
they could be tricked, cajoled, ignored, and finally bought for gifts. |
| Celtic gods mediated in all of Celtic life, but nowhere more than in warfare. Histories
about the Celts in battle must, de rigueur, 'explain' why they often went into battle
naked. Such explanations often range from the frivolous to the ridiculous. "So that they didn't
become overheated during battle," or, "to prevent any clothing from becoming caught in thorn
bushes." The true reason, however, was much more religious than reasoned. The essence of the
religion of our Celtic forebears was the knowledge - not 'belief' - that death was
a midpoint of life, and that after death each Celt was to be reborn. (More on this thought in a later
chapter and in the second section, "The Virtual Druid.") Not only did Celtic warriors before
battle hyperoxygenate their bodies and spirits with their knowledge of the Otherworld, but they
wanted the enemy to know that they had no fear whatsoever of physical death. Their powerful war cries
just before battle (has the reader ever heard the resonant chants of European soccer fans,
for instance?) and their nakedness often robbed the opposing army of its own sense of
invincibility because those warriors WERE afraid to die. The final issue of the battle
might be cast before a blow was struck, due to the superior depth of religious fervor of the
Celtic battle group... and nothing was more convincing to the enemy that Celtic psychic strength
was supreme than to see a veritable tidal wave of naked Celtic warriors screaming exultantly
and surging forward into the field of action. |
| At this point we run into one of those minor mysteries of history which tend to shed
a great deal of light... if we follow the point carefully. To the Celts, who were a people
totally devoted to their religious worldview, the battle was a sacred act. Did they, then, dash forth
naked while covered with sweat, dirt and ashes? Not at all. They washed their bodies
before battle, and dressed with clean linen if anything were to be worn. What did they wash
with, just water? No, with soap and water! Now soap is not a complex substance. Just
some animal fat dripping into the ashes of a wood fire will produce a crude soap. Thus, it's
obvious that any ancient group in the world could discover soap and use it thereafter
for personal hygiene, that is if they were observant enough and so inclined. There is no
definitive history of the discovery of soap, nor will there ever be. Yet, on looking up
the 'history of soap' the stories told are not all that squeeky clean. Around 3000 BC the Sumerians may
seem certain to have begun to make a dilute solution of soap, and the process is described in
clay tablets dating around 2500 BC. The Babylonians were making soap as early as 2800 BC. Another
source credits the Romans with discovering soap around 1000 BC due to fat dripping from sacrificial
fires which mixed with wood ashes. All this took place on a hill
called Sapo, thus the product was called 'soap.' Frankly, that story doesn't really read all that well. |
| For instance, the famous Roman baths were built around 312 BC... but did NOT feature
the use of soap... seven hundred years after the Romans were supposed to have discovered it
and even to have named it! Roman bathers used essential oils, not soap, to help clean themselves. Queen
Cleopatra of Egypt, born shortly before the Christian era, did not use soap either. She, also,
used essential oils... and very fine sand for baby-bottom-smooth skin! As far as orthodox historians
go, the Arabs and the Turks were the first to recognize the value of soap in personal hygiene,
not the Romans. (In fact, later in the Dark Ages the good personal hygiene of the Arabs kept
them largely indemn from leprosy, while that disease ran rampant among the European Christians.)
|
| But one chance remark by a Roman historian, Diodorus Siculus
(first century BC) cast an entirely new light not only on the subject of soap but on the
probable antiquity of the Celtic culture as well. Diodorus was a finicky man, and he found the Celts
habit of straining their wine through their moustaches quite disgusting. Yet he noted that
the Celts washed with soap, a custom the Greeks and the Romans themselves had not yet adopted...
and this was noted in the reign of Julius Caesar. To confuse the matter more, the EB states, |
