Chapter Twenty-Six -SourcesThere are three principal sources of information available about Celtic burial
practices and beliefs. The major source of information will always be archaeology.
Two other sources require particular care in their use. The first is the writings about
Celtic society by observers from the classical Mediterranean world (elsewhere
referred to as Celtic ethnographies), and the second are tales and myths with religious
meanings preserved in the Celtic vernacular literature of Ireland and Wales. Both of
these sources should probably be used only to provide background, avoiding
applications that are too specific (Wait 1985: 21-34).
In recent years the archaeological approach to the Iron Age and the Celts has
altered radically. The 1970S and early 1980s were dominated by an interpretative
framework that saw the Celts in relation to the classical world of the Mediterranean,
reacting to stimuli originating in Greece or Italy. To a certain extent this generaliz-
ing approach was valid and useful, but it also created a view of the Celts as timeless
and traditional, a monolithic entity across Europe and across more than a thousand
years. An important goal of this short discussion is to discuss 'Celtic' burial practices
while still recognizing the internal variability within the Celtic world.
The Literary Sources
The nature and descent of the Celtic vernacular literature has been discussed in some
detail elsewhere (Wait 1985: 210-34). Here it may be sufficient to observe that Irish,
and to a lesser extent Welsh, myths do contain a wealth of religious information
deriving from a late and provincial Celtic society. This may legitimately be used as a
source, but should not be extended to apply to Celtic societies widely separated in
time and space.
One immediate limitation is that these sources contain virtually no direct refer-
ences to typical Celtic funerals. There are, on the other hand, many passages about
the Celtic Otherworld, or Otherworlds. One problem is that it is not made clear
whether these Otherworlds are simply places where the gods dwelt, or included
places where the Celtic dead went after death as well (e.g. Davidson 1988: 122-6,
167-76; MacCulloch 1949: 80-8). Another qualification is that the modern concept
of the 'soul' may not be appropriate in the Celtic context.
What does seem very clear is that the Irish and Welsh Celts did believe in an
Otherworld of superlative, Elysian nature, where the gods dwelt and which could be
accessed through the Sidh mounds or by voyages. More common mortals (or their
souls) journeyed to an Otherworld, called Tech Duinn, or the House of Donn. This
Otherworld was ruled by Donn, a somewhat mysterious figure in mythology.
Tech Duinn appears to be a more sombre place than the Sidh Otherworld, reached
through the far south-west coastal land of Kerry. The 'mechanics' of travel to Tech
Duinn are never stated.
Similarly, the observations by classical visitors about Celtic society in Gaul in the
first centuries Be and AD have been widely discussed (e.g. Wait 1985: 191-209; Nash
1976, 1978). These sources have their own limitations, such as the motives of the
Greek and Roman observers, but nonetheless are of considerable value in under-
standing Gaulish Celtic society during that crucial period of change.