Celts and China

[Dr. Gonzo]

When in Xinjiang in '97, I was struck by the similaries between Uyghur music and that originating from Ireland; the same frantic minor key fiddle solos in particular. Some reading outlined various theories of Celtic migration into Western China, ranging back 2-3,00 years.

Then 2 nights ago, I was playing some retro music, in this case "The Devil Went Down to Georgia"[Charlie Daniels Band, a bunch of good ol' boys], which contains some searing fiddle solos.
My wife had never heard the song before, but dismissed it as "Xinjiang music".
I'm fascinated. Any insights out there?

[Lotus Eater]

It's possible the Uyghurs and the Celts met at some stage - lots of travel through that area historically.

Their Khaganate stretched from the Caspian Sea to Manchuria, and lasted from 745?840. when they were overrun by the Kirghiz, with the result that tribal groups from the Uyghurs migrated to a number of new areas, including modern Xinjiang and Gansu regions and Central Asian steppes.

I was fascinated the other day to see a similarity between some southern Chinese and Maori drum rhythms.

[Newbs]

They are stranger things than are dreamed of in heaven and earth. I remember the Roaming Kiwis telling me about being in Xinjiang, or way out there somewhere, and remarking on how the people looked European. ie. blond hair, blue eyes were not at all uncommon.

I'm reading a book at the moment, which I shall post about when I'm finished, in 2009 at the rate I'm going. Anyhoo, it talks about the Turks getting to Turkey from Heilongjiang, or thereabouts. If you can get from China to Turkey, across deserts and mountains, etc. then from Turkey to Ireland would just be a pleasant weekend jaunt.

I've just had a thought. Is "The Devil Went Down to Georgia" some reference to Bubba returning there?

[acjade]

Dr. Gonz it wasn't the music that made me think but the Knots... especially the Celtic endless knot motiffs.

A professor John Haskins was stationed in Yunnan during the Second World War ( he was a flying tiger) and post-war taught courses on the art of migrations. He wrote an article on the Shi chi shan - stone fortress which made a connection between the areas earliest people and the nomads... the Yue chi mentioned by Chinese historians. Prof. Haskins traced the movement of images and the etymology of tribal names across the geographical expanse.

I have read somewhere that some historians believe that the Celts were the ancestors of the Tocahrian people from Xinjiang.

Also Nordic, Welsh and Irish Celtic mummified corpses have been found in the Tarim Basin region in Western China. The major ethnic group in that area today, the Uygur, includes people with unusually fair hair and complexions. It is also said that Genghis Kan had red hair and grey eyes.

Many words of Indo- European origin have been found in the earliest known layers of sinitic languagesby anthropological linquists . These include words for 'horse', 'track', 'cart' and 'wheel'. One of the hallmarks of Celtic culture was the use of the Ogham alphabet. Inscriptions of the alphabet have been found in Japan and China.

[Raoul Duke]

Sure, and we were a rovin' lot even back then.

Raoul
currently listening to NetRadio's Traditional Celtic channel...

PS: Charlie Daniels and Boogie-Uygur? I don't think so. Sounds like a Chinese wife's peremptory dismissal to me.

[Dr. Gonzo]

An Ozark fiddler would not feel out of place jamming with a bunch of Urumqi street musos. [BTW, these guys peddle their own CDs after a set].
Here's a couple of sites fitting in with acJade's post.

www.natall.com/national-vanguard/117/aryans.html

homepages.utoledo.edu/nlight/uyghhst.htm

[hankuh]

Hmmmmmm, this is all news to me; it's a documented fact to some members that I absolutely love and crave Xinjiang food, and in Suzhou, two Xinjiang restaurants will always be one of my culinary treasured memories.

I remember during the 80's that Charlie Daniel song; it was played to death, so regrettably I really don't have a fondness for the song, although I do think Charlie Daniels plays a mean country fiddle.

I find the Celts a fascinating study, but it seems to me to be rather far fetched that they were tramping around China, though I will concede some Xinjiang people do have european physical features, but what AJ pointed out seems to lend possible credence to this.

Other than that, I am not the devil, but I did return to Georgia.

I hope my little posting abided within the contraints of this topic.

[Dr. Gonzo]

Thanks Bubba, and I'm glad this thread hasn't prompted any lecherous desires.
Loking at a map, the west of "China" is closer to Turkey than Beijing. The acquisition of East Turkestan to the Chinese Empire is quite recent. The Uyghur language shares its roots with modern Turkish.
"The territory in modern central Turkey known as Galatia was an oddity in the eastern world. It was originally home of the ancient civilization of the Hittites, but came to be occupied by Gallic Celts in the 3rd century BC, hence Galatia, or "Gallia of the East." The Gauls had migrated east and south during the reign of Alexander the Great in the late 4th century BC, but he held them off and pushed them back towards the Danube. A couple of generation later, around 280 BC, the Gauls were on the move again, first settling in Thracia and then continuing south into Macedonia and Greece"
[from www.unrv.com/provinces/galatia.php'

Paul even wrote the Galatians a letter!

So the Celts were a warlike, wandering lot, and their prescence in Xinjiang would not surprise me.

[Raoul Duke]

I think of you every time I eat in YaKeXi...wish you were there.

The Uygurs are basically Turks that settled down earlier. A Turkish speaker from Istanbul can mostly understand a Uygur speaker from Urumqi. They're Central Asians, not "Orientals", and like many Afghans, Iranians, and others they definitely favor the Indo-European side when it comes to features.

A lot of European stock (including the Celts) started off in Central Asia. Over time, a succession of filthy two-bit hordes washed over Europe, either wiping out the previous waves or pushing them further west. The Celts were an early wave...they started off in Asia and ended up defending Ireland, Scotland, Wales, Brittany, pockets of Spain and Germany, and a few other places.

Doesn't mean they were bad fighters.

I like the Uygurs I've met. And they have arguably the best food, and DEFINITELY the best music in China.

Oh, yeah...the split from Central Asia was long enough ago that similarities in music may (or may not) be coincidence, I think...

[Newbs]

a succession of filthy two-bit hordes washed over Europe

Raoul, I'll thank you to show my ancestors the respect and courtesy that they deserve.
























Oh, wait a minute. You are.

[Crippler]

Interesting theory here. I think it is very plausible.. Celtic tribes fanned out over all of Europe at least and it is quite probable that they visited Asia as well as N. and S. America. Saxons, Normans, etc. share lineage. Olgham is found in North America as well.

[acjade]

crippler said:

Olgham is found in North America as well.

Roger Maris, that's a very interesting point. I saw a History Channel programme years ago on that but haven't read or heard anything further on the matter. Can you tell me more?

[Mr Nobody]

There are Celts in Turkey in the mountians I think, albeit not of the Gael variety, such as in western europe.

Ogham in North America? I doubt it. Are you sure? They had no way of crossing - most advanced craft was the coracle. A bark canoe or a raft is more seaworthy.

I am also quite sure that Saxons and Normans don't share lineage with Celts. They are Germanic. I seem to remember that the blood tests don't agree, although perhaps my memory isn't right. Same blood tests show that the Celts of southern Europe AREN"T the same race as those of western - the Gaels. The Romans gave them all the same name (Keltoi) since they had what appeared the same culture. But then, they felt the same way about the Germans as well, pretty much. The name stuck for all history.

Celts in China? Well the Romans got here. And my friend, Alan Au-yeung claims that his name is actually O'Young, and his family moved there from Ireland Lo these many centuries ago. (But then, I told him the story and he liked it, so that is why he claims it.)

[Raoul Duke]

Man, I've had to learn a lot about the Celts.

The Romans used TWO names for the Celts: "Celtae" and "Galli".

There WERE Celts in Turkey- the Galatians, as in St. Paul's letter to. Seems they were pushed back out by the Romans and Huns, though.

Biggest surprise: the Celts are apparently NOT Central Asian. They seem to have come from what is now the Alsace-Lorraine region.

[Mr Nobody]

Yep, that matches my memory. Forgot about the two names, was using the Greek, Keltoi. My bad.

However, I also recall something about blood tests and the Eastern Celtic types coming from a different area, but that research is about ten years ago as part of the genetic bloodline project of trying to track down genetic origins of races. Not sure how complete it is now, but it was damn incomplete when I heard about it, but even then, had thrown out a lot of old assumptions.

Although the Romans pushed Celts out of many areas, even in Turkey there are still small groups living in the mountains (genetic enclaves). And Spain, and southern Germany, and other places where it is assumed they had vanished. However, most of their culture has been lost, replaced as they were assimilated. Cultural markers have traditionally been the way scholars determine race, but this method cannot identify culturally assimilated people, of course.

The Galli/Keltoi and the Gael/Celt thing unfortunately seems to have caused a lot of historical (hysterical?) confusion, partly due to bad scholarship throughout history, and partly because they sound the same. Gallatians aren't Gaels, those from Gaul are, even if they are called Gallae, something like that. I can't recall, because I am terrible at linguistics, and the guy who told me this died some years ago, was a world class scholar in it, but he talked way over my head when he got going - he honoured me by this, though, assuming I could follow it (I could in other things, but then, this guy got flown around the world to read new tombs as they were opened etc. Prof Emeritus Godfrey Tanner, genius, which I don't say often). I got the high points. Questions only got me deeper. I remember, though, that a lot of the generally taught stuff got thrown out, pretty much, by the scientific data from the genetic testing, but he died before the stuff came in.

Don't know if the issue is settled yet. Haven't kept up to date.

[Crippler]

Petroglyph in Concord in the Form of Ogham
After reading that there were traces of Ogham writing in New England I started keeping an eye out for scratched rocks. Ogham was a writing system used in Bronze age Europe and Britain, based on groups of vertical lines crossing a long horizontal base line. Different numbers of verticals in a group or whether the group was above, below or across the baseline, determines which letter is represented by the group. Ogham came in many forms and appears to have been used by such people as the Celts in Western Europe and Britain, the people of Troy, and by other seagoing people whose God was "Bel" or "Baal". Examples of Ogham also have been found in Japan and in Africa, and very clear examples have been found on the east coast of America and along its larger river systems. For the most part, the languages written in Ogham and the variants of the alphabet are known and it is sometimes possible to read Ogham inscriptions. A search on the Web for "Ogham" turns up plenty of sites on the subject.

Sure enough, there is a Petroglyph in Concord in the form of Ogham (top right). This example comes from the woods around Hanscom field. The grooves are uniform in depth and width, with a shallow "U" cross section, but I had to put water on them to make them visible, a somewhat suspect procedure. Normally, engraving like this can only be seen when the light comes in just right from the side.

Here is a closer view (second photo, right) -- and you can see that the added water started to drip. Following a version of the alphabet given in The White Goddess by Robert Graves, I came up with 'C', 'H', 'B', 'N' for the first four main strokes, but could not make anything of the way the message is divided along the ridge of the rock into a separate line of strokes. In one reference book, the small cross below the left end of the horizontal is identified as a symbol for "moon".

Someday perhaps an expert in deciphering Ogham can make something out of this. The presence of Ogham in America is highly controversial so let us leave it at this: there are petroglyphs here in Concord that could be Ogham.

(That is Concord Connecticut) I have read books about some being found in Tennessee and Oklahoma as well. Usually related to possibilities of Celtic races having visited North America.. Date as far back as 500 AD are discussed. However, as statd above it is a controversial subject.

www.concordma.com/magazine/nov98/OGGAM1.JPG

anonymouse.org/cgi-bin/anon-www.cgi/http://www.newworldcelts.org/United%20States.html

Now the second one is definitely a little prejudiced but I still think their argument has some merit!