The Celts were a group of people who came together around the mid-eight century BC with the discovery and use of iron. Called Keltoi or Celtae by the Greeks and Galli or Galatae by the Romans, they originated in the Central European regions of Bavaria and Bohemia.

Archaeological evidence shows the region of the Upper Danube to have been where the Celtic people originated. They were a farming people of brave nomadic warriors. Population expansion and the need for more farmland encouraged their spread into France, Spain, Ireland, Britain, Italy, Greece and Turkey. The regional name of Cetice survived in southern Spain well into Roman times and is the only known geographic reference to the Celts.

The Celts were at the height of power between 450 BC - 250 BC. In 387 BC they sacked Rome. Around 100 years later they sacked Delphi. As a result of pressures from the Romans and from Germanic tribes, the Celts were driven back from their territory.

By the time of Julius Caesar, the Celtic civilization was already in decline. Eventually they were reduced to the few surviving remnants left in Britain and Ireland.


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