The Ancient Celts and Their Culture

Hello everyone! It has been a while since I have last posted on this forum, but do any of you know if there are academic experts on ancient Celtic culture? I am also looking for a text that has well-rounded, up-to-date information on ancient Celtic culture, that includes archaeology, history, etc. I have become exceedingly interested in ancient Celtic culture through Peter Berresford Ellis. Do you believe that Peter Berresford Ellis is a credible source of ancient Celtic culture? I have heard many good things about his work. I'm trying to obtain the most unbiased and most recent research on the ancient Celts.

According to Encyclopaedia Britannica: http://kids.britannica.com/comptons/article-9273574/Celt (for kids )

"Among the ancient European peoples were the warlike Celts—tall, fair-skinned wanderers who spoke an Indo-European language. Their ancestors probably came from the distant steppes near the Caspian Sea. By 500 BC they were living in northeastern France, southwestern Germany, and Bohemia. The Celts, who were also called Gauls, continued to migrate in all directions. "

It seems to be very possible that the region in the west of the Caspian sea where modern Galish and Talish people live was the original land of the Celtic culture, these people have been called as Cadusii: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cadusii in the ancient Greek sources but the famous Roman historian Pliny the Elder (23 - 79 AD) mentions that they have always called themselves Gaeli -> http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Pliny_the_Elder/6*.html "Gaeli, quos Graeci Cadusios appellavere" (Gaeli, whom the Greeks called Cadusii).

Modern Galish languages is of course very similar to the Gilaki language which is spoken by about 3 million people in Gilan province of Iran but there are also a large number of words in this language which could have Celtic origin, like the word Baleno (fire festival), look at this thread: Gaulish Beltane & Galesh Baleno, Summer Festival, it should be also mentioned that people who live in the west of the Caspian sea have certainly fair skins and mostly light hairs, some kids from this region:

They are also tall and powerful, like Ali Hosseini: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saeid_Ali-Hosseini Iranian weightlifter who holds the junior world record for the +105 kg category:

But about the ancient culture and religion of this people, we know they worshipped the God di (Celtic word for "God", Latin deus, Sanskrit deva, ...), and like ancient Urartians who entered this region in the later times, also called themselves Khaldi (Servant of the God), English word Culdee has the same Celtic origin: http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?search=Culdee+&searchmode=none

Edited by Cyrus Shahmiri - 15-Jul-2010 at 01:55