Celtic Laws in Late Prehistory
The various legal systems that have been called Celtic originated in prehistory, with little actual data available as to what they actually contained at this early stage. While occasional references to ‘common Celtic law’ in academic literature, such as Fergus Kelly's Guide to Early Irish Law, seem to imply that there was one original Celtic law from which the various later Celtic laws, some of which are historically attested (see Brehon Laws; Welsh law), evolved, it is unlikely that anything like ‘original Celtic law’ (or ‘common Celtic law’) ever existed as a unified, let alone a codified body of law. Rather, it is currently thought that various central and western European societies in later prehistory, commonly lumped together under the name ‘Celts’, had individually different customary laws, which evolved out of similar social needs, influenced each other considerably over several centuries or even millennia, and thus ended up reasonably similar to each other.
‘Original (or Common) Celtic law’ thus can only be reconstructed, and only as a generalisation. Such a generalisation does not reflect actual past legal practice, but can only show which general principles are likely to have been typical for many (but not necessarily all) early Celtic laws.
Read more about this topic: Celtic Law
Famous quotes containing the words celtic, laws and/or late:
“Coming to Rome, much labour and little profit! The King whom you seek here, unless you bring Him with you you will not find Him.”
—Anonymous 9th century, Irish. “Epigram,” no. 121, A Celtic Miscellany (1951, revised 1971)
“The counting-room maxims liberally expounded are laws of the Universe. The merchant’s economy is a coarse symbol of the soul’s economy. It is, to spend for power, and not for pleasure.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“Lancaster bore him such a little town,
Such a great man. It doesn’t see him often
Of late years, though he keeps the old homestead
And sends the children down there with their mother
To run wild in the summer a little wild.”
—Robert Frost (1874–1963)