The Continental Celtic languages are the Celtic languages, now extinct, that were spoken on the continent of Europe, as distinguished from the Insular Celtic languages of the British Isles and Brittany. The Continental Celtic languages were spoken by the people known to Roman and Greek writers as Keltoi, Celtae, Galli and Galatae. These languages were spoken in an arc stretching across from Iberia in the west to the Balkans and Asia Minor in the east.
Linguistically, Continental Celtic is divided in Celtiberian and Gaulish. Gaulish can be further subdivided in Transalpine Gaulish, Cisalpine Gaulish, Galatian, Lepontic and Noric, with the precise relation between these subgroups being uncertain or unknown.
Even though Breton is spoken in continental Europe, and has been since at least the 6th century AD, it is not considered one of the Continental Celtic languages. It is a Brythonic language closely related to Welsh and Cornish. Nevertheless, it has been suggested that there is a Gaulish substratum in the Vannetais dialect (Galliou and Jones 1991), and François Falc'hun considered Breton a descendant of Gaulish, but the historical and linguistic evidence shows otherwise.
Read more about Continental Celtic Languages: Attested Languages, Use of Term
Famous quotes containing the words celtic and/or languages:
“I find very reasonable the Celtic belief that the souls of our dearly departed are trapped in some inferior being, in an animal, a plant, an inanimate object, indeed lost to us until the day, which for some never arrives, when we find that we pass near the tree, or come to possess the object which is their prison. Then they quiver, call us, and as soon as we have recognized them, the spell is broken. Freed by us, they have vanquished death and return to live with us.”
—Marcel Proust (1871–1922)
“Wealth is so much the greatest good that Fortune has to bestow that in the Latin and English languages it has usurped her name.”
—William Lamb Melbourne, 2nd Viscount (1779–1848)