Galicia & Asturias

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• Some Historical Fact about Celtic Galicia:  

  • The Galicians are Celts, first cousins to the Irish, Welsh, Scots, Cornish and Bretons and used to speak a language of the same family... They have many ancient customs in common with the Irish (their music sounds Irish too!) and the same laws of inheritance
    Iberian Civilization - Anita Kelly, Ph. D.

  • Around 1,000 BC the whole of western Europe was overrun by a group of people called Celts. Those in France were called Gauls, and those in Spain were called Celtiberans. They were all Celts originally. As the Romans developed, Ceasar started the Gaulic wars and drove a wedge between 'France' and 'Spain' and they delineation between the Gauls and Celt-Iberians was created to reflect the difference in the two campaign fronts. (This information was generously submitted by Rick of Celtic Store) They were tribal not "civilized" and lived in small settlements... The Celts in many cases finally stopped struggling and became colonials... but many fled to the west, to Cornwall, Wales, Scotland and Ireland and Galicia in north west Spain...  The French based Celts kept moving north by sea across the English channel, and ALSO later under pressure from the Romans, to migrate up into Cornwall and Wales, bringing their brand of "Q" gaeilge to the lower quadrant of what is now known as 'England' (This information was generously submitted by Rick of Celtic Store) Basques were in the Pyrenees before anyone then, and Basques aren't Celts, at least linguistically. The Celtiberans came there a couple of thousand years later than the Basques. Basques and Celts probably interbred over 3,000 years of living close to each other...

    Now here is the difference between Galicia and Asturies. The two regions are separated by a river, and each occupy a different mountain range. The Romans traveled by both sea/river, and land, creating this division. However, they were never able to conquer either region. Prior to the Romans the Spanish based Celts migrated north by sea into Ireland (the legend of King Mil or the Milliesans), the Isle of Man, and Scotland, and with further migrations during the Roman era. Here they brought their brand of "P" gaeilge, which is common to Irish, Scots, and Manx gaeilge.

    The Basques are a tribe of unknown origin that originally were from north of the Pyrenese mountains, but shifted into the lower western Pyrenese under pressure from the Northmen, Norse, or Visigoths. They stopped there rather than treading into the Picos de Europa mountain range occupied by the Asturian Celts. (This information was generously submitted by Rick of Celtic Store)

  • The people in Galicia, northwest Spain around Santiago de Compostela near north Portugal, are descendents of the same people that covered western Europe for a thousand years, until about the time of Christ, when the Romans overran them and they fled west; they're first cousins of the Irish, etc. If you think it's strange, listen to their music; you'd swear it was Irish. Some Gallegos look Irish; there's a lot of red hair... In my travels to both Galicia and Asturias, I never saw a redhead. What I did see is the 'premature grey' trait which is most common in Ireland. In Asturias it is more of just dark hair. The red attributed to the Irish and Scottish comes from the Norse Vikings during the 3rd-5th century invasions and subsequent trading era. (This information was generously submitted by Rick of Celtic Store)  The Galicians, on the Atlantic coast, are first cousins to the Irish/Scots/Welsh/ Cornish and Bretons, with the same physical traits, customs, legends, music, etc. Gaelic has died out in Cornwall and Galicia (they speak a language like Portuguese now), but the 3,000-year-old Celtic language is still spoken in parts of Ireland, Wales, and Scotland. If you see a Restaurant or Bar Gallego, go in and try their cider and sea-food and you'll think the music is Irish. Like other Celts, they have emigrated in large numbers to the Americas. 

    Galician language is called Gallego, whereas a different language exists in Asturias called Pable or Asturian. While very little of the original P gaeilge exists in the language of both regions, it is an amalgum of 3 Latin based languages in both regions. The music closely resembles Irish jigs and reels, but is influenced by the 'processional' music of Christian traditions. The dance more closely resembles Breton dancing. 'Step' dancing is not part of either culture as its root is distinctly Irish.

    The Asturians were mountain based farmers and miners, whereas the Galicians faced the sea to the north and west so were primarily sea-farers and migrated mostly to S. America. Look up the Costa de Muerte in Galicia and you might find some interesting insights.  (This information was generously submitted by Rick of Celtic Store)

  • A autonomous region (also a Duchy of the Spanish Monarchy) of north west Spain, comprising the provinces of La Coruna, Lugo, Orense, and Pontevedra. Cities. And if you're going to refer to it in Celtic context, its A Coruna, as opposed to the Spanish name La Coruna, which was imposed on it during the Franco era of suppressing the independent regional cultures. (This information was generously submitted by Rick of Celtic Store)

    The capital is Santiago de Compostela . Most of the people speak Galician, a language closely related to Portuguese with ancient roots to ancient Iberceltic and Latin. The region is mainly agricultural with a large fishing and timber industry. Galicia was a Celtic kingdom from 411 to 585, This is the referred to as the Swabian dynasty because Galicia was ruled over by a group of German based Swabes (part of the Visigoths) after the fall of the Roman empire.

    Ironically, Asturias was the first true independent "kingdom" in Europe with the rebellion by the Asturian Pelayo, who united the independent Celtic tribal chieftains against the Visigoths, who were also being pressured by the Moors from the south. Everything else in Europe during this period was a 'principality', or similar small city size power stronghold. (This information was generously submitted by Rick of Celtic Store)

    and again in the 11th century after the death of Ferdinand I King of Castile and Leon. It came under Spanish domination late in the 15th century. In 1833 it was divided into its present provinces. Area 29,434 sq kin (11,364 sq mi), population (1991) 2,731,669. Strong Celtic Customs. Language spoken : Galician and Spanish. This all sofar looks like a good clip from Wikepedia, but is all somewhat misleading when representing the Celtic culture of Galicia. The biggest and most glaring error is lumping Asturias together with Galicia. Kind of like calling Scotland a part of Ireland. (This information was generously submitted by Rick of Celtic Store)

    The author of the text has the labels of P and Q Celts backwards. You could really call them P and C Celts except that P and Q is more poetic and the C can sometimes be hard or soft, whereas Q is always hard, and we want the hard C here. 

    In any case, the Gaels are Q Celts (C) and this would be Irish, Scottish, Isle of Manx, and Galician. The P Celts are Cornish, Welsh, Breton. Before contact with the Latin world, the Q (C) Celts had no "P" sound at all. Either it was a C, or it was simply gone. So for instance, in Welsh (P-Celt) head is "penn". But in Irish (Q-Celt), it is "Ceann". And there are a thousand other p/c-correspondences like this between the words of these two groups of Celts.  Since Galicia is a Q Celt type, that makes the connection between Galicia and the other Q Celts at least 1000 years closer (more recent) than the common connection between all P and Q Celts. (This information was generously submitted by Galt Barber)

     

• Autonomous Province of Asturias in N. Spain is truly a Celtic Nation, irregardless of what the myth of 'Only 7 Nations' claims.  Historically, while it was the better known Celtic King Halstead that surrendered to the Romans, it was the lesser known Asturian Celtic King Pelayo that organized the N. Spanish tribes and repelled the Moors from the Picos de Europa mountain range and protected the Galicians from further assault. This Celtic coalition evolved in time to begin the drive to expel the Moors from the Iberian peninsula.

• Asturias Flag

  Asturias Church