AHC: Continental Celtic Survives

The Continental Celtic languages--once spoken from Spain to Asia Minor--have long since been extinct. True, one Celtic language--Breton--is spoken on the Continent, but it is not really an exception; it was brought from Cornwall and South Wales in the 5th and 6th centuries by Britons fleeing the Saxon invaders, and is thus an "Insular Celtic" rather than "Continental Celtic" language. Such at least is the standard view. However, it has been argued that "In Brittany, relatively remote and far removed from the more intensely romanised centres and in close proximity to Celtic-speaking Britain and in close contact with it, circumstances may have been exceptionally favourable for the late survival of Gaulish. Here, there is little doubt, Insular and Continental Celtic did merge." The author quoting this passage acknowledges that "...the Gaulish contribution to the development of the Breton language will probably never be determined with any degree of certainty owing to a lack of direct evidence..." https://books.google.com/books?id=VgBtaDT-evYC&pg=PA148 (BTW, I once read somewhere that Breton nationalists dislike this theory, because they think it makes the Bretons "Gauls, just like the French"...)

Leaving aside the possible influence of Gaulish on Breton, can anyone give a plausible scenario for a Continental Celtic language surviving? Yes, the Italic and Germanic tides were hard to resist, yet after all the Basques managed to retain their language. Could some tribes deep in the Alps, say, have retained theirs?

(Given that some of the Belgae had crossed over to Britian by Caesar's time https://books.google.com/books?id=3cHdQC1cXLEC&pg=PA90 could we even see Continrntal Celtic surviving--in Britain?...)
 
Last edited:
Mountain fastnesses are always a good bet. Look at the linguistic diversity of the Caucasus. Or how Welsh survived in OTL's Wales, or Albanian (whatever it is) in the Balkans.

Having a small group hang on in Switzerland, say, or the Balkans would be entirely plausible, IMO. Maybe Andorra stays independent because it's Celtic speaking? :)
For that matter, a small group might survive in the Caucasus itself.
 
Mountain fastnesses are always a good bet. Look at the linguistic diversity of the Caucasus. Or how Welsh survived in OTL's Wales, or Albanian (whatever it is) in the Balkans.

Having a small group hang on in Switzerland, say, or the Balkans would be entirely plausible, IMO. Maybe Andorra stays independent because it's Celtic speaking? :)
For that matter, a small group might survive in the Caucasus itself.

You'd have to have either the Gauls or an Iberian Celtic groups migrate to Andorra, since apparently the natives there spoke a language related to Basque up until Late Antiquity. Switzerland would be the best option, but Raetic wasn't a Celtic language, was it?

So that leaves the best option being Noric, in which case it needs to avoid being displaced by the Germanic peoples as well as later on the Slavs. It's probably impossible to not have it displaced after a certain point, but I guess it could survive in the Tyrol or eastern Switzerland through migrations into and around the Alpine valleys. Or for that matter, Liechtenstein, and that's why Liechtenstein can stay independent too.
 
The locals don't need to speak a Celtic language. They just need to be displaced by an immigrant Celtic group being pushed out of their flatland homes. That's probably what happened in much of the Caucasus, for instance.

The Helvetii were supposed to be Celts, weren't they?
 
Top