Celtic drinkers could boogie on down
By Carrie Trousil

Bettina Arnold spends a lot of her time digging up links of the chain connecting modern Celtic identity to civilizations long past. In fact, her archaeological research has brought her into contact with remains dating back to 1000 B.C., and interestingly enough into regions that no one would think to consider lands of Celtic origin, namely Germany and France.

Her most persuasive tenet, however, for connecting these regions to a culture usually considered indigenous to the British Isles is convincingly simple. It is the legacy of alcohol.

Arnold, who knew she wanted to be an archaeologist at the tender age of 6, decided in college that she would also like to explore Celtic culture and civilization. She said, "Since I was born in Germany and my parents are German, I did a fair amount of fieldwork there as an undergraduate. That's when I realized that I could do Celtic archaeology on the continent."

Subsequently, Arnold will speak on Drinking and Feasting in the Celtic World, at the upcoming Milwaukee Irish Fest, Aug. 17-19. Focusing on Pre-Roman Iron Age continental Celts, Arnold will illustrate their various uses of the drink and how these practices eventually migrated elsewhere.

"There is no written documentation of social practices on the continent from this time, or in the British Isles until relatively late, actually after the population in question ceased to behave in this way," Arnold explained. "Clearly, though, there is a connection between the two in respect to drinking and feasting equipment, particularly as it is found in early Iron Age burials," she add.

At this point in history, alcohol connoted a lot more than just a good time. "The alcohol had ritual and political significance," Arnold pointed out. For example, she explained that a body found in the continental central burial at Hochdorf, Germany, had with him a brass cauldron with a 500-liter capacity, which contained 350 liters of mead when it was placed in the grave. Also inside were discovered drinking horns as well as other fabulous artifacts. Arnold laughed, "Clearly this guy, when he got to the underworld, was planning to throw one hell of a party."

Furthermore, adding extra mystique to the grog, Arnold described how alcohol was often the means with which individuals could gain or claim status over their peers. "People during this time were obviously taking advantage of a changing world to benefit themselves, and presumably taking advantage of some sort of supernatural associations to do this. One of the ways is with alcoholic beverages," she said.

This relationship between booze and power is a key cultural link that extended well into later periods in the British Isles, after Greek and Roman contact had successfully wiped out most traces of the continental Celts. In fact, the Kavanagh family of Leinster is noted to have laid claim to the kingship based on their possession of a 300-year-old drinking horn yet in the 15th century.

How could drinking and its accouterments be so highly regarded as to gain the possessor claim to rule? Arnold explains, "At first, there was no liquor of any kind back then. Initially there were only two things people had access to. Beer, which was pretty hideous stuff back then, like a thick soup, and mead, which was made from fermented honey." Since the honeybee was not yet domesticated at this point, Arnold indicated that even the mead was hard to come by. 

After the Roman contact around 600 B.C., wine was introduced to these early Celts. that seemed to be the juice that really got them going, considering how exotic it was in color, potency and sheer strangeness. Arnold added, "A lot of this had to do with the underworld connection, the animal/human connection and the fact that alcohol is a mood-altering substance. Later, written records talk about how poets drink their inspiration and the druids were involved in making magic potions, these were probably alcoholic as well."

These written references to alcohol were recorded much later, although significantly in mythological tales from Ireland and Wales. How the cultural ideas traveled from Gallic regions to the British Isles, however, is not always agreed upon.

Arnold conceded, "It is argued whether we're really dealing with migration of people into Ireland and the British Isles, or the migration of cultural ideas. At this point there is really a hot debate going on about that."

Whatever the case may be, Arnold certainly knows her alcohol history. Luckily, she can still imbibe some of the juice herself to relax. She agreed that archaeologists as a subculture like to drink as well. "Working a lot in Germany is a pretty good thing. At least you get access to some pretty good beer."

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