by a later wave of Celts, whose language in their Continental home had undergone in the interval certain sound-changes shared by Gaulish also. The Celtic languages have probably been spoken in the British Isles for more than three thousand years they were brought by newcomers, perhaps already in the Bronze Age before 1000 B.C., and reinforced in the Iron Age after 500 B.C. This extension of meaning is a convenient one and will be adopted throughout this book. In general speech, however, the term has come to be used in a wider sense of the people speaking one or other of the various branches of the Celtic languages, and then, by a further extension, of their countries.
There is no 'Celtic' race or group of tribes, or any 'Celtic' area. Strictly speaking the term 'Celtic' is a linguistic one, and refers to a branch of the Indo-European languages.
The peoples speaking a Celtic language are the earliest Britons of whom we have written records. The text and engravings are in the public domain.
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