Classical sources - Greek and Roman writerswith their references to Celti, Celtae, Keltoi, Celtici, Galli, Gallic,and Galatae -

When SirAugustus Wollaston Franks, a Keeper at the British Museum,produced a catalogue of British decorated metalwork in 1863, hechose the term ‘Late Keltic’ to describe items of Iron Age date. Thephrase was used throughout the first edition of the British MuseumGuide to the Antiquities of the Early Iron Age (1905), but by thetime of the second edition (1925) the characterization was droppedbecause, as the preface cautiously noted, ‘There is some uncertaintyas to the existence or date of an earlier Keltic civilization in theseislands.’

John Collis who, in ‘States without Centres’,complains that Celtic society described by some modern authorsmerely represents a mishmash of information from different timesand different places which is often of little value for understandingthe societies being described. Descriptions, or rather caricature, ofsocieties cannot be transposed in time and space under an inventedconcept of the ‘Celts’; indeed the whole use of the terms Celt andCeltic is something which should be avoided as it distorts ourunderstanding of the archaeological record.