When
the Saxons poured out across Britain, though, it was something
else. They weren't very nice people. In all of what's now England
- south of Scotland, east of Wales - you almost never find a
Celtic place name. That's because, when the Saxons looked across
the field, there weren't any Celts left for them to ask, "What
do you call that river?" So they had to make up their own
names for everything.
The Celts who were left ended up in Wales,
Scotland, and across the Channel in Brittany. During the seventh
century the Saxons tried to keep going north. Up there they
found a mixed bag of Picts - who'd been in Britain longer than
the Celts - Britons, raiders from over in Ireland, and Scandinavians.
The Saxons came up from the south and the fact is that no one
knows exactly what happened.
For an entire generation, all written
records just... stopped. And at the end of that time things
had settled down. The Picts and Britons and the Gaels from Ireland
had become more or less one people, who turned out to be the
Scots. The Saxons and the Scandinavians had become more or less
one people, who turned out to be the English. Right along the
Scottish border things were a bit more mixed up. But they weren't
all killing each other any more.
And something wonderful finally happened.
When you get that many different kinds of people mixing together
you see a lot of traditions mingling and brewing up something
new. So at the end of this truly awful period of history we
see the Germanic and Pictish and Celtic traditions combining,
and all of a sudden there's new music, new art, and new poetry.
The three-sided frame harp came out of this mess. And so did
what we call Celtic knotwork.
That's
why, way up above the history, I said that it's not uniquely,
or originally, Celtic. This is a style of art that a lot of
people paid a high price to create. And once they had, it
appeared on everything they did, from stone monuments to jewelry
and metalwork to some of the most beautiful books - handmade,
illuminated manuscripts - that anyone has ever penned.
In
more recent years Celtic Art has cross-pollinated other art
form; like in the Celtic Revival, where it was changed and informed
by the Arts and Crafts and Art Nouveau styles. I'd place my
own work in, I guess, a post-Revival mode - since that Celtic
Revival work has certainly influenced mine. |
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