The ancient Celtic world evokes debate, discussion, romanticism and mythicism. On the one hand it represents a specialist area of archaeological interest, on the other, it has a wide general appeal. The Celtic world is accessible through archaeology, history, linguistics and art history. Of these disciplines, art history offers the most direct message to a wider audience. This volume of 37 papers brings together a truly international group of pre-eminent specialists in the field of Celtic art and Celtic studies. It is a benchmark volume the like of which has not been seen since the publication of Paul Jacobsthal’s Early Celtic Art in 1944. The papers chart the history of attempts to understand Celtic art and argue for novel approaches in discussions spanning the whole of Continental Europe and the British Isles. This new body of international scholarship will give the reader a sense of the richness of the material and current debates. Artefacts of rich form and decoration, which we might call art, provide a most sensitive set of indicators of key areas of past societies, their power, politics and transformations. With its broad geographical scope, this volume offers a timely opportunity to re-assess contacts, context, transmission and meaning in Celtic art for understanding the development of European cultures, identities and economies in pre- and proto-history.

Essays in honour of Vincent Megaw on his 80th birthday.

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Contents
• Contributors
• Chapter 1: Introduction to Celtic Art in Europe: making connections
• Chapter 2: Once again, Herodotus, the Κελτοί, the source of the Danube, and the Pillars of Hercules
• Chapter 3: The Sheffield origins of Celtic Art
• Chapter 4: Theorie der keltischen Kunst. Ein Versuch
• Chapter 5: Les codes de représentation visuelle dans l’art celtique ancien
• Chapter 6: Hidden faces and animal images on Late Iron Age and Early Roman horse harness decorated using the champlevé technique
• Chapter 7: The human masks of unknown provenience
• Chapter 8: Heads, masks and shifting identities: a note about some Danubian kantharoi with anthropomorphic decoration
• Chapter 9: Off with their heads…! once again: images of daggers and severed heads on an Iberian falcata sword
• Chapter 10: A Celtic severed head, or Lazarus in the arms of Abraham?
• Chapter 11: Zur Attachenzier der Schnabelkannen von Basse-Yutz
• Chapter 12: The not so ugly duckling – an essay on meaning
• Chapter 13: Fragments of a carnyx from Leisach (Austria)
• Chapter 14: Between ruling ideology and ancestor worship: the mos maiorum of the Early Celtic ‘Hero Graves’
• Chapter 15: Alfred and Alexander
• Chapter 16: La fibule de Moscano di Fabriano: un jalon important de l’évolution de l’art celtique au IVe siècle avant J.-C
• Chapter 17: Zum Wenden: der Halsring aus Gehweiler-Oberlöstern im Saarland
• Chapter 18: Late Hallstatt and Early La Tène gold and silver beads in southeast Pannonia
• Chapter 19: East meets West… The stamped pottery from the La Tène cemetery at Fântânele-Dealul Popii (Transylvania, Romania)
• Chapter 20: A vessel with stamped decoration from the Želiezovce collection
• Chapter 21: Balkan Kantharoi
• Chapter 22: La Tène and Przeworsk strap shield bosses from Poland
• Chapter 23: De l’anneau en bronze à têtes de béliers de Chermignac (Charente-Maritime) et de quelques pièces de harnais. La Tène finale de Gaule de l’Ouest
• Chapter 24: A mould for Celtic-type rings from Sanzeno in the Valle di Non, Trentino
• Chapter 25: ‘Leopold Bloom I’ and the Hungarian Sword Style
• Chapter 26: The Celtic mercenary reconsidered
• Chapter 27: The Dragon from Oberleiserberg
• Chapter 28: A l’aube du IIIe s. av. J.-C.: les fourreaux d’épée à décor estampé sur fer
• Chapter 29: ‘…to boldly go where no man has gone before.’ Dedicated to Ruth and Vincent…
• Chapter 30: Art and Craftsmanship in elite-warrior graves: ‘from Boii to Parisii and back again. ’
• Chapter 31: Ascot hats: an Iron Age leaf crown helmet from Fiskerton, Lincolnshire?
• Chapter 32: Snettisham swansong
• Chapter 33: The Iron Age open-air ritual site at Hallaton, Leicestershire: some wider implications
• Chapter 34: Brit-art: Celtic Art in Roman Britain and on its Frontiers
• Chapter 35: Art in context: the massive metalworking tradition of north-east Scotland
• Chapter 36: The Torrs Chamfrein or Head-piece: restoring ‘A very curious relic of antiquity’
• Chapter 37: Vincent, in appreciation
• Bibliography
• Colour Plates