According to some ancient authors, the (ancient) Celts did indeed use a hair product based on lime, especially when they went into battle, because it made their hair spiky and, I suppose, their aspect more fierce :). This product would also have made their hair look paler and probably partly accounts for the stories that say they were "all blond" (I didn't find any mention of redheads in the ancient sources myself).
I like to stress the "supposedly" in "the Celts were supposedly tall and fair". It sounds like such an over-simplification to me, and typically the kind of thing you can expect from a Roman arriving in Gaul - the Celts would probably have said that the Romans all looked the same, too. I feel quite sure that the Celts were more of a mixed bunch than the Greek and Roman sources make them out, especially because the people we call Celts seem to have been bound by culture and language more than by anything else.
In any case, in Irish myths and legends, dark hair and blue eyes are considered marks of beauty (Naoise and Diarmuid are examples). That leads me to think such colour would not be associated with foreigners.
I'm not sure how many Romans actually settled in Britain - not a lot, I think, because after the Romans left, Britain quickly reverted to its Celtic habits. In any case, the settlers were a mixed bag too: Sarmatian and Saxon auxiliaries would have counted as "Romans" as well ... and any Briton with Roman citizenship was a Roman too! - Just doing my best to make "part-Roman" extra tricky ;P. I confess I am evil.
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winterfish
Re: Actually (celtic coloring)
Date: Saturday, 6 November 2010 04:21 pm (UTC)I like to stress the "supposedly" in "the Celts were supposedly tall and fair". It sounds like such an over-simplification to me, and typically the kind of thing you can expect from a Roman arriving in Gaul - the Celts would probably have said that the Romans all looked the same, too. I feel quite sure that the Celts were more of a mixed bunch than the Greek and Roman sources make them out, especially because the people we call Celts seem to have been bound by culture and language more than by anything else.
In any case, in Irish myths and legends, dark hair and blue eyes are considered marks of beauty (Naoise and Diarmuid are examples). That leads me to think such colour would not be associated with foreigners.
I'm not sure how many Romans actually settled in Britain - not a lot, I think, because after the Romans left, Britain quickly reverted to its Celtic habits. In any case, the settlers were a mixed bag too: Sarmatian and Saxon auxiliaries would have counted as "Romans" as well ... and any Briton with Roman citizenship was a Roman too! - Just doing my best to make "part-Roman" extra tricky ;P. I confess I am evil.