Anne and Les,

I now see what you both mean: a large, genetically-distinct population of Celtic-speakers did not invade and take up residence in England. This is probably true. Invasions of this kind have never been provable, and historians have generally acknowledged that.

What seems to have happened instead was that a small group arrived and then spread their language, farming techniques, burial practices, stories, and artifacts to the remaining indigenous population. But it doesn't matter much whether Celtic culture spread by invasion or by adoption. The outcome is the same: an area with a culture identifiable as "Celtic."

As Anne pointed out, Celtic is not and never has been a genetic distinction. it is primarily a linguistic one, and secondarily a cultural one. (People who spoke Celtic languages seem to have had other cultural practices in common as well, which makes sense since much culture is spread by language.) Anyone who tries to use "Celtic" in racial terms is blowing smoke. We don't even know, historically, if the peoples who spoke Celtic languages were genetically from one stock or many. So when I say "the pre-Saxon population of Britain was Celtic" I mean they spoke and made inscriptions in Celtic languages. This much Francis Pryor does not dispute. I don't make any racial or genetic arguments whatsoever.

"Boudicca" is a Celtic word meaning "victorious." Her people certainly spoke a Celtic language. They also engaged in cultural practices such as chariot warfare, which was widely observed and written about among Celtic speakers, from Gaulish warriors in antiquity to medieval Irish sagas. Were these chariot-fighting Celtic speakers descended (mostly) from invaders who spoke Celtic languages, or (mostly) from an indigenous population who adopted the language and cultural practices of neighbors, settlers, or immigrants who spoke Celtic languages? It really doesn't matter that much. The culture of Boudicca's people was identifiably Celtic, and again, Celtic is a cultural, not a genetic, distinction.

Les, you're also right about the Oppenheimer book. He's a geneticist, not an archaeologist or a linguist, and his point is that the genetics of Britain suggest that the pre-indo-European people of Iberia (now represented mainly by the Basques) were the source of Britain's population.

Does this mean England was "not Celtic?" Well, not really. The genetic surveys done by Rosser show that, in Oppenheimer's words, "the closest population to the Basques is in Cornwall, followed closely by Wales, Ireland, Scotland, England, Spain, Belgium, Portugal and then northern France." So the genes that predominate in England (over 58% in even the weakest areas) are found even more strongly in Wales, Ireland, and Scotland (where we know Celtic languages have been consistently spoken since antiquity). To argue that the ancestors of the English are "not Celts," you'd have to argue that the Welsh, Cornish and Irish are "not Celts" but "genetically non-Celtic peoples who spoke Celtic languages." That doesn't really mean anything, again because Celtic is a linguistic distinction.

One thing Oppenheimer does suggest is that Germanic genes seem to have been present in eastern England before the period we commonly think of as the "Saxon invasions" (he shows that they really were more Anglian than Saxon). He extrapolates from this to suggest that perhaps a form of proto-English was spoken in that part of England, without leaving much trace in writing. This is the most meaningful sense in which his work argues that "much of England was not Celtic": he suggests that in about half of England they never spoke a Celtic language, but went from the indigenous proto-Basque language to a Germanic one. This is possible, but it's a stretch...and he's a geneticist, going wildly outside his field on that one.

All of this goes back to one question. Are very old customs practices in Britain "Celtic?" The answer is probably this: some are Celtic in origin, and were borrowed into Britain along with Celtic language; some may be indigenous in origin, and continued in the population after Celtic language was adopted; and some are Germanic in origin, either from early proto-English people in eastern England, or from later Anglo-Saxon culture.

Wassail is almost certainly Anglo-Saxon.