For the last 15 years, the Celtic culture has taken over Austin for one weekend as part of the Austin Celtic Festival. But what is this “Celtic” culture?
“Celtic is basically an ethno-linguistic group that started in central Europe,” said Things Celtic storeowner Lanora Davidson, when asked to describe what the term means. “It was a loose-knit group of tribes who shared similarities in religion, history, mythology, culture and art.”
The group of tribes started in the Rhine Valley region of Europe. They traveled through Europe before settling down in the British Isles. The main locations where these people settled were Ireland, Scotland, Wales, Cornwall, the Isle of Man and Brittany, Davidson explained.
“Products made by artists in those areas are generally considered “Celtic’,” she said.
From these various origins, six Celtic languages emerged, some of which are still around today. The Welsh and Breton languages were descended from British language, while Irish and Scottish Gaelic were descended from Old Irish. Cornish and Manx were still spoken into modern times, but have since died out, however, there is a movement to revitalize the two languages.
“There are similarities in the language and there are differences in the languages, the religion, and the culture,” Davidson said. “But a lot of the mythology comes from the same roots.”
While the Celtic heritage has been around for much of history, the Celtic community in Austin established some roots in the late 1990s and early 2000s with the establishment of a few Celtic organizations. In 1997, the Austin Celtic Association was founded to “celebrate and promote the Celtic culture” while the Celtic Cultural Center of Texas was founded in 2002 to help host and promote events with Celtic ties.
About the same time Davidson was opening her store, Celtic culture was experiencing a burst of popularity.
“When we first got started in 1999, it was the height of the Celtic renaissance,” Davidson said. “(There was) the Celtic Tiger in Ireland, Rob Roy, Braveheart the movie had come out, Riverdance had come out…Celtic was really popular.”
Also during that time, Austin experienced the dot com boom, so there was more of a disposable income for Austinites involved with the boom, and Celtic items were the splurge of choice, Davidson said.
“We really couldn’t stock the shelves fast enough. We were reordering every week, it was great,” she said.
Davidson admits that the popularity has dropped off, but is optimistic that it won’t bottom out.
