"Celt" Conjecture

[Robert Vermaat]

Vercingetorix's father Celtillus was born (and named) well before the Roman conquest.

No, he is actually gets his name in Caesar's account, there' s no way to show it's not a Roman interpretation.

In this case I go with Chris, there's no logical reason whatsoever to suppose that Caesar would invent a name for him, and a Roman name at that. An interpretation of what exactly?

The Celtici tribe of Spain bore this name before the Roman conquest.

Evidence?

Evidence of the contrary? And I don't mean 'it was written by a Roman writer so it could have been invented by that writer'. If you suggest that the Romans' use of the name 'Celt' was really an invention, you must be able prove that as well in each case. If not, as a historian I acceot names of people and places at face value. I accept different versions when the author misunderstand s a name, but I can't accept that authors like Caesar go on to invent names altogether and use Roman names.
so in this case, if we have a Roman source that describes to subjugation of the Spanish tribe of the Celtici, i see no reason to think that they were called differently but that some author wanted for some odd reason to use a different name.

The name Kelti was inscribed on a stone in Iberian script along with numerous other Celtiberian graffiti in Peñalba, Spain and a tombstone from Langa de Duero:, Spain bears a Celtiberina inscription with a name on it that can be read as Keltis.

Interesting. But evidence?
For example on the inscription from Langa de Duero, it can be as well "Beltis" (to be sure, the first symbol on the last line doesn't look really neither as a "be", nor as a "ke")

OK, the evidence seems not 100% conclusive.

This is not controversial stuff, folks. No serious scholars question that *kelt- is a Celtic root word, or that some tribes in Gaul and Spain used it as an ethnic term.

Let me quote you an "unserious" scholar about the latter part. Peter S. Wells in The Barbarians Speak (Princeton 1999):
The Greeks and the Romans defined the categories Celt and German, associated them with particular regions of temperate Europe, and ascribed specific characteristics to the peoples so designated. There is no reason for us to think that all of the groups whom the Classical writers referred to as the Celts ever felt they belonged to a common people, nor that those Caesar and Tacitus called Germans saw themselves as members of a distinct super-regional population. Outsiders dominated the written discourse, and the domination persists today, in the way most researchers approach issues of identity among the indigenous Europeans.

You are right here, however, Chris is not arguing for anything like that. I think all serious schoars accept that the 'categories Celt and German' are not clear-cut, homogenous, black and white groups, but a much more difficult mixture of ethnicity, culture and language.

But that's not what Chris is arguing - he does not say that Caesar and tacitus are right by saying that Celts or Germans saw themselves as part of one common group. Or do you Chris?
He is trying to show us that at least some groups knew and used the name Celt or Kelt in their personal names and tribal names.