Scotland's Past and the Present View

Recently when I had a disagreement with someone that has little knowledge of the
Celtic past history, they responded to me in a way I've grown tried of hearing.

In essence the response was:

The thing that brought the Celtic Nations to their demise was the constant "infighting" that they're so well known for.

I replied: You're not going to get hung up on that drivel that the oppressive ranks of invaders tried to use to further the misunderstanding of what was really going on during those periods of history, ... are you?

1. The Celtic Nations never did come to a 'demise', they are still up and running now,
or there would be no Ireland or Wales or Scotland today. And they've survived all thrown at them for many thousands of years.

2. The Celts believed that their leaders were "the first among equals", the ranks of the clans were involved in the choice of leadership, if those leaders moved against their own, they would cast them out and choose another to lead them. These ideals are where your modern day democracy grew from.

3. The Celtic Clans believed that each of their land holding and people were "a realm" onto itself. Most of the disputes down through the years were one clan moving against another because of disagreements, border disputes, treachery of one sort or another, etc, .... this is not infighting.

4. "Infighting" would be disputes happening constantly within the one clan against others of their same kith and kin.

5. These clansmen and women, of different clans commonly would band together with each other to fight common foes.

6. Don't use historical events from a realm you know little about, to justify your actions in the modern world, and present circumstance.


And that's how I feel about that.

The Bard