Dennis
> I agree with your point no.2 below. On the surface it seems that
Danu/Don in Britain is pre-Celtic. After all, the Tuatha De Danann
(the People of the Gods of Danu) were driven underground by the
Milesians (=Gaels?). Is there any other evidence of Don/Dan names
elsewhere in the Celtic world apart from Britain and Ireland?
People have suggested that the Medieval reconstruction of the "Book
of
Invasions" relates in some way to history. In actual fact they
don't.
The Tuartha de Danaan all have good Gaelic/Celtic names. Even the
earlier "waves" - eg. Fir Bolg, are in fact the Belgae. Ptolemy
stated that Menapi were found both in Belgium and on the East Coast
of
Ireland. With the g-p shift this became the tribe of the Monaghans.
The movements into Ireland were not just one way. Brennius, (the
name of the Celtic chief who saked Delphi, as well as the name of
the Celtic chief who saked Rome) and Bran the Blessed whose head
protects London are names which are cognates with the Irish myth.
There were Irish fighting on the side of the Goths against the
Frankish advance, and the pagan Irish High King Nath I died in the
Alps in the Dark Ages. Irish gold was the source of most gold
objects
throughout barbarian Europe from about 1,200 BCE. Ireland tended to
export people long before it became the land of saints and scholars,
and there is a lot of evidence that European Celtic people sent their
druids to Ireland for training.
Druidic filid, has been linked with the Latin flamen, and hence to
the
Hindu brahmin.
Regards
John