Hello, I found this paragraph in the Wikipedia article "History of Portugal" and it struck me as odd:
"It should also be mentioned that according to John Koch [6] Cunliffe, Karl, Wodtko and other highly respected scholars (such as Villar), Celtic culture may well have developed first in far Southern Portugal and Southwestern Spain, approximately 500 years prior to anything recorded in Central Europe.[7][8] The Tartessian language from the south of Portugal, which John T. Koch claims he has been able to translate, is being accepted by a growing number of philologists (such as Villar and Ballester) and other linguists (such as Cólera and Wodtko) as the first Celtic language.[6][9][10]"
from
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Portugal
I've never known Tartessian to be seriously considered a Celtic language.
-Michael
There are those who claim it is BUT others believe that the Celts moved in c. 400BCE (a very rough date) when Tartessos was falling apart and picked up the pieces. Some try to link Tartessian to Anatolian. I'm neutral on all this but I do wonder why the Celts would use two completely different home-grown alphabets.