Review of Typical Structures and Content of Insular and Continental Celtic Inscriptions
David F. Mora-Marín
davidmm@unc.edu
University of North Carolina
Chapel Hill
20/8/26
Before proceeding with the study of Pictish Symbols as glottographic (linguistically-encoded) writing, and therefore of Pictish Symbols inscriptions as (linguistic) texts, a survey of the typical content, genres, and media of Celtic inscriptions from both the British Isles and the continent could be helpful. The following synthesis was prepared on the basis of several sources (Eska 2004; Swift 2007; Eska and Evans 2009; Stifter 2020).
Table 1 presents the comparative examples and their common attested genres and contexts. Table 2 provides some basic information regarding the linguistic content. And Table 3 summarizes the relevant content for the early Irish and Welsh inscriptions.
Table 1. Typical genres/media across different written Celtic languages.
| Genres | Welsh (Ogham and Latin biscriptal, bilinguals) | Early Irish (Ogham) | Transalpine Celtic/Gaulish (Hellenic capitals, Roman capitals, Roman cursive) | Cisalpine Celtic (Lepontic) | Hispano-Celtic (Iberian, Roman) |
| Period | 5th–early 6th CE | 4th–6th CE | 3rd BCE–2nd CE | 6th–1st BCE | 2nd BCE–2nd CE |
| Funeral inscriptions | Yes (HIC IACIT) | Yes (KOI/XOI) | Yes | Yes | |
| Memorial inscriptions | Yes (X MAQI Y) | Yes | |||
| Dedicatory inscriptions | Yes | Yes | |||
| Laws/prohibitions | Yes | ||||
| Pacts between two parties | Yes | Yes | Yes | ||
| Magic/curses | Yes | Yes | |||
| Other inscriptions on personal objects | Yes (Rare) | Yes | |||
| Administrative graffiti | Yes | ||||
| Religious graffiti | Yes | ||||
| Coin legends | Yes | Yes | Yes | ||
| Calendar | Yes |
Table 2. Typical content across different written Celtic languages.
| Content | Welsh (Ogham and Latin biscriptal, bilinguals) | Early Irish (Ogham, Latin biscriptal, bilinguals) | Transalpine Celtic/Gaulish (Hellenic capitals, Roman capitals, Roman cursive) | Cisalpine Celtic (Lepontic) | Hispano-Celtic (Iberian, Roman) |
| Period | 5th–early 6th CE | 4th–6th CE | 3rd BCE–2nd CE | 6th–1st BCE | 2nd BCE–2nd CE |
| Personal name (agent/dedicant, dedicatee, or owner) | Single names and dual names (Genitive) | Yes (Genitive, one example of dedicatee in Dative) | Yes (Nominative, Dative, or Genitive) | Yes (Nominative, Dative, or Genitive) | Yes (Nominative) |
| Author/Carver | No | ||||
| Object dedicated | Yes (ANM ‘name’ or ‘inscription’, Nominative) | Yes (Accusative) | Yes (Accusative) | ||
| Omission of implied object dedicated/owned | Yes (LIE, presumably ‘stone’) | ||||
| Patronymics (and other kinship relations) | Yes (Genitive) | Yes (e.g. MAQQI ‘son’) instead of Genitive on father’s name (in general) | Yes (Genitive) | Yes (Genitive) | |
| Gentilics | Yes (Genitive) | Yes (Genitive) | |||
| Functionary Title | Rare (‘priest’, ‘poet’) | Yes (Nominative) | |||
| Place of Origin | Yes (Ablative) | ||||
| Dedicatory verbs (raised, place, set, offer, made) | Yes | Yes | |||
| Omission of implied dedicatory verb | Yes | Yes | |||
| Funerary verbs (bury) | Yes? | Yes |
Table 3. Content of early Insular Celtic stone inscriptions (Welsh/Irish Ogham, Latin).
| Content | Welsh | Irish |
| Single names | Yes (Genitive) | Yes (Genitive, rare cases in Dative) |
| Dual names | Yes | ? |
| Onomastic formula | X MAQI/AVI Y (X FILI/FILUS in Latin) | X MAQI/MUCOI/AVI/CELI Y; phrase MAQI MUCOI could refer to sept |
| Funerary | Implied by Latin (HIC) IACIT, no equivalent in Welsh Ogham | X KOI MAQQI MUCOI Y
Irish Ogham KOI ‘here’ (after X in onomastic formula) |
| Dedicatory | No evidence | ANM X (MAQI Y)
(ANM ‘name’) “A very small number of inscriptions appear to be in the dative case, i.e. dedicated to the recipient” (Stifter 2020:867) |
Given the comparative examples, the following types of content can serve as a basis for testing linguistic analyses of Pictish Symbols texts:
- Proprietary statements with single (or dual) names (X, typically in Genitive (implied owner of object)), ‘X’s’ [Implicit Ownership of Inscribed Object]
- Onomastic formula with patronyms and potentially also gentilics (X kinterm Y…, typically in Genitive), ‘X’s son of-Y […]’
- Funerary text (Latin HIC IACIT ‘here lies’, Ogham KOI ‘here’ plus single name or onomastic formula), ‘Here [lies] X son of-Y […]’
- Dedicatory text (dedicatory verbal expressions, dedicatee in Dative, dedicant in Nominative, and/or object dedicated in Accusative), e.g. ‘X(Nom) offered Y(Dat) Z(Acc)’ = ‘X(Nom) offered Z(Acc) to Y(Dat)’
- Implicit dedicatory text (omission of dedicatory verbal expression), potentially implicit dedicated object, e.g. ‘X(Nom/Abl/Instr) Y(Dat) […] (Z(Acc))’ = ‘X(Nom/Abl/Instr) […] (Z(Acc)) to Y(Dat)’ (i.e. ‘(Z,) From X to Y’)
These options would have different implications for the likely orthographic units of the Pictish Symbols writing (e.g. logograms only vs. logograms and phonograms vs. phonograms only), given that, as I will describe in more detail in a future Note, the average text length of Pictish Symbols texts is 3.95 signs (when Vrod and Zrod are counted) or 3.1 signs (when Vrod and Zrod are not counted).
References
Eska, Joseph F. 2004. Continental Celtic. In The Cambridge Encyclopedia of the World’s Ancient Languages, edited by Roger D. Woodard, pp. 857–880. Cambridge University Press.
Eska, Joseph F., and D. Ellis Evans. 2009. Continental Celtic. In The Celtic Languages, edited by Martin J. Ball and Nicole Müller, pp. 28–54. Routledge.
Swift, Catherine. 2007. Welsh ogams from an Irish perspective. In Ireland and Wales in the Middle Ages, edited by Karen Jankulak and Jonathan M. Wooding, pp. 62–79. Dublin.
Stifter, David. 2020. Insular Celtic: Ogam. Paleohispánica 20:855–885.
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