This impressive addition to ABC-CLIO’s library of reference works contains 808 articles by 263 contributors on a wide range of people, places, customs, and other topics related to Celtic studies. The two-volume set is one of five publications prepared by a research project at the University of Wales, The Celtic Languages and Cultural Identity: A Multidisciplinary Synthesis, under the direction of John T. Koch. Participants felt that existing popular and semi-popular books in the field lacked balance and scholarly reliability, that handbooks related to Celtic studies had become outdated, and that specialist publications were too erudite. The project’s magisterial five-volume Celtic Culture: A Historical Encyclopedia (ABC-CLIO, 2006), for example, is relatively inaccessible for non-specialist readers. The Celts: History, Life, and Culture, an updated and more concise version of the encyclopedia, retains all essential information, but eliminates “esoteric facets…of interest only to specialists” (xxxviii).

The book offers a comprehensive but succinct overview of a broad range of Celtic topics. The geographical scope stretches from Ireland, Cornwall, the Isle of Man, Wales, England, and Scotland to Armorica (Brittany), the Iberian Peninsula, and Central and Eastern Europe. It considers the Continental Celts of ancient Gaul, as well as the Celtic diaspora to North America. The chronological span extends from the Hallstatt and La Tène periods of the late Iron Age through the twenty-first century. Detailed cross-references allow readers to connect the threads of a topic by going from one related article to another, while a “Celtic Chronology” (xli-lxi) outlines developments across a broad spectrum of geography and time.

This book serves as a useful ready-reference handbook for readers interested in Celtic studies per se, as well as for others concerned with the language, literature, history, folklore, archaeology, and mythology of countries with a Celtic heritage. Readers with an absorbing interest in literature are likely to be disappointed by the abbreviated treatment allotted figures such as James Joyce; but they will nevertheless find much of interest in the numerous explanations of the Celtic allusions that often figure in novels, poems, and plays. Narratives related to legendary people or events are somewhat truncated; readers seeking stories from Celtic folklore, e.g., tales from the Ulster Cycle, the Mabinogion, or the Fiannaíocht, may find themselves longing for more characterization and plot. A bibliography of 160 items for further reading, organized by subject, directs readers to more detailed works and original sources. References to reliable websites are also included.

Articles about real or imagined Celtic heroes range from “Heroic ethos in Early Celtic literatures” to “Arthur, historical evidence”; “Boudica”; “Brian Bóruma/Brian Boru”; “Bruce, Robert de”; “Cassivellaunos/Caswallon”; “Cú Chulainn”; “Finn mac Cumaill”; “Wolfe Tone”; and “Vercingetorix.” Asterix, the indomitable Gaul of comic book fame, also makes a brief appearance. Entries related to archaeology include “Coinage, Celtic”; “Hadrian’s Wall”; “Hallstatt culture”; “Ring-forts”; “Stonehenge”; and “Watery depositions.” Articles dealing with religion and the supernatural address such topics as “Fairies”; “Reincarnation and shape shifting”; “Religious beliefs, ancient Celtic”; “Sacrifice, human”; and “Samain.”

We learn, inter alia, that Beltaine (May 1) was an important day for legal contracts in the Celtic calendar. Rents were due, and workers hired themselves out from May Day to May Day. Animals increased in value on May 1, but dairy products were especially at risk from supernatural tampering. “Fairies and witches were particularly likely to be abroad on May Day, as were the dead; thus many beliefs and customs were aimed at preventing harm from supernatural sources” (92). We are reminded that cauldrons had a special significance in Celtic culture. They were widely used for cooking, storing, and serving food from the Late Bronze Age to early medieval times, but were likewise associated with wisdom, prophecy, truth, and magic potions. Owning a cauldron conveyed status, as indicated by literary references and archaeological finds, including their depiction on coins (154-155).

Other fascinating details abound. In the Táin Bó Cuailnge, the warrior queen Medb uses seductive ploys to enlist her allies, wiles that include her own sexual favors, “cairdes sliasat,” the “friendship of thighs” (762). Early Celtic coinage (c. 300 BC) copied Greek designs, but it isn’t clear whether or not the appearance of coins among Iron Age Celts “signals the transition to a true cash economy [or was merely] a continuation of earlier patterns of exchange of prestigious gifts between chieftains and followers” (214-215). We learn that Clawdd Offa (Offa’s Dyke) can be linked to the emergence of Welsh. “The fact that a Welsh language, showing linguistic features distinct from the cognate Old Breton and Old Cornish, does not emerge until c. AD 800…means that the building of Offa’s Dyke is a useful milestone at which point it becomes unproblematical to speak of Wales, the Welsh people, and the Welsh language” (211-212). Some historical controversies are discussed in substantial detail, e.g., a relatively long entry on the so-called Anglo-Saxon “conquest” (21-23) and how the impression arose that Celts in Britain were overcome by waves of violent invasion (instead of accommodating newly arrived speakers of Old English without extensive bloodshed).

The volumes are sturdily bound, well-designed, and nicely printed. An introduction about how to use the book is a useful tool, but a much-needed pronunciation guide to Celtic names is nowhere to be found. More illustrations would also be welcome; for example, the treatment of medieval clothing (575-576) is disappointingly uninformative because no pictures elucidate the text. Readers looking for information about Wales will be directed to “Cymru.” Those seeking articles on Scotland, Ireland, or the Aran Islands will be rerouted to “Alba,” “Éire,” and “Oileáin Árann” respectively. But these are minor inconveniences. At $185, The Celts: History, Life, and Culture is not priced for individual purchase, but it is likely to occupy an honored place on the reference shelves of college and public libraries for many years to come.

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[Review length: 962 words • Review posted on April 10, 2013]