Tracing the Spread of Celtic Languages using Ancient Genomics

Abstract

Celtic languages, including Irish, Scottish Gaelic, Welsh and Breton, are today restricted to the Northern European Atlantic seaboard. However, between 3 and 2 thousand years before present (BP) Celtic was widely spoken across most of Europe. While often associated with Bell Beaker-related populations, the spread of this prominent Indo-European linguistic cluster remains debated1—7. Previous genomic investigations have focused on its arrival to specific regions: Britain8, Iberia9 and Southwestern Germany10. Here, we utilize new genomic data from Bronze and Iron Age Europe to investigate the population history of historically Celtic-speaking regions, and test different linguistic theories on the origins and early spread of the Celtic languages. We identify a widespread demographic impact of the Central European Urnfield Culture. We find ancestry associated with its Knovíz subgroup in the Carpathian Basin to have formed between 4—3.2 kyr BP, and subsequently expanded across much of Western Europe between 3.2 and 2.8 kyr BP. This ancestry further persisted into the Hallstatt Culture of France, Germany and Austria, impacting Britain by 2.8 kyr BP and Iberia by 2.5 kyr BP. These findings support models of an Eastern Central rather than a Western European center of spread for a major component of all the attested Celtic languages. Our study demonstrates, yet again, the power of ancient population genomics in addressing long-standing debates in historical linguistics.