For ‘Celt’ is more than an ethnonym; it is a concept that entails language, art, material
culture, historical, cultural and religious identifications both in the past and the present
(Karl, 2010). In other words, the ‘Celt’ is a changing construction that is bound to political
agendas, to scientific traditions, as well as to the life of local populations. To ignore this
dynamic does not explain those historical phenomena, and most certainly does not give us
ground to further our views of the past or of our disciplines. Therefore, it is our view that the
‘Celt’ is not just useful, but crucial to the comprehension of changing and non-essentialist
views of culture. Cultures are always changing; they are not crystallised and immutable
throughout time. Scepticism towards romanticised and overly literal approaches to the
Celts of Antiquity, the Middle Ages and the present has been a useful corrective. But it
also runs the risk of being overly reductionist and of closing off dialogues with the complex
pasts of Celtic-speaking peoples, the cultures that they encountered and the changes that
happened over time. Used with care, the terms ‘Celt’ and ‘Celtic’ can help encourage new
transdisciplinary dialogues that will enrich the scholarship of our cognates field. So the
‘Celt’ is as diverse as its own history; and that is what remains to be explained
