Art From The Edge Of Time

One of the first things to cross my mind when I discovered the wealth of new and striking imagery upon Iron Age coins was that it is now possible to greatly improve the vocabulary of Celtic Art and redress some of the stylistic and cultural imbalances brought about by the Celtic Revival of the 19th century.

The ubiquitous interlace patterns of Early Medieval Irish art, though not devoid of elegance and charm, have, through overuse, slipped into stereotype and cliche. They also reflect the eclectic cultural influences of the Celtic Christian Church ( drawing on Insular Celtic metalwork traditions, Coptic Egyptian carpet designs, Germanic and Norse animal interlace, Greek and Roman mosaic patterns etc.) more than the long established traditions of the Neolithic and Iron Age peoples of Western Europe.

Though widely used and developed in later Celtic societies, interwoven knots are a common motif found throughout the world, usually representing a seal for protection from harm, a barrier to negativity, a knitting together of the individual’s life-force. In carpets and mosaics it creates a magical boundary, on doorways and openings it acts like a symbolic web to trap unwelcome energies. This metaphorical binding, though formed from interlocked ribbons, has a regular and restrictive quality that is really rather alien to the free-flowing, assymetrical and ambiguous tendencies of the older prehistoric and tribal traditions. The sinuous and the spiral, the plant form and the patterns in water, visionary ripples and transformational beings are central to the shamanic basis of pre-Christian Celtic art.

The earliest known name for the people of Britain is “Pretani”, which the Romans modified to ‘Britannia’. The name relates to design or pattern-making, and has usually been interpreted as ‘painted ones’, in the same way as the peoples known as Picts were designated apparently for their fondness for tattooing or body paint. Some believe that Pretani may define the natives of the British Isles as “those who are pattern-makers”, who delight in visual, verbal and philosophical complexities. This certainly fits in with the reputation as the home of sacred tradition and metaphysics that these islands had by the 2nd century BC, when Greek and Roman commentators were writing, and the remnants of Iron Age druidical and bardic traditions surviving into the Middle Ages.

There have been no direct evidence of tattooing on bodies found in Celtic contexts, unlike the spectacular Scythian grave finds, but there are depictions on coins of body art. Whether these are of permanent tattoos, scarification or temporary paint is impossible to say, but I would suggest they are more likely to be tattoos. Tattoooing and painting serve very different functions. Painting is a means of disguise, a way of changing appearance or role for a particular purpose. The use of woad and lime-wash, for example, by British Celtic warriors would have visually transformed them into the already-dead: spirits who could no longer be killed. Woad can be made into a rich, deep blue dye, but more easily into a wash that will turn the skin a deathly grey colour. This is a perfect camoflage during darkness and twilight. At these times the eye loses its facility to identify colours and relies on tonal contrast to distinguish forms. Whilst an object that is black can still be seen against the variegation of most natural backgrounds, grey cannot. ( We can just about make out our big, black cat wherever he may be sitting at night, but it is near impossible to see our little, grey cat!).

Woad has the advantage of also being an astringent and antiseptic, helping to reduce the bleeding and disinfection of wounds. Body paint hides or overlays the ordinary with the extraordinary, making a human being into a spiritual warrior, and a priest into the image of a god. It is a mask to inspire or to avert misfortune. One can eventually return to the normal world again to become ‘just a human being’.

Tattooing, in contrast, is a permanent identifier, a part of who one is, a sign of change of status, of initiation. More permanent and personal even than a name, a tattoo marks the wearer as ‘chosen’. ( The body of Harold Godwinson, King Harold of Wessex, was only recognised conclusively after the Battle of Hastings, by the tattoos he bore on his chest found by his wife, Edith Swan-Neck. The Normans, being of Norse blood, were not renowned for their gentlemanly behaviour on the battlefield and routinely hacked off this and that. At Hastings no prisoners were taken, hence most of the Anglo-Saxon male bloodlines ended that day, but Vikings and Normans routinely cut off hands and feet of the surviving captured enemy.)

Coin art is all about symbolic image. It has to tell the viewer a story in order to maintain its intrinsic value. It is likely that body art depicted therein is shown as an identifier, either of an individual or of a role.
Regardless of any doubt one may have as to whether the depiction is paint or tattoo, it is likely that the forms of both will follow very similar designs – the style will reflect the primary symbols recognised throughout the tribal area and beyond. So even when there are a small number of likely tattoo images in coin art we can safely speculate that many painted images, textile designs, body art will have been similar to the images found on coins. This greatly increases our repertoire of early Celtic iconography, as the patternmaking found on existent large-scale metal work is usually much more abstracted and less able to be interpreted by us in a narrative manner. The function of pattern on cast or forged metal probably served a different magical purpose to that on coins…..