Common Celtic (CC)

CC refers to the putative ancestor of the Celtic language family, or to our reconstruction of it. It was probably spoken by a West European speech community early in the first millennium BC.

CC is descended from Proto-Indo-European (PIE), possibly via Italo-Celtic. It is characterised by the following phonological innovations:

Loss of PIE *p in nearly all environments, thus PIE *super "on" > Old Irish for, Welsh gor-/gwar-, Cornish gor-, Old Breton guor, Gaulish uer-, Celtiberian uer- : Latin super, Greek huper
Development of PIE *gw > *b, thus PIE *gwous "cow" > OIr bo:, Middle Welsh biw : Sanskrit gauh, Gk bous
Merger of PIE voiced stops and breathy-voiced stops (voiced aspirated stops) as voiced stops, thus PIE *dhe: "to suck" > OIr denim, MW dynu : Skt dha:yati; PIE *der- "tree" > OIr daur "oak", MW dar : Skt daru "wood"
Merger of PIE o: and a: as a: (long a), thus PIE *bhra:ter "brother" > OIr brathir, W brawd, Gaul Bratr(onos) : Lat fra:ter, Gk phra:te:r; PIE *gno:tos "known" > OIr gna:th, W gnawd "customary", Gaul (Eposo-) gnatus : Lat no:tus, Gk gno:tos
Merger of PIE i: and e: as i:, thus PIE *re:gs "king" > OIr ri:, W rhi, Gaul (Bitu-)riges, Galatian (Adiato-)riks : Lat re:x; PIE *li:w > OIr li:, W lliw, Old Cornish liu : Lat liuor
"Centum" merger of palatal and velar stop series in opposition to labiovelar series (see PIE)

The break-up of the CC speech-community

While the interrelationships of the more recent and well-attested Celtic languages are well-understood, the nature of the earlier splits is not agreed. The traditional view is that the Continental languages (Gaulish, Celtiberian, Lepontic etc.) form one group, in opposition to the Insular languages (which themselves fall into two uncontroversial groups: Goidelic and Brittonic). This is supported by the similarity of the verbal system in the latter two branches, which differs strongly from the Continental systems, insofar as these are known. More recent views, however, connect Brittonic and Gaulish (and perhaps Lepontic) more closely in a Gallo-Brittonic subfamily, though without suggesting a close relationship between Goidelic and Celtiberian. This view is supported mainly by proposed phonological innovations.

According to the traditional view (as still promulgated by eg. Kim McCone), the Celtic family is to be classified as follows:

       	       	       	 Common Celtic
	        _______________|_________________
               |  	       	          	 |
          Insular Celtic                 Continental Celtic
        _______|________               __________|_________________
       |                |             |          |        |        |
    Goidelic        Brittonic    Celtiberian  Gaulish  Lepontic  Galatian
  _____|____        ____|_____
 |          |      |          |
Irish  NE Gaelic  Welsh  SW Brittonic
       _____|_____       _____|_____
      |           |     |           |
 Scots Gaelic   Manx  Breton     Cornish

However, the theory of eg. KH Schmidt would group the languages thus:

                         Common Celtic
                _______________|_______________________
               |                                       |
               |_______________________             Goidelic
               |                       |          _____|_____
               |____________      Celtiberian    |           |
               |            |                  Irish     NE Gaelic
               |         Lepontic                       _____|_____
        Gallo-Brittonic                                |           |
        _______|_______                           Scots Gaelic    Manx
       |               |
   Brittonic        Gaulish
   ____|______
  |           |
Welsh   SW Brittonic
         _____|_____
        |           |
      Breton     Cornish