02-25-2011, 05:32 PM
Not very much hard evidence at all unfortunately. You might want to check out Osprey Publishing's Men At Arms Vol 158 - Rome's Enemies Vol 2, Gallic and British Celts, although even this book pretty much admits that really hard evidence is fairly flimsy, most of it being stuff the Romans wrote about which then gets the 'Chinese Whispers' treatment as it is repeated and copied through the ages, for example, we aren't even absolutely sure what Boudica's name actually was, nor what she looked like, and she's probably the most famous ancient Briton of them all.
It's worth noting that when we read stuff such as Caesar's Commentaries in an attempt to determine facts, we can take a fair bit of it with a pinch of salt, since its main purpose was to make JC look good upon returning to Rome and in that sense, to demonise enemies in order to justify having gone to war and to open up Rome's coffers in much the same way as the military today bang on about potential threats in order to get the budget for any new weaponry they want. So we always have to remember the standpoint from which such stuff is written.
Much of what is written is relative too. For example, using the description of someone having 'long hair' is of course dependent on how long your own hair is, i.e. if you have a crew cut, then everyone has long hair in comparison to you. As a modern example we can relate to more easily, back in the 1960s, the media chose to describe The Beatles and the Rolling Stones as having 'long hair', but when we see that kind of hairstyle today we'd probably call it pretty short, it was simply long in comparison to the short back and sides most men tended to have.
Having long hair myself (i.e long enough to be in a pony tail) and being from the grim north of England where it can rain quite a bit, I know that long hair is a pain in the ass when outside doing practical things, especially in inclement weather - it blows in your face, getting in your eyes and mouth etc - so it is more often than not tied back into a pony tail or I wear a hat or a bandana. I suspect that's probably something the Ancient Britons would have done too on occasion, simply as a practical measure, they may also have plaited their hair too, and probably did, possibly weighting it with beads to prevent it blowing around and irritating them, especially since we do know ancient Britons loved a decorous appearance if the beautiful torcs and brooches that survive today are anything to go by. After all, you don't need any documentary evidence to know that the last thing you'd want when facing off against a Roman Legion would be to have your hair flick into your eyes in the wind, blinding you just as someone is jabbing a gladius at your unarmoured body.
When not tied back or plaited, we know such ancient warriors would use lime wash or clay to hold their hair out of their eyes in a manner similar to today's hair gels and sprays are used for the same thing, so we can surmise one or two might have chosen to spike it up in a fashion similar to punks did circa 1977, which would have had the effect of making them look taller amongst other things, that probably also having a useful psychological effect when going into battle, since we can recall in modern times the shock value punks gained with the media for appearing with their hair in that fashion.
There is of course also the cultural significance of having long hair to consider, for example, it is known that in some tribes, neophyte warriors would only cut their hair when having made a kill in battle, it being a rite of passage to do so. In practical terms, we also know that if you do wash your hair with lime, or even clump it into a mass with mud or clay, it will either temporarily or permanently tend to bleach it out and make it look lighter, especially to Roman eyes, where dark hair is certainly the norm as opposed to the blond and red hair one finds more in northern Europe.
What all this boils down to, is that the cliche look of a nordic or celtish warrior with a beard or drooping moustache, long hair streaming in the wind or slicked into a style of some kind with lime wash, is probably not too far off what they would have really looked like, even though there is little documentation to actually say for a fact that this was the case.
Al
It's worth noting that when we read stuff such as Caesar's Commentaries in an attempt to determine facts, we can take a fair bit of it with a pinch of salt, since its main purpose was to make JC look good upon returning to Rome and in that sense, to demonise enemies in order to justify having gone to war and to open up Rome's coffers in much the same way as the military today bang on about potential threats in order to get the budget for any new weaponry they want. So we always have to remember the standpoint from which such stuff is written.
Much of what is written is relative too. For example, using the description of someone having 'long hair' is of course dependent on how long your own hair is, i.e. if you have a crew cut, then everyone has long hair in comparison to you. As a modern example we can relate to more easily, back in the 1960s, the media chose to describe The Beatles and the Rolling Stones as having 'long hair', but when we see that kind of hairstyle today we'd probably call it pretty short, it was simply long in comparison to the short back and sides most men tended to have.
Having long hair myself (i.e long enough to be in a pony tail) and being from the grim north of England where it can rain quite a bit, I know that long hair is a pain in the ass when outside doing practical things, especially in inclement weather - it blows in your face, getting in your eyes and mouth etc - so it is more often than not tied back into a pony tail or I wear a hat or a bandana. I suspect that's probably something the Ancient Britons would have done too on occasion, simply as a practical measure, they may also have plaited their hair too, and probably did, possibly weighting it with beads to prevent it blowing around and irritating them, especially since we do know ancient Britons loved a decorous appearance if the beautiful torcs and brooches that survive today are anything to go by. After all, you don't need any documentary evidence to know that the last thing you'd want when facing off against a Roman Legion would be to have your hair flick into your eyes in the wind, blinding you just as someone is jabbing a gladius at your unarmoured body.
When not tied back or plaited, we know such ancient warriors would use lime wash or clay to hold their hair out of their eyes in a manner similar to today's hair gels and sprays are used for the same thing, so we can surmise one or two might have chosen to spike it up in a fashion similar to punks did circa 1977, which would have had the effect of making them look taller amongst other things, that probably also having a useful psychological effect when going into battle, since we can recall in modern times the shock value punks gained with the media for appearing with their hair in that fashion.
There is of course also the cultural significance of having long hair to consider, for example, it is known that in some tribes, neophyte warriors would only cut their hair when having made a kill in battle, it being a rite of passage to do so. In practical terms, we also know that if you do wash your hair with lime, or even clump it into a mass with mud or clay, it will either temporarily or permanently tend to bleach it out and make it look lighter, especially to Roman eyes, where dark hair is certainly the norm as opposed to the blond and red hair one finds more in northern Europe.
What all this boils down to, is that the cliche look of a nordic or celtish warrior with a beard or drooping moustache, long hair streaming in the wind or slicked into a style of some kind with lime wash, is probably not too far off what they would have really looked like, even though there is little documentation to actually say for a fact that this was the case.
Al
Alan Bradbury
