Spearthrower
Thrower of spears
You are totally right cbrxkhan - of course they didnt call themselves the Celts!
I dont think that's an issue..... even with modern day nations and ethnic groups, the adjective we use in English (or any other language) is not the name they call themselves.
Nor does calling them all "Celts" imply any ethnic unity.... culture does not require people to have the same genes to share it! This is the crux of this issue and in fact of this thread - anachronous thought! It is really hard to fully imagine what Europe would have been like with no political/ethnic borders, but tiny chiefdoms littered across from atlantic to the middle east. Just as it is hard for people who have been educated to believe that Charlemagne was French to accept that this is an anachronistic and totally untenable concept (especially given that the Franks originated in modern day Germany) that speaks more of nationalistic education systems than of historical reality. HRE is a political entity, not an ethnic one.
What's in a name? A rose by any other name may welll smell as sweet.... but there'll always be people who argue that it doesn't because it's not a "rose".

Nor does calling them all "Celts" imply any ethnic unity.... culture does not require people to have the same genes to share it! This is the crux of this issue and in fact of this thread - anachronous thought! It is really hard to fully imagine what Europe would have been like with no political/ethnic borders, but tiny chiefdoms littered across from atlantic to the middle east. Just as it is hard for people who have been educated to believe that Charlemagne was French to accept that this is an anachronistic and totally untenable concept (especially given that the Franks originated in modern day Germany) that speaks more of nationalistic education systems than of historical reality. HRE is a political entity, not an ethnic one.
What's in a name? A rose by any other name may welll smell as sweet.... but there'll always be people who argue that it doesn't because it's not a "rose".