Historic cultures often inspire modern artists and are reimagined for consumption as popular culture. The Celts are no exception. While attempts at genuine historical portrayals of Celtic history and culture are rare, the recent television series Brittania being a notable exception, Celtic mythology, folklore, and symbology fascinate modern audiences. This article explores how Celtic culture is represented in modern popular culture.
What Is “Celtic” in This Context?
Before elaborating on the influence of the historical Celts in popular culture, it must be noted that modern interpretations of who the Celts were are often significantly divorced from the historical reality. The Celts are popularly associated with magic, the fey, mystical connections to nature, the trope of the “noble barbarian,” and other fantastical associations that have been muddled with approximations to the Anglo-Saxons, Vikings, and the other cultures of medieval Europe.
The blurred vision of the Celtic past was largely created by 19th-century Romantic reconstructions of British history. While the historical Celts certainly did engage in ritual practice that relied on a strong spiritual connection with nature, we know very little about their actual beliefs and folklore due to a lack of written sources from the period.
What we know today about Celtic society, mythology, and beliefs has been pieced together from sources written by the ancient Greeks and Romans, as well as Christian medieval sources written centuries after Celtic peoples were the primary inhabitants of Britain and Ireland. It cannot be assumed that references to the Celts and their folklore in modern media are based on historical reality. Rather, they are often highly romanticized visions of the Celtic past.
Popular Fiction Influenced by Celtic History and Folklore
Several works of literature, particularly in the fantasy fiction genre, tap into Celtic folklore as a source of worldbuilding inspiration. Some of the most well-known include J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings series and C.S. Lewis’s Chronicles of Narnia series. Even though Tolkien himself was an English nationalist and expressed a general dislike of all things “Celtic,” elements of Celtic folklore and Irish legend are undeniably present in his work. The languages of Middle-earth are rooted in Irish and Welsh. Scholars have identified multiple areas where he was influenced by Irish and Welsh legends, such as the Noldorin Elves resembling the Irish Tuatha Dé Danann, their sanctuary of Rivendell recalling Tír na nÓg, the Undying Lands echoing the Immrama tales, and the tale of Beren and Lúthien paralleling that of the Welsh Mabinogion.
C.S. Lewis, on the other hand, was born in Ireland and vocally expressed a love for Ireland’s history, culture, and landscape. The influence of Irish fairy stories is palpable in his series, and he cited the Mourne Mountains in County Down as his inspiration for the idea of Narnia. Other examples of literature influenced by Celtic folklore include Darren Shan’s Bec, Katherine Kerr’s The Deverry Cycle, and Sarah J. Maas’s use of the Fae realm in her Throne of Glass, A Court of Thorns and Roses, and Crescent City series.
The Celts in Movies and Television
Many movies and television shows have incorporated Celtic themes and legends. As discussed above, the British historical fantasy drama Britannia is one of the only examples of a recent television show that has reached a large audience to feature depictions of historical Celts and events in Iron Age Britain. The show is certainly a dramatization of the Roman invasion of Britain and is not entirely historically accurate, but the show presents a unique example of Celtic society being depicted in a Game of Thrones-esque manner.
Animated films like Brave and Song of the Sea draw on Celtic folklore. Brave utilizes will-o’-the-wisps from Scottish mythology, referencing the Celtic bear goddess Artio, who was worshiped by the Helvettii tribe. It also frequently references Celtic and Pictish iconography and art styles in its design. Song of the Sea follows the story of a young Irish boy that discovers that his sister is a selkie who must free faerie creatures from the Celtic goddess Macha.
Further examples of media inspired by Celtic myths from Ireland and Scotland, as well as Arthurian legends, which originated in Wales and were influenced by existing Celtic mythology, include The Secret of Roan Inish, The Mists of Avalon, Camelot, Outlander, and The Water Horse. A few films have been made centering Boudica, the famed warrior queen of the Iceni tribe in Britain. The most notable recent examples are the 2003 TV movie Warrior Queen and the 2023 film Boudica: Queen of War.
The Celts in Video Games and Tabletop Gaming
There are a few notable examples of Celtic characters appearing in video games. Boudica is referenced in Civilization IV: Beyond the Sword as leader of the Celts, and Assassin’s Creed: Valhalla, where players can explore “Boudicca’s Tomb” in East Anglia. Assassin’s Creed: Valhalla also received an expansion pack titled “Wrath of the Druids,” which allows players to “explore the haunted wilds and beautiful landscapes of Ireland as [they] battle a druidic cult known as the Children of Danu.” Other appearances of Celtic influence and mythology in video games include Clan O’Conall and the Crown of the Stag, Folklore, and King Arthur: The Role-Playing Wargame.
One area of gaming that has long looked to the Celtic world for inspiration is Dungeons & Dragons, a popular fantasy tabletop role-playing game that was first published in 1974. One of the most obviously Celtic-influenced aspects of D&D is the presence of Druids as a playable character class. These characters use nature-themed magic and are known for their strong connection to the natural world. Baldur’s Gate, a series of video games based on a D&D role-playing campaign, features a Druid’s Grove. Creatures from Celtic mythology that can be found in the D&D world include banshees, bodaks, the cailleach bheur, kelpies, and púcas.
Celtic Influence in Modern Music
Celtic music, otherwise known as Celtic fusion, refers to modern music that incorporates “Celtic” themes and influences. The genre includes music that borrows from any of the musical traditions of the so-called “Celtic nations,” which refers to the lands of Brittany, Cornwall, Ireland, the Isle of Man, Scotland, and Wales. As such, this music often has a “traditional feel” that is rooted in folklore.
Some sub-genres that fall under the umbrella include Irish folk music, Celtic rock, and Celtic punk. Some major names in Celtic music include Flogging Molly, The Irish Rovers, The Corrs, The Chieftains, Celtic Woman, Enya, Lúnasa, and The Dubliners.
While Celtic music is, at its core, rooted in tradition, how that tradition manifests in the messaging of the music varies. Certain Celtic music artists, like Celtic Woman and Enya, produce music that has a fantastical, whimsical quality aligned with folklore and romantic visions of the past. Other groups, like Flogging Molly and The Dubliners, focus their musical messaging on Irish politics, history, and socio-economic issues. That there is space for both sub-genres under one broader umbrella of “Celtic” reflects the intertwined nature of Ireland’s present and its Celtic past. Born out of the 19th-century Celtic Revival movement, Irish nationalism has a long history of looking to the ancient Celts as Ireland’s origin. Irish nationalist movements, therefore, have embraced Celtic lore and iconography, and utilize it in messages of Irish liberation.
Celtic Tattoos
Finally, Celtic symbols and iconography have become a popular subject for modern-day tattoos. Some of the most popular designs include “Celtic” knotwork, spirals, animal or nature-inspired imagery, and Celtic crosses. The most common reason that people request Celtic style tattoos is ancestral: they somehow identify with having Celtic ancestry and wish to reflect their pride in these cultural ties.
The trouble with Celtic tattoos is that they often have little to do with the historical Celts, and everything to do with modern signaling regarding ancestry and identity politics. Art historian Maggie M. Williams, who has researched tattooing as an art medium, has said of Celtic tattoos: “An image of the past rests on the surface to remind collectors and viewers that the tattooed person is eternally connected to an Irishness that spans millennia.” The emphasis, therefore, is placed on Irishness rather than Celtic-ness.
Those that get Celtic tattoos may also see themselves as participating in a tradition that the Celts themselves participated in, as there are mentions of the historical Celts tattooing themselves in ancient Greek and Roman sources.
For many tattoo artists that design Celtic-style tattoos, the “Celtic Irishness” embodied by these tattoos references the themes of strength, passion, storytelling, and legends. Some Celtic tattoo artists have leaned into the idea that the primary purpose of these tattoos is to signify pride in one’s ancestry and not necessarily to convey the same meaning that these images held for the Celtic and medieval audiences that would have originally seen them. Curiously, several Ireland-based tattoo shops have shared that a large portion of their clients that ask for Celtic tattoos are Americans that claim Irish ancestry.
