[Found] Map of Pre-Roman Peoples of Western Europe

[cowrecked]

Came across this hand-drawn map on reddit, drawn by /u/ironandredwoods. There's a lot of detail--it's interesting to see how it compares to the EB2 world map.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

[Hummer]

Where's the eastern portion of the map?

[Morrowgan]

It has no eastern portion since it's focused on western Europe/northern Africa.

[Hummer]

Too bad, it's quite detailed and quite interesting. See if whoever made that can make one for the eastern portion of the Mediterranean...

[NosPortatArma]

ah so beautiful.... this is map porn. i love maps.. someday i will make similar maps myself, hopefully

[hlidskjalf]

what's the reasoning behind the "gaels"?

ah that's armorica. still a little strange

[cowrecked]

Too bad, it's quite detailed and quite interesting. See if whoever made that can make one for the eastern portion of the Mediterranean...

In the thread, the dude said he had plans to do Italy, the Balkans, and Asia Minor next

[Gurewicz]

That's an absolutely beautiful map, I really hope it's accurate.

It's really too bad that EB2 can't add more provinces and factions. Most ancient Rome games don't really capture the number of Celts and the size of their lands.
Having to fight the Celts as the Romans in the beginning of the game should be a huge threat and a scary thing to do.
And being able to play a complicated diplomatic game would be cool too.

Maybe we can hope for a Europa Universalis: Rome 2 someday?

[hlidskjalf]

That's an absolutely beautiful map, I really hope it's accurate.

It's really too bad that EB2 can't add more provinces and factions. Most ancient Rome games don't really capture the number of Celts and the size of their lands.
Having to fight the Celts as the Romans in the beginning of the game should be a huge threat and a scary thing to do.
And being able to play a complicated diplomatic game would be cool too.

Maybe we can hope for a Europa Universalis: Rome 2 someday?

start an arvernoi campaign and try to sack rome within the first 50 turns i try to do it every campaign!

[Nightsh4de]

what a beautiful map, would love to see other regions. I only wonder how boundaries are determined or if its a little arbitrary. also, what year does it reflect?

[Roma_Victrix]

So the western half of Spain and nearly all of Portugal was Western Hispano-Celtic, with the Celtiberians in the north central part of the Iberian peninsula. Aside from them and the Greek and Carthaginian colonies on that peninsula, who exactly were the Iberians? What language did they speak? Were at least some of them even Indo-Europeans? Do we know anything about their languages?

[bigdaddy1204]

I heard that southern Spain was the last place Neanderthals existed before they went extinct, thousands of years ago. Probably long before the time of Ibero-Celts, though.

[Roma_Victrix]

I heard that southern Spain was the last place Neanderthals existed before they went extinct, thousands of years ago. Probably long before the time of Ibero-Celts, though.

This Wiki article here says that it's basically unclassified, with very little evidence for its use textually before its extinction around the 1st century AD.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iberian_language

This article is also very useful, and contains a map similar to the one we have above:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Languages_of_Iberia

[Trarco]

So the western half of Spain and nearly all of Portugal was Western Hispano-Celtic, with the Celtiberians in the north central part of the Iberian peninsula. Aside from them and the Greek and Carthaginian colonies on that peninsula, who exactly were the Iberians?

Just some humble notes in regard with your questions: according to the studies focused on pottery, it's accepted that the Iberization started ca. 600 BC. Since Iberians did not develop a united culture (although they had several features in common) that Iberization varied depending on the region. But in general terms, it can be said that Iberians reached the state stage and developed urbanised cities due to the Mediterranean influences (Greeks, Punics, Tartessians...). The most paradigmatic example would be the Iberian oppidum of Ullastret. At that area (think of the Greek city of Emporion), not for nothing, the Iberian aristocracies experienced some sort of hellenic acculturation. There are a lot of examples of this fact, but they say a picture's worth a thousand words. This is a reenactment of Ullastret (4th century BC).


It can be seen the level of urbanization influenced by the Mediterranean ideas.

What language did they speak? Were at least some of them even Indo-Europeans? Do we know anything about their languages?

-They spoke a non-Indo-European language.

-Turdetans aren't considered Iberians anymore. Some historians think that they spoke a Celtic language but currently that's not easy to prove. In Catalonia there are more evidences of the existence of Indo-European words (personal names, place names...) although in theory, the communities would be Iberian.

-The Iberian language can be read but unfortunately can't be translated yet. There were three different type of scripts and Phoenicians and Greeks were the ones that influenced them. We also know that an Iberian use of the script was based on the writing of lead letters which were used by the Iberian political systems in order to supervise and protected the local trade.

[Roma_Victrix]

A fascinating post, Trarco, +1 rep to you! Yes, I was aware of the urbanization of southern and eastern Iberia before the Romans even stepped foot on the peninsula, thanks largely to the Greek and Carthaginian influence. For instance, when Hannibal besieged Arse (i.e. Saguntum, modern Sagunto, Spain), it was a laborious siege due to the city's extensive and large defensive fortifications. This was the starting point of the Second Punic War as well, so clearly such Iberian settlements existed far outside of the Greek and Carthaginian colonies.

[Raiuga]

Found the original in my pc, searched for the followup. Seem like a great work!

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Credit to the artist for his work. He has more here: https://society6.com/product/la-fran...8275375p4a1v45
You can find more info on https://www.reddit.com/r/MapPorn/comments/9970vo/handdrawn_and_painted_map_of_the_peoples_of/

[Raiuga]

People of Eastern Europe

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

[Jurand of Cracow]

Well, the problem with the map is: it's actually not "according to Ptolemy". It's Ptolemy's list of settlements (we don't have his map, if it ever existed) interpretation by a number of modern historians, and usually not corrected with the recent advancements of this science.

Just a tiny problem example that actually has made some impact on the EBII design.
The city of Calisia. I think it belongs to Lugiones and is indeed called ... and it's placed in today's Poland (more precisely: in Polonia Maior)
As the theory that Calisia is the same city/site that the contemporary city of Kalisz has been rejected by serious historians (based mainly on prof. Kolendo work), it doesn't feature in the history textbooks anymore. We "know" that Calisia was a Roman fort somewhere in Western Sloviakia.
In some more nationalistic textbooks (and also the outdated ones) - yes, Calisia=Kalisz. We were here already in the ancient times! (or preferably earlier, there're so called Turbosłowanie folkloristic historians, brrr). The city of Kalisz is, obviously, not very positive of this research so claims it "some historians think...". And this is replicated in the Wikipedia - guess who is crazy about correcting it to the "some historians think..." I haven't checked it but I can make a safe bet.

If anybody is interested (and I'd be happy if the EBII team would have read it) there's a quite reader-friendly article in Polish, you can just google-translate it.

[Raiuga]

Didn't say it was historical accurate, didn't expected it to be but though it was a good shout to the work.