The AWMC is collaborating with the Department of Welsh, University of Wales, Aberystwyth, on two of its projects, both directed by Patrick Sims-Williams, Professor of Celtic there (pps@aber.ac.uk).
The first is ‘Ancient Celtic Place-Names in Europe and Asia Minor,’ a five-year project funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council. This team is studying the density and distribution of Celtic names area by area and source by source. One of its aims is a Lexicon of all the Celtic names localized in the Barrington Atlas, and all their work includes cross-references to the Atlas data. They have already published two databases on CD-ROM (a PC or Macintosh with Microsoft Word is needed):
- The Antonine Itinerary Land Routes by G.R. Isaac, CMCS Publications 2002.
- Place-Names in Ptolemy’s Geography, CMCS Publications, 2004.
The Ptolemy CD (which costs £12 sterling or $18) includes the Antonine Itinerary database as an appendix. In 2000 the project published the book Ptolemy: Towards A Linguistic Atlas of the Earliest Celtic Place-Names of Europe, edited by David N. Parsons and Patrick Sims-Williams (CMCS PUblications, £12/$18).
The second project, funded by the British Academy, is ‘Celtic Compound Names in the Latin Inscriptions of the Roman Empire.’ This project aims to analyze and map the distribution of this most distinctive type of Celtic personal name (about 950 names), and to edit and translate the relevant inscriptions.
