ABSTRACT
There is no doubt that intensive husbandry of animals was practised in both Gaul and Britain during the Celtic Iron Age. The Celts were so good at stock-raising that the Greek geographer Strabo had occasion to comment: ‘They have such enormous flocks of sheep and herds of swine that they afford a plenteous supply of sagi [woollen coats] and salt meat, not only to Rome but to most parts of Italy’.5 The vernacular sources of Ireland and Wales show us a Celtic society which relied on its cattle, sheep and pigs and in which a cow or a pig represented wealth.
