Talk:Dumnonii

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I have put in the point about Dumnonii being a Roman name, because there is absolutely no evidence to the contrary, but a lot of evidence to support it. Isca Dumnoniorum was the Roman name for the Legionary Garrison and later Civitas at what is now Exeter. There is almost no evidence of significant pre-Roman occupation of the site, though there probably was some settlement in the area. Likewise there is no evidence of any unified tribal kingdom pre-Roman, whereas there are significant differences in pre-Roman Iron Age hillforts and structures, with Dartmoor and Cornwall having significant differences to other areas, and those other areas having strong distinctions. If this is to be changed, some kind of evidence needs to be cited to support the change. The brythonic term for Exeter was Caer Uisk, nothing to do with 'dumnonii' or 'dumnoniorum'.

A further myth is that the Dumnonii provided no resistance to the Romans, this was supposed because the Exeter Garrison was not big enough for a full Legion, and there were 'no other significant sites', In fact, in Devon alone there are at least 15 known military sites inlcuding a vexillation fortress and two other forts on one site at North Tawton - see http://www.roman-britain.org/places/nemetostatio.htm - this concentration of sites, along with the 25 year Military occupation of the second legion Augustus at Exeter, rather give the lie to the myth of the Dumnonii offering no resistance.

--Trotboy 20:28, 5 July 2006 (UTC)

"Caer Uisk" is either modern or middle Welsh, not Brythonic, or at least not the Brythonic that was spoken in the Iron Age, and Uisk is obviously derived from the "Isca" part of "Isca Dumnoniorum", not the "Dumnoniorum" part. The Romans absolutely did not make up names for the people they conquered. They rendered the names those people had for themselves into Latin spelling, which in reality meant little more than changing the Brythonic -os masculine ending to the Latin -us masculine ending, and I have again removed your absurd statement. --Nicknack009 23:45, 5 July 2006 (UTC)

You have still failed to cite anything whatsoever to support your assumption. Unless you were alive in the Iron Age - then there is no evidence whatsoever to support your claim, whereas there is plenty of Archeological evidence to support what I am saying. At the very least, if the Romans did Latinise an existing 'Celtic' Tribal name, then it was that of the Tribe in the area between the Axe and the River Exe, or solely the Exe valley area, since this was their first line of incursion into Devon - evidenced by the string of marching camps along the Eastern edge of the Exe Valley. Certainly it had nothing to do with the Cornish, or the people of Dartmoor or much or North, South and West Devon. 172.200.254.161 08:07, 6 July 2006 (UTC)

"Dumno-" is not a Latin word form. I've searched the Latin dictionaries at Persus and the only words that come up containing the substring "dumn" are Dumnorix, a Gaulish individual, and Geidumni, a Gaulish population group (the related substring "dubn" turns up nothing). It's Celtic. It exists in attested personal names like Togodumnus, Cogidubnus and Dumnovellaunus. I've seen it interpreted as meaning either "deep" or "world". The "-on-" infix is also well known in Celtic languages, appearing in personal, group and deity names to turn a noun or adjective into a proper name - for example, *mapos, son; Maponos, "the" son. "Dumnonii" is empatically not Latin.

The west wasn't politically centralised, it's true, but "Dumnonii" may have been an ethnic name which applied to lots of small political units. By analogy, there were many English kingdoms in the early middle ages, but they all self-identified as "English". Equally, there may have been lots of local chiefdoms which all self-identified as Dumnonii. Alternatively, the Dumnonii may have been a suzereign tribe over a federation of a number of smaller local groups, and thus their name could reasonably be applied beyond the Exe valley area. --Nicknack009 18:24, 6 July 2006 (UTC)

Is the mention of a devon flag really anything to do with this, bbc devon which invented the flag seems to deny this,and though others are using it when talking about ancient brythonic devon/southwest its orignal idea was a rouce of pride and tourism rather than a recognition of any sort of celtic tribe! This would be surely if a dumnonnian flag was invented surely? 131.111.8.104 19:36, 1 December 2005 (UTC) wpm

Stannary parliments? Is this relavent? I thought that the stannary parliments were created just to help the tin industry in these tin rich areas. I know the cornish one was granted additional rights afterwards that could be considered a recognition of legal rights etc. but thats cornwall not dumnonia. I don't know what the situation was for the devon stannaries But I'm farily sure both were originaly just in charge of an industry.

I think this was more a recognition of there being lots of tin rather than of dumnonia. I may edit or remove it.

131.111.8.97

[edit] Citation demanded

User:Setanta747 has restored a demand for a citation. I've tried to explain this to the editor very simply, so that the editor who demands a citation will understand it. In the following sentence, no claim is being made: Another tribe with a similar name but with no known links were the Fir Domnann in the province of Connacht. What would a citation consist of? Now, if a connection were being asserted, then you'd need to know why, and a citation would support the claim. Do you see how that works? Is the issue whether the Fir Domnann existed? Or whether they were in Connaught? Am I missing something? Is it that Fir Domnann mustn't be mentioned? I note that User:Setanta747 has never contributed a single edit to this article. --Wetman 14:06, 30 April 2007 (UTC)

I note that there are several hundred thousand articles that I have never contributed a single edit to. What's your point?

Since you seem to be taking a soapbox style, I'll follow your lead...

User:Wetman edited this article after I had inserted a citation template, and removed the template. As the edit made by the editor didn't satisfy my original rationale for the citation request, I replaced the citation tag. The editor communicated with me quite abrasively on my talk page and I duly offered an explaination, which the editor still appears confused about. Perhaps somebody else could attempt to explain it to him "very simply", so that he will understand it. --Mal 21:09, 4 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Celtic tribe

While I can accept the Dumnonii as a Celtic tribe we are relying on the administration of the Roman province of Britain as our source. In a number of cases the Romans divided or combined local tribes into their administrative civitates. So, referring to the discussion at the top of this talk page, maybe there is some value in pointing out that we don't know of the Dumnonii as a tribe in the ethnological sense prior to Roman occupation, but do know them as a tribe in the (original) sense of a division, and in this case possibly one imposed from above. Anyway, just a thought. Also I've added a big chunk about William Camden. I am recycling other people's work here, but I found it useful, especially in understanding the 'deep valley dweller' thing, and I have indicated Camden as the source of this because I can think of no one older who would have had a knowledge of Celtic languages (simultaneously removing the citation request, which I hope is OK - I think this pretty much covers that particular interpretation of the name). Personally I regard 'deep valley dweller' as an example of folk etymology, seeing as Camden himself regards 'Danmonii' as more proper, somewhat reducing the similarity to Duff-neint, and if anything undermining his own assertion. So I've added the 'people of the land' thing as an alternative, seeing as that was the name of an exhibition of Iron and Bronze Age artifacts in Plymouth Museum when I was a kid, and a more likely explanation of the name in my personal opinion. Stevebritgimp (talk) 01:10, 4 February 2008 (UTC)