The Celts (1978 TV series)

Not to be confused with The Celts (1987 TV series) or The Celts (2000 TV series).

'The Celts' is a 1978 television series produced by BBC Wales.[1]

Episodes

1. "Dawn of a Culture"[2][3]
2. "Years of Affluence"[4]
3. "Secrets of the Gods"[5]
4. "Heroes in Defeat"[6]

4 parts of 25 minutes, made by and only ever shown on BBC Wales, narrated by David Parry-Jones.

Reception

Bernard Davies of Broadcast penned a mostly negative review of the show. He said it "adorn[ed] its topic rather more than to explain it" and "inefficiently informative". He praised it for "the remarkable way in which it re-sensitised one's somewhat atrophied taste-buds to the achievements of Celtic peoples".[7] The Evening Standard television critic Celia Brayfield praised the show as "almost invariably fascinating" and said "this piece of archaeological detective work should be well worth overcoming our prejudices to see".[8] The Daily Telegraph's Sean Day-Lewis called the programme disorganised and found it "untidy in minor matters like the identification of speakers and left the major issue of where the Celts originated in a kind of Celtic twilight somewhere the plains of Hungary". He thought Emyr Humphreys's script was "a bit free with its generalisations".[9]

References

1. "BBC One Wales - Schedules, Sunday 12 November 1978". BBC. Archived from the original on 2025-01-07.
2. "The Celts [Series 1] [sic - This is listed alongside the later and otherwise unrelated 1987 series of the same name]". Archived from the original on 2023-02-09.
3. "(BBC Scripts Archive) File T5/83/49 - The Celts: 1. Dawn of Culture". The National Library of Wales. Archived from the original on 2025-01-17. The Celts: 1. Dawn of Culture. First broadcast: 29 October 1978. [..] BBC television script for The Celts: 1. Dawn of Culture.
4. "(BBC Scripts Archive) File T5/83/50 - The Celts: 2. The Years of Affluence". The National Library of Wales. Archived from the original on 2025-01-17. The Celts: 2. The Years of Affluence. First broadcast: 20 October 1978. [..] BBC television script for The Celts: 2. The Years of Affluence.
5. "(BBC Scripts Archive) File T5/83/51 - The Celts: 3. The Secrets of the Gods". The National Library of Wales. Archived from the original on 2025-01-17. The Celts: 3. The Secrets of the Gods. First broadcast: 12 November 1978. [..] BBC television script for The Celts: 3. The Secrets of the Gods.
6. "(BBC Scripts Archive) File T5/83/52 - The Celts: 4. Heroes in Defeat". The National Library of Wales. Archived from the original on 2025-01-17. The Celts: 4. Heroes in Defeat. First broadcast: 19 November 1978. [..] BBC television script for The Celts: 4. Heroes in Defeat.
7. Davies, Bernard (1975-06-09). "One Man's Television". Broadcast. No. 814. p. 19. ProQuest 1776921097.
8. Brayfield, Celia (1975-05-28). "Programme guide compiled by Celia Brayfield". Evening Standard. ProQuest 2712585962. Archived from the original on 2025-01-18. Retrieved 2025-01-18 – via Newspapers.com.
9. Day-Lewis, Sean (1975-05-29). "Television: Girl of compassion in Vietnam war". The Daily Telegraph. Archived from the original on 2025-01-18. Retrieved 2025-01-18 – via Newspapers.com.