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Yay! Ranting about inconsequential things in films!

This one is brought to you by a line in Transformers The Last Knight, which reminded me of a line in G I Joe Rise of Cobra.

'Wait a minute, this is celtic!' 'What's fire in celtic?'

NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO. There is no such thing as a Celt. It's a romanticised term from relatively recent history.

There's certainly isn't and never has been a language, written or otherwise, known as celtic. Gaelic? Yes. But which dialect? There's at least four broad ones I can think of (French Gaelic, Irish Gaelic, Scots Gaelic, Welsh Gaelic)...

Just.....

Get it right, Hollywood.

And whilst you're at it, stop giving Archers the order to 'fire'. The correct term would be loose, or shoot. 'Fire' is a command given to black powder weapons, seeing as you need to apply a lit cord or somesuch to take your shot.

Gah. Idiots.

The term is artistic license.


You see it used quite a bit, in films like 300.


Or dare I say it. Braveheart.....


It is also very annoying to a history buff.

There's artistic license and there's just being outright wrong.

Especially Braveheart.

well said.
i know that i prefer as much realism and historical accuracy as possible in my giant transforming robot movies as i can get.

Just an attention to detail is appreciated.

It's Bay-formers they can't even get the Transformer part right let alone the rest


That said to the average person; indeed the average fantasy fan "celtic" is a thing. Granted its reached a point where its rather like elf and dwarf in that its a very generalist term; but in general terms say the word "celtic" and most people have a reasonable similar understand of what you're talking about. Even if it factually incorrect and not a static term (seriously any society that lasts longer than one generation is going to have some pretty diverse changes through its time. A Roman from the early days of Rome is totally different to a Roman from the latter days of the Empire).

Romans that use their Pila as thrusting spears really gets to me.

Plus, Romans with Bracers. That is like Hollywood code for Roman, as apparently, only "civilized" Romans wear Bracers. Except they typically did not!

Dutch people do not speak German, so stop it you witches.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
There's artistic license and there's just being outright wrong.

Especially Braveheart.

Wait, Braveheart is not 100% accurate? What about the scene with the Comanches harassing them as Wallace discovers the Loving - Goodnight trail?

Here we go again!

MDG bringin' the noise!




Is this really a nitpick thread about things that movies get wrong?

Isn't that just about...everything?

No, that's totes legit that scene.

It's just such little things that take no time to get right.

 Easy E wrote:
Romans that use their Pila as thrusting spears really gets to me.

Plus, Romans with Bracers. That is like Hollywood code for Roman, as apparently, only "civilized" Romans wear Bracers. Except they typically did not!

Actually there are recording instances of the pila being used as a spear. Not all of them were designed to bend in the middle.

[3] The Parthians, however, thinking that the Romans dropping on one knee was a sign of fatigue and exhaustion, laid aside their bows, grasped their spears by the middle and came to close quarters. But the Romans, with a full battle cry, suddenly sprang up, and thrusting with their javelins slew the foremost of the Parthians and put all the rest to rout. This happened also on the following days as the Romans, little by little, proceeded on their way.

Plutarch, The Life of Antony, Chapter 45.

 welshhoppo wrote:

 Easy E wrote:
Romans that use their Pila as thrusting spears really gets to me.

Plus, Romans with Bracers. That is like Hollywood code for Roman, as apparently, only "civilized" Romans wear Bracers. Except they typically did not!

Actually there are recording instances of the pila being used as a spear. Not all of them were designed to bend in the middle.

[3] The Parthians, however, thinking that the Romans dropping on one knee was a sign of fatigue and exhaustion, laid aside their bows, grasped their spears by the middle and came to close quarters. But the Romans, with a full battle cry, suddenly sprang up, and thrusting with their javelins slew the foremost of the Parthians and put all the rest to rout. This happened also on the following days as the Romans, little by little, proceeded on their way.

Plutarch, The Life of Antony, Chapter 45.

Yes, but it was exceedingly rare. I am familiar with that story and it is the exception and not the rule.

The Celtic languages of Wales, Cornwall and Brittany aren't Gaelic languages, but Brythonic. Irish, Scottish Gaelic and Manx are Gaelic (or Goidelic) languages.

Gaelic and Brythonic languages are Celtic languages, and they're all part of the Indo-European language family together with English, French, Swedish, Sanskrit, Russian, Greek, Latin, Farsi and lots of other languages.

 Easy E wrote:

 welshhoppo wrote:

 Easy E wrote:
Romans that use their Pila as thrusting spears really gets to me.

Plus, Romans with Bracers. That is like Hollywood code for Roman, as apparently, only "civilized" Romans wear Bracers. Except they typically did not!

Actually there are recording instances of the pila being used as a spear. Not all of them were designed to bend in the middle.

[3] The Parthians, however, thinking that the Romans dropping on one knee was a sign of fatigue and exhaustion, laid aside their bows, grasped their spears by the middle and came to close quarters. But the Romans, with a full battle cry, suddenly sprang up, and thrusting with their javelins slew the foremost of the Parthians and put all the rest to rout. This happened also on the following days as the Romans, little by little, proceeded on their way.

Plutarch, The Life of Antony, Chapter 45.

Yes, but it was exceedingly rare. I am familiar with that story and it is the exception and not the rule.

Additionally, later legionaires did indeed use spears (as did earlier ones pre marian reforms). In the 4th Century they used the spatha sword and Contus thrusting spear, very much in line with what their German mercenaries probably used back home.

One problem with talking about "Romans"

The Roman Empire lasted for hundreds of years over a vast territory. Within that there's huge variation of what was "standard" based on what evidence we have. So its very possible that a casual understanding or level of research could well highlight certain practices that are considered "abnormal" in other areas/generations.

The average person has a very simplistic view of it, they don't study the various ages or Emperors in any great depth so you can get away with huge abuses of the actual fact

Yeah, most "Romans" are late republic or early empire style.

You do get different Romans for different centuries. Early ones basically fought as hoplites, later ones fought as basically barbarian soldiers.


But that's what happens when you try and condense a 2000 year long civilization into a stereotype.

 BrookM wrote:
Dutch people do not speak German, so stop it you witches.

I know! The Dutch speak Afrikaans!

What is the difference between this thread and this thread?

Very little, apparently.

Duplicate thread - closed!