Aside from proper names and a few short inscriptions written in Etruscan, Greek or Latin, little remains to document the Celtic language. Important examples of the Celtic linguistic residual — evidence of the great geographical expansion of these peoples — are the names of European cities:London (Londiniom), Vienna (Vindobona), Milan (Mediolanum), Lyon (Lugdunum), Verdun (Virodunum), Kempeten (Cambodunum) and Dublin. In the 1st century AD, Continental Celtic, spoken in Gaul, disappeared, overtaken by the Latin of the Roman invaders. Only a few dialects of Insular Celtic remain, divided into two groups:
1) Britonic, which comprises Breton or Armoric, Cornish and Welsh.
2) Gaelic or Goidelic, which comprises Irish, Scottish or "erse" and Manese.
All Celtic languages use the Roman alphabet. Breton is spoken today in French Brittany. The period of greatest splendor of the Breton language corresponds to the middle of the 17th century. In this period, grammars were written and a large body of plays, literature and ballads emerged.
Cornish, the language of Cornish, disappeared in the 18th century, although recent efforts have been made to revive it. From documents written in the Cornish language there remain some glosses from the 9th century, a vocabulary from the 12th century and religious dramas from the 16th and 17th centuries.
Welsh — also called Cambrian and Cimbrian by its own speakers — is the dialect of the region of Wales and one of the best-known variants of the Celtic language. It is divided into Old, Middle and Modern Welsh (see Welsh Literature).
Irish, also called Irish-Gaelic, is the oldest language of the Gaelic group. In the Republic of Ireland it is a co-official language (see Irish Literature).
In the 5th century CE, the Irish invaded Scotland and took a variety of Gaelic that replaced the old Brythonic language. During the 15th century, Scots became a different language from Irish and gained the status of a language (see Scottish Literature).
Finally, Manese is a Gaelic-Scottish dialect, heavily influenced by Scandinavian languages, spoken on the Isle of Man, located between England and Ireland.
In the second half of the 18th century, a new interest in continuing the exploration of the New World and expanding knowledge about the gigantic domains of the Spanish Crown in America developed in Spain. This phenomenon will cause a large sending of scientific expeditions, trips or commissions to A