Celts and Greeks around Marseille, Who’s who ?
Résumé
The question of the ethnicity of the populations surrounding the Greek Marseilles offers an excellent laboratory to analyse how different approaches have been used by different researchers in order to interpret the same cultural markers, especially if they were classical archaeologists or pre- or protohistorians. Concepts such as hellenisation, acculturation, together with tribe names and archaeological evidence have been used in order to define groups or evidence of interaction. With the passing of the time it appears that very few elements can be considered as key markers of ethnicity. In this paper I shall explore how theoretical and analytical approaches changed through time in highlighting what matters in terms of ethnic definition in the archaeological and historical record, especially as regards the relationship between the Greek newcomers and the locals in the area of Marseille between the 6th and the 1st centuries BC.