The Decantae were a people of ancient

Britain Britain most often refers to: * Great Britain, a large island comprising the countries of England, Scotland and Wales * The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, a sovereign state in Europe comprising Great Britain and the north-eas ...

, known only from a single mention of them by the

geographer A geographer is a physical scientist, social scientist or humanist whose area of study is geography, the study of Earth's natural environment and human society, including how society and nature interacts. The Greek prefix "geo" means "earth" a ...

Ptolemy Claudius Ptolemy (; , ; ; – 160s/170s AD) was a Greco-Roman mathematician, astronomer, astrologer, geographer, and music theorist who wrote about a dozen scientific treatises, three of which were important to later Byzantine science, Byzant ...

c. 150. From his general description and the approximate locations of their neighbors, their territory was along the western coast of the

Moray Firth The Moray Firth (; , or ) is a roughly triangular inlet (or firth) of the North Sea, north and east of Inverness, which is in the Highland council area of the north of Scotland. It is the largest firth in Scotland, stretching from Duncans ...

, in the area of the

Cromarty Firth The Cromarty Firth (; ; literally "kyles traitsof Cromarty") is an arm of the Moray Firth in Scotland. Geography The entrance to the Cromarty Firth is guarded by two precipitous headlands; the one on the north high and the one on the ...

. Ptolemy does not provide them with a town or principal place. The name has a base either in the

Celtic Celtic, Celtics or Keltic may refer to: Language and ethnicity *pertaining to Celts, a collection of Indo-European peoples in Europe and Anatolia **Celts (modern) *Celtic languages **Proto-Celtic language *Celtic music *Celtic nations Sports Foot ...

root *''deko-'', meaning "good" or "the best". or *''dekan-'' meaning "ten". There were similarly named peoples in Wales, the Deceangli and in

Liguria Liguria (; ; , ) is a Regions of Italy, region of north-western Italy; its Capital city, capital is Genoa. Its territory is crossed by the Alps and the Apennine Mountains, Apennines Mountain chain, mountain range and is roughly coextensive with ...

, the Deciates, as well as a

Gaulish Gaulish is an extinct Celtic languages, Celtic language spoken in parts of Continental Europe before and during the period of the Roman Empire. In the narrow sense, Gaulish was the language of the Celts of Gaul (now France, Luxembourg, Belgium, ...

personal name ''Decantilla''.X. Delamarre, ''Noms de personnes celtiques dans l'épigraphie classique'', Errance, Paris (2007)

References

* {{Scotland during the Roman Empire Historical Celtic peoples Picts Tribes mentioned by Ptolemy