The Demetae were a Celtic people of Iron Age and Roman period, who inhabited modern Pembrokeshire and Carmarthenshire in south-west Wales. The tribe also gave their name to the medieval Kingdom of Dyfed, the modern area and county of Dyfed and the distinct dialect of Welsh spoken in modern south-west Wales, Dyfedeg.

A date for the arrival of the Demetae in the region cannot be pinpointed with any accuracy, but they were probably part of the first or second wave of Celtic immigrants into Britain, arriving from around 750 BC onwards and perhaps reaching the west coast in the fourth century BC.

Demetia certainly bore the Romanised form of its name throughout the fourth and fifth centuries. Its early centre was at Castell Dwyran (in Carmarthenshire, roughly halfway between Carmarthen and Haverfordwest).

Demetae. Indigenous British tribe of the Iron Age and Roman periods whose territory covered Pembrokeshire and much of Carmarthenshire in south-west Wales. The Demetae appear not to have been intensively garrisoned by the Roman army, except along their eastern border, which may have been to protect them from their hostile neighbours the Silures.

The Kingdom of Dyfed (Welsh pronunciation: ['dəvɛd]), one of several Welsh petty kingdoms that emerged in 5th-century sub-Roman Britain in southwest Wales, was based on the former territory of the Demetae (modern Welsh Dyfed).

The southwest quadrant was called Demetae, comprising what was later known as Dyfed and Ystrad Tywy. It was ruled from Menevia by Caradog ap Einudd of c. 220, an older half-brother of Eudaf Hen and Geraint.

Mar 22, 2024 · The Demetae quickly became a civitas and their capital was founded at Carmarthen. Ironically, while the other Welsh tribes ultimately disappeared, swallowed up by the Romans, the more peaceful Demetae were the only tribe to survive the Roman conquest intact.

During the Late Pre-Roman Iron-Age the Demetae tribe inhabited a territory roughly equatable with the modern county of Dyfed in south-west Wales. There are only two places of note in the Roman administrative district, both of which are attributed to the tribe by Ptolemy (vide supra).

Information on the Demetae Tribe of Celtic society before and during the time of Roman Britain

Demetae. The name of the Demetae is derived from that of their patron warrior deity Demotos which literally means the god of mead, or the god of drunkenness. A warrior deity, linked to the ancient Celtic practice of getting drunk before going to battle.