Celts are not italic

No, the Iberians were considered Iberians, obviously. That the Iberian Peninsula is called that way does not mean it was populated by the Iberians only, just like the Italic Peninsula was not populated exclusively by IE speakers of the Italic branch. There existed other peoples too like Celts, Lusitanians (probably an Italic tribe according to some authors) and the mighty Tartessians. The Iberians were just the peoples that inhabited in the Eastern half of the Iberian peninsula, and thus they were the ones that the Greeks met when they arrived to Spain, hence they called their land "the Iberian peninsula" as they had no clue about other inhabitants like let's say those of the north-western part. There had to be strong similarity between Spanish celts and the Gauls since for example the Romans called nowadays Galicia as "Gallaecia" ("little Gaul"). Also the only tribe that called "Celts" themselves in History was one in South Portugal, the "celtici".



http://www.eupedia.com/forum/threads/26213-Were-the-Iberians-considered-Celtic-by-the-Romans