Page "Boii" Paragraph 5

The " cow " derivation depends most immediately on the Old Irish legal term for " outsider :" amboue, from proto-Celtic * ambouios, " not a cattle owner.

" In a reference to the first known historical Boii, Polybius relates that their wealth consisted of cattle and gold, that they depended on agriculture and war, and that a man's status depended on the number of associates and assistants he had.

The latter were presumably the * ambouii, as opposed to the man of status, who was * bouvios, a cattle owner, and the * bouii were originally a class, " the cattle owners.