The Dagda was the figure on which male humans and other gods were based because he embodied ideal Irish traits. The leader of the gods for the Irish pantheon appears to have been the Dagda. The Tuatha Dé represent the functions of human society such as kingship, crafts and war, while the Fomorians represent chaos and wild nature. What has survived includes material dealing with the Tuatha Dé Danann and the Fomorians, which forms the basis for the text Cath Maige Tuired “The Battle of Mag Tuireadh”, as well as portions of the history-focused Lebor Gabála Érenn (“The Book of Invasions”). As Christianity began to take over, the gods and goddesses were slowly eliminated as such from the culture. The oldest body of myths stemming from the Heroic Age is found only from the early medieval period of Ireland. Indeed, many Gaelic myths were first recorded by Christian monks, albeit without most of their original religious meanings. Rome introduced a more widespread habit of public inscriptions, and broke the power of the druids in the areas it conquered in fact, most inscriptions to deities discovered in Gaul (modern France and Northern Italy), Britain and other formerly (or presently) Celtic-speaking areas post-date the Roman conquest.Īlthough early Gaels in Ireland and parts of modern Wales used the Ogham script to record short inscriptions (largely personal names), more sophisticated literacy was not introduced to Celtic areas that had not been conquered by Rome until the advent of Christianity. Julius Caesar attests to the literacy of the Gauls, but also wrote that their priests, the druids, were forbidden to use writing to record certain verses of religious significance (Caesar, Commentarii de Bello Gallico 6.14) while also noting that the Helvetii had a written census (Caesar, De Bello Gallico 1.29). mythology in Goidelic languages, represented chiefly by Irish mythology (also shared with Scottish Gaelic mythology)Īs a result of the scarcity of surviving materials bearing written Gaulish, it is surmised that the most of the Celtic writings were destroyed by the Romans, although a written form of Gaulish using Greek, Latin and North Italic alphabets was used (as evidenced by votive items bearing inscriptions in Gaulish and the Coligny calendar).Ancient Celtic religion (known primarily through archaeological sources rather than through written mythology).The nature and functions of these ancient gods can be deduced from their names, the location of their inscriptions, their iconography, the Roman gods they are equated with, and similar figures from later bodies of Celtic mythology.Ĭeltic mythology is found in a number of distinct, if related, subgroups, largely corresponding to the branches of the Celtic languages: However, from what has survived of Celtic mythology, it is possible to discern commonalities which hint at a more unified pantheon than is often given credit. Inscriptions of more than three hundred deities, often equated with their Roman counterparts, have survived, but of these most appear to have been genii locorum, local or tribal gods, and few were widely worshiped. Thousands of such wheels have been found in sanctuaries in Gallia Belgica, dating from 50 BCE to 50 CE. National Archaeological Museum, France OverviewĪlthough the Celtic world at its height covered much of western and central Europe, it was not politically unified nor was there any substantial central source of cultural influence or homogeneity as a result, there was a great deal of variation in local practices of Celtic religion (although certain motifs, for example the god Lugh, appear to have diffused throughout the Celtic world). Votive Celtic wheels thought to correspond to the cult of Taranis. The Celtic peoples who maintained either political or linguistic identities (such as the Gaels in Ireland and Scotland, the Welsh in Wales, and the Celtic Britons of southern Great Britain and Brittany) left vestigial remnants of their ancestral mythologies that were put into written form during the Middle Ages. It is mostly through contemporary Roman and Christian sources that their mythology has been preserved. For Celts in close contact with Ancient Rome, such as the Gauls and Celtiberians, their mythology did not survive the Roman Empire, their subsequent conversion to Christianity and the loss of their Celtic languages. Like other Iron Age Europeans, the early Celts maintained a polytheistic mythology and religious structure. Julius Caesar on Celtic gods and their significanceĬeltic mythology is the mythology of Celtic polytheism, the religion of the Iron Age Celts.Remnants of Gaulish and other mythology.
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Humility, Modesty, Chastity, and Temperance.