- All four buste-socles found at Paule, Côtes-d'Armor.
- Decapitated buste-socle from Plounévez-Lochrist, Finistère.
- A herm-type buste-socle from Trémuson, Côtes-d'Armor.
A buste-socle [a] is a type of Iron Age stone statue found in France. Most buste-socles have been found within Armorica (a historical region of Gaul, roughly modern day Brittany), though examples have been found in central and southern France. The statues are busts of male figures which sit on an unworked square base (or socle ). These bases were perhaps intended to be buried. The statues have been dated to within the later La Tène period. [1] : 59 [2] : 393–395 [3] : 294
Excavations at Paule, Côtes-d'Armor between 1988 and 1997 found four buste-socles. A lyre-playing figure with a torc, named the Bard of Paule, is perhaps the best known buste-socle. [1] : 59 It is from the examples found at Paule that archaeologist Yves Menez (in a 1999 article) defined this type. [3] : 294
Buste-socles usually have a height upwards of 20cm and less than 1 metre. [2] : 393 The largest known buste-socle (found in Bozouls, Aveyron) measures 95 cm. [1] : 61 On some buste-socles the arms and torso are rendered and on others only the head is (as on a herm). Of those with arms, some have their arms pressed flat against the torso while others hold items. The Bard of Paule holds a lyre and the buste-socle from Bozouls wields a dagger. [2] : 393, 400
Several buste-socles have been found in archaeological contexts that suggest they were recipients of devotion. A buste-socle found in Tour Magne , Nîmes was mounted in a box into which coins had been thrown. [1] : 61 A granite buste-socle found in La Vraie-Croix, Morbihan was ploughed up next to a Roman altar, suggesting that such devotion extended into Roman times. [1] : 91 However, one buste-socle from Molesme, Côte-d'Or appears to have been part of a late La Tène sanctuary complex and then deliberately buried during the reign of Tiberius. [1] : 61, 223
What these statues were intended to depict is not certain. [3] : 294 Menez has suggested the Paule buste-socles were intended as ancestor portraits. [2] : 357 Armelle Duceppe-Lamarre has suggested a Levroux, Indre buste-socle, buried in the 1st century BC with a polisher and a deer antler, was intended to depict a god (with the polisher and deer antler intended as that god's attributes). [3] : 294, 307
In ancient Celtic and Gallo-Roman religion, Cernunnos or Carnonos is a god depicted with antlers, seated cross-legged, and is associated with stags, horned serpents, dogs and bulls. He is usually shown holding or wearing a torc and sometimes holding a bag of coins and a cornucopia. He is believed to have originally been a Proto-Celtic God. There are more than fifty depictions and inscriptions referring to him, mainly in the north-eastern region of Gaul.
Brittany is a peninsula, historical country and cultural area in the north-west of modern France, covering the western part of what was known as Armorica in Roman Gaul. It became an independent kingdom and then a duchy before being united with the Kingdom of France in 1532 as a province governed as a separate nation under the crown. Brittany is the traditional homeland of the Breton people and is one of the six Celtic nations, retaining a distinct cultural identity that reflects its history.
In Celtic polytheism, Sirona was a goddess worshipped predominantly in East Central Gaul and along the Danubian limes. A healing deity, she was associated with healing springs; her attributes were snakes and eggs. She was sometimes depicted with Apollo Grannus or Apollo Borvo. She was particularly worshipped by the Treveri in the Moselle Valley.
Boulogne-sur-Mer, often called just Boulogne, is a coastal city in Northern France. It is a sub-prefecture of the department of Pas-de-Calais. Boulogne lies on the Côte d'Opale, a touristic stretch of French coast on the English Channel between Calais and Normandy, and the most visited location in the region after the Lille conurbation. Boulogne is its department's second-largest city after Calais, and the 183rd-largest in France. It is also the country's largest fishing port, specialising in herring.
Saint-Brieuc is a city in the Côtes-d'Armor department in Brittany in northwestern France.
Saint Laurent, Saint-Laurent, St. Laurent or St-Laurent may refer to:
Les Plus Beaux Villages de France is an independent association created in 1982 for the promotion of the tourist appeal of small rural villages with a rich cultural heritage. As of 2024, it numbers 176 member villages. It is affiliated to the international association The Most Beautiful Villages in the World.
Pigüé is a town in Argentina located in the Pampas, 584 km (363 mi) south-west of Buenos Aires. It was founded by 165 Occitan-speaking French immigrants from Aveyron and one Argentine of direct Irish descent on December 4, 1884. The urban population is now 13,822 and has increased by 9.5% since the 1991 census. Pigüé is the administrative centre of Saavedra Partido, Buenos Aires Province.
Prehistoric France is the period in the human occupation of the geographical area covered by present-day France which extended through prehistory and ended in the Iron Age with the Roman conquest, when the territory enters the domain of written history.
The Vix Grave is a burial mound near the village of Vix in northern Burgundy. The broader site is a prehistoric Celtic complex from the Late Hallstatt and Early La Tène periods, consisting of a fortified settlement and several burial mounds.
A gold lunula was a distinctive type of late Neolithic, Chalcolithic, and—most often—early Bronze Age necklace, collar, or pectoral shaped like a crescent moon. Most are from Prehistoric Ireland. They are normally flat and thin, with roundish spatulate terminals that are often twisted to 45 to 90 degrees from the plane of the body. Gold lunulae fall into three distinct groups, termed Classical, Unaccomplished and Provincial by archaeologists. Most have been found in Ireland, but there are moderate numbers in other parts of Europe as well, from Great Britain to areas of the continent fairly near the Atlantic coasts. Although no lunula has been directly dated, from associations with other artefacts it is thought they were being made sometime in the period between 2400 and 2000 BC; a wooden box associated with one Irish find has recently given a radiocarbon dating range of 2460–2040 BC.
Ailleville is a commune in the Aube department in the Grand Est region of northern-central France.
Armand Dayot,, was a French art critic, art historian and leftist politician. He was born in Paimpol, Côtes-d'Armor, Brittany. He founded the journal L'Art et les artistes and the Breton liberal organisation les Bleus de Bretagne.
Émile Nestor Joseph Carlier, called Joseph Carlier, was a French sculptor.
The Larzac tablet is a lead curse tablet found in 1983 in the commune of L'Hospitalet-du-Larzac, Aveyron, southern France. It is now kept in the museum of Millau. It bears one of the most important inscriptions in the Gaulish language.
Roland Doré was a 17th-century sculptor and his workshop or "atelier" produced many sculptures for the enclos paroissiaux or "parish church enclosure or closes" of Brittany. In particular his work can be seen on calvaries and in the church's south porch. He was born in 1616 and died in 1660. Little detail of his life is known but it is recorded that he practised as an architect in Landerneau, as well as running his workshop, and was recorded as calling himself the "Sculpteur du Roi". His works, all of an ecclesiastical nature, are mainly located in Léon and the north of Cornouaille. They can be taken as works by Doré's workshop rather than just by Doré himself. Brittany is particularly rich in calvaries, some of a very elaborate nature. In most cases the calvary involves both the crucifixion cross and side crosses or gibbets bearing the good and the bad robbers. Below this, on the crosspieces, were statues of those present at the crucifixion. A feature of Breton calvaries is that most of the statues were carved as a pair and effectively back to back. Doré's output was prodigious and he worked on nine monuments in Saint-Thégonnec, five in Logonna-Daoulas and four in the parish of Plougastel-Daoulas. He also received four commissions to work in Hanvec, three in Guiclan, Irvillac and Lampaul-Guimiliau and two commissions in Cléden-Cap-Sizun, Hôpital-Camfrout, Landerneau, La Martyre, Plabennec, Pleyben, Plogonnec, Saint-Nic, Saint-Servais and Saint-Urbain.
The Phoenician Sphinx inscription, also known as the Abdadoni inscription is an inscription found at Umm al-Amad, Lebanon.
The Euffigneix statue or God of Euffigneix is a Celtic stone pillar statue found near Euffigneix, a commune of Haute-Marne, France. The statue has been dated to the 1st century BC, within the Gallo-Roman period. The statue is a human bust with a large relief of a boar on its chest. The boar was a potent symbol for the Celts and the figure has been thought to represent a Gaulish boar-god, perhaps Moccus.
The God of Étang-sur-Arroux is a Gallo-Roman bronze statuette, probably found in the commune of Étang-sur-Arroux, not far from Autun, France.