Related Research Articles
In Gallo-Roman religion, Rosmerta was a goddess of fertility and abundance, her attributes being those of plenty such as the cornucopia. Rosmerta is attested by statues, and by inscriptions. In Gaul she was often depicted with the Roman god Mercury as her consort, but is sometimes found independently.
In Gallo-Roman religion, Arduinna was the eponymous tutelary goddess of the Ardennes Forest and region, thought to be represented as a huntress riding a boar. Her cult originated in the Ardennes region of present-day Belgium, Luxembourg, and France. She was identified with the Roman goddess Diana.
Artio was a Celtic bear goddess. Evidence of her worship has notably been found at Bern. Her name is derived from the Gaulish word for "bear", artos.
In Celtic polytheism, Belisama was a goddess worshipped in Gaul. She is identified with Minerva in the interpretatio romana.
Brigit, Brigid or Bríg is a goddess of pre-Christian Ireland. She appears in Irish mythology as a member of the Tuatha Dé Danann, the daughter of the Dagda and wife of Bres, with whom she had a son named Ruadán. She is associated with the spring season, fertility, healing, poetry and smithcraft. Cormac's Glossary, written in the 10th century by Christian monks, says that Brigid was "the goddess whom poets adored" and that she had two sisters: Brigid the healer and Brigid the smith. This suggests she may have been a triple deity.
Coventina was a Romano-British goddess of wells and springs. She is known from multiple inscriptions at one site in Northumberland county of England, an area surrounding a wellspring near Carrawburgh on Hadrian's Wall. It is possible that other inscriptions, two from Hispania and one from Narbonensis, refer to Coventina, but this is disputed.
In Gallo-Roman religion, Loucetios was a Gallic god known from the Rhine-Moselle region, where he was invariably identified with the Roman Mars. Scholars have interpreted his name to mean ‘lightning’. Mars Loucetius was worshipped alongside the goddess Nemetona.
In Gallo-Roman religion, Bricta or Brixta was a Gaulish goddess who was a consort of Luxovius, god of the waters of Luxeuil-les-Bains. Nicholson (1999) has suggested however that if "Bricta is a title incorporating Bríg, it may actually be a title assigned to Sirona rather than a separate goddess".
In Celtic mythology, Nantosuelta is the goddess of nature, the earth, fire and fertility.
In localised Celtic polytheism practised in Great Britain, Sulis was a deity worshipped at the thermal spring of Bath. She was worshipped by the Romano-British as Sulis Minerva, whose votive objects and inscribed lead tablets suggest that she was conceived of both as a nourishing, life-giving mother goddess, and as an effective agent of curses wished by her votaries.
In Gallo-Roman religion, Sucellus or Sucellos was a deity depicted as carrying a large mallet and also an olla and/or barrel. Originally a Celtic deity, his cult flourished not only among Gallo-Romans, but also to some extent among the neighbouring peoples of Raetia and Britain. He has been associated with agriculture and wine, particularly in the territory of the Aedui.
The Viducasses or Viducassii were a Gallic tribe of Gallia Lugdunensis.
In ancient Celtic polytheism, Latis is the name of two Celtic deities worshipped in Roman Britain. One is a goddess, the other a god, and they are both known from a single inscription each.
Satiada was a Celtic goddess worshipped in Roman Britain. She is known from a single, unadorned altar-stone dedicated to her at Chesterholm (Vindolanda). The inscription reads:
Icovellauna was a Celtic goddess worshipped in Gaul. Her places of worship included an octagonal temple at Le Sablon in Metz, originally built over a spring, from which five inscriptions dedicated to her have been recovered; and Trier, where Icovellauna was honoured in an inscription in the Altbachtal temple complex. Both of these places lie in the valley of the Moselle river of eastern Gaul, in what are now Lorraine in France and Rhineland-Palatinate in Germany. One such inscription was, somewhat unusually, inscribed on a copper tablet in Roman cursive letters.
Lenus was a Celtic healing god worshipped mainly in eastern Gaul, where he was almost always identified with the Roman god Mars. He was an important god of the Treveri tribe, who had large sanctuaries at medicinal springs at Trier and the Martberg by Pommern in what is now Germany. Two dedications to him are also known from southwestern Britain. Edith Wightman characterizes him as “one of the best examples of a Teutates, or god of the people, equated with Mars—protector of the tribe in battle, but also [...] bestower of health and general good fortune” (p. 211). His sanctuary ‘Am Irminenwingert’ at Trier had a large temple, baths, smaller shrines and a theatre; that on the Martberg also included a large variety of buildings, probably including rooms for health-seeking pilgrims to stay. Despite his associations with healing, Lenus Mars is depicted classically as a warrior with Corinthian helmet in a bronze statuette from the Martberg.
Moritasgus is a Celtic epithet for a healing god found in four inscriptions at Alesia. In two inscriptions, he is identified with the Greco-Roman god Apollo. His consort was the goddess Damona.
Litavis is a Gallic deity whose cult is primarily attested in east-central Gaul during the Roman period. She was probably an earth-goddess.
The gods and goddesses of the pre-Christian Celtic peoples are known from a variety of sources, including ancient places of worship, statues, engravings, cult objects and place or personal names. The ancient Celts appear to have had a pantheon of deities comparable to others in Indo-European religion, each linked to aspects of life and the natural world. By a process of syncretism, after the Roman conquest of Celtic areas, these became associated with their Roman equivalents, and their worship continued until Christianization. Pre-Roman Celtic art produced few images of deities, and these are hard to identify, lacking inscriptions, but in the post-conquest period many more images were made, some with inscriptions naming the deity. Most of the specific information we have therefore comes from Latin writers and the archaeology of the post-conquest period. More tentatively, links can be made between ancient Celtic deities and figures in early medieval Irish and Welsh literature, although all these works were produced well after Christianization.
Anvallus was a Gaulish god, known from several public inscriptions at Augustodunum (Autun). Two Latin inscriptions on altars were dedicated by gutuatres in requital of vows; both such dedications began with the formula Aug(usto) sacr(um). The title gutuater is typically understood to mean 'priest'; the gutuatres have at times been taken to be Romanized continuations of the druids. These altars were both discovered in 1900 on the site of Autun's railway station, along with a Greek-style helmet of thin bronze that would have been left there as a votive offering.
References
- ↑ Roman-britain.org
- ↑ Xavier Delamarre (2003), Dictionnaire de la langue gauloise, p.256.
 | This article relating to a Celtic myth or legend is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. |