Don’t Know Much About® Mythology (40 page)

At the center of this account is the story of the last race of gods in Ireland, the Tuatha (“tribe,” or “people”), told in a foundation myth known as the Tuatha Dé Danaan. The Tuatha—the “people of the Goddess Danu”—were the fourth of five races that invaded Ireland and fought two battles for supremacy. In the first, they defeated the clumsy Firblogs. The second was against the Fomorians, a race of misshapen, violent, and evil beings who controlled the country. But after defeating the Fomorians, the Tuatha gave them the province of Connacht. Because this account provides a list of most of the divinities that the Irish Celts worshipped before they were Christianized after 400 CE, it is a valuable resource for piecing together the rudiments of late Celtic mythology. The Tuatha were ultimately replaced with the arrival of the Celts, who were said to come from Spain (perhaps Celtic Galicia, hence the derivation of the word “Gaels,” for Irish). Following their defeat, the Tuatha retreated to the underground mounds called
sídh,
where they continued to play a major role in Irish legend as the “little people,” aka leprechauns.

The second collection of tales is called the Ulster Cycle, and the most important of these is the
Táin Bó Cúailnge
, or
The Cattle Raid of Cooley
—and often referred to simply as the
Táin
. Combining ancient myth with legends of early Irish heroes, the
Táin
is Ireland’s
Iliad
and
Aeneid
all wrapped into one, a story that describes the conflicts between two of Ireland’s northern provinces, Ulster and Connacht. Steeped in the supernatural, the
Táin
features a goddess-queen Medb (Maeve), who may well be based on an actual historical figure, and Ireland’s greatest national hero, Cuchulainn (
koo-hool-n
), an Irish version of Gilgamesh, Hercules, and Achilles.

The third group of significant Irish stories is found in the Fionn (Fenian) Cycle, also compiled in the twelfth century, which chronicles the adventures of another Irish folk hero, Finn MacCool, and his band of warriors, called the Fianna, who are famed for their great size and strength. Again, these characters are legendary figures, probably based on real people—just as the
Iliad
may have been—although they also interact with true mythic deities. The events in the Fionn Cycle are believed to hint at the actual political and social conditions in Ireland around the year 200 CE.

Finally, the
Mabinogion
is a collection of Welsh tales that was also compiled sometime in the twelfth century CE. These stories describe the mythical history of parts of Britain, though many of the gods who appear in Welsh mythology largely resemble the Tuatha Dé Danaan in Irish mythology, possibly because Irish Celts migrated to Britain and took their myths with them. These stories are significant not only because they offer a view of Welsh Celtic myths, but also because they introduce the first references and early tales of a figure who would evolve over centuries into the legendary King Arthur.

Did the Druids practice human sacrifice?

When they weren’t storming around on horseback, sacking villages, and plundering their enemies, the ancient Celts had time to gather for worship ceremonies in natural, outdoor settings, like forests, where the oak was considered especially sacred. But before you conjure up some pastoral image from a Walt Disney film in which the birds, rabbits, and other forest creatures join forces to gently drape daisy chains around the neck of some benevolent Merlin-like character, consider this—human sacrifice was clearly part of the deal for the Celts. Clubbing, a sliced jugular, garroting—being strangled with a knotted cord—and drowning were all among the usual methods. While the Romans were antagonistic toward the Druids, and some of their reports may be exaggerated, sacrificial victims may have also been burned in giant wicker baskets wrought in the shape of a human figure, as Julius Caesar reported. The first-century Roman writer Tacitus recorded that Druids analyzed the death throes and blood flows of sacrificial victims to divine the future. Then the body might be tossed in a bog.

In 1984, the mummified remains of a man were dug out of a peat bog in Lindow Moss, near Manchester, England. Peat is an excellent natural preservative and the fellow in the bog—since known as Lindow Man—was exceptionally well preserved. Hands uncalloused, indicating he was probably highborn and not a laborer, Lindow Man might have been an Irish Druid prince. We even know what Lindow Man ate before his ritual death—bits of a blackened hearth cake that included traces of mistletoe. Then his skull was flattened with three blows of an ax; he was strangled by a cord knotted three times; and his blood was emptied with a slice through his jugular. According to authorities on the Celtic world who studied his remains, Lindow Man may have offered himself as a sacrifice to the gods in order to aid in the defeat of the Romans then assaulting Britain, in about 60 CE. He was a willing victim—a sacrifice for the good of his people.
*

But, to be fair, early Celtic worship was not just about human sacrifice. Archaeological evidence from burial sites suggests that the Celts believed in the afterlife as well as the immortality of the soul. They provided their dead with weapons and other necessities to carry along on their journey. Sometimes, with a buried body, they placed small wheels that were intended to be emblems of the sun, to provide light in the afterlife.

The Celts were also pantheists who revered a range of nature deities, including the gods of thunder, light, water, and sun, as well as stags and horses. Concerned about having a continuous food supply, they looked to gods like Sucellos—the “Good Striker”—who made sure the plants woke up in the spring. Sucellos did this by striking the winter-hardened earth with the long-handled hammer he always carried.

Perhaps the least understood—and, recently, most romanticized—aspect of Celtic belief was the class of hereditary priests called Druids. Skilled in magic and fortune-telling, they advised kings and chieftains, served as judges in trials, and oversaw religious ceremonies—including sacrifices—often in groves of oak trees. (Linguists suggest a connection between the words “druid” and “oak.”) In Celtic Ireland, Druids were also “knowledge-keepers,” who memorized the tribe’s history—as opposed to the bards, who sang the legends, and seers called
filidh
, who kept the sacred traditions and managed, unlike Druids, to survive into the Christian era. Though few historical reports exist, one memorable and oft-cited passage by a Roman writer describes how the Druids dressed in white robes and used a golden sickle to cut down mistletoe. The sacred plant they called “all-heal,” mistletoe was thought to possess the miraculous power to cure disease, promote fertility in women, make poisons harmless, protect against witchcraft, and generally bring blessings and good luck. It was also baked into the cake eaten by Lindow Man before his ritual death.

In fact, mistletoe was considered so sacred that even enemies who happened to meet beneath it in the forest would lay down their arms, exchange a friendly greeting, and keep a truce until the following day. From this old custom grew the practice of suspending mistletoe over a doorway or in a room as a token of peace. The use of this once-powerful Druidic plant in modern Christmas festivities is just one example of the crossover of Celtic and other pagan customs to Christian practices. But when Britain was converted to Christianity, the bishops did not allow the mistletoe to be used in churches, because it was considered the central symbol of a pagan religion.

What did Druids have to do with Stonehenge?

As one famous newspaper’s slogan suggests, “Inquiring minds want to know.” And inquiring minds have been wondering for centuries—did ancient Celtic religion have anything to do with the megalithic monument called Stonehenge?

Located in southwestern England—not too far from the waters of Bath—Stonehenge is one of the world’s most recognizable sites and inspiration for many theories, both serious and pseudoscientific. It has attracted the curious, the superstitious, and the scientific for hundreds of years, yet remains shrouded in mystery. Were these huge stones—weighing tons and moved from hundreds of miles away—set in a circle on an open landscape as an ancient calendar or “clock” that helped primitive Britons measure the seasons? Or were they another landing pad for alien visitors who needed a terrestrial parking spot? Or was Merlin, the famed magician from the legend of Arthur, behind the Stonehenge mystery?

That last idea, introduced by the early “historian” Geoffrey of Monmouth, had Merlin magically construct the monument as the “Giant’s Dance” to commemorate a battle victory. It is an idea that ties in with one popular theory in New Age circles—that Stonehenge was some sort of gigantic altar where the Druid priests made sacrifices, since Merlin had “Druid priest” written all over him. It is certainly conceivable that Druids found Stonehenge to be a prime spot for their own worship ceremonies—though what those ceremonies were remains a matter of conjecture. We don’t have a neat set of hieroglyphics describing a Druid-led dawntime observance of the summer solstice with the first rays of the sun breaking through the gaps between these giant stone plinths. Or an etching of a ceremony on a midsummer day with the famed “Heel Stone” of Stonehenge casting a long phallic shadow into the center of the stone ring, in a symbolic “Midsummer Marriage” of Father Sky coupling with Mother Earth.

Lacking solid, authoritative evidence of Stonehenge’s original purpose, people will keep speculating. As they do, it is important to keep one fact in mind: according to most authorities, Stonehenge existed long before the Celts arrived in Britain. Once arrived, Celtic Druids may have appropriated Stonehenge for their religious ceremonies. But they most likely didn’t build it. According to recent archaeological findings, this ancient monument was erected in three main phases that may date back to around 3300 BCE and continued for nearly two thousand years, until about 1500 BCE. The monument’s famous ring of large stones is thought to have been built between 1800 and 1700 BCE, but the Celts probably did not arrive in the British Isles until 350 BCE. And while some may argue for a much earlier date of around 700 BCE, that is still centuries removed from the construction of Stonehenge.

WHO’S WHO OF THE CELTIC GODS

This list is divided into two parts. Part I comprises the chief gods as they would have been known to early Celts in Europe before they fell to the Romans and Druidism was suppressed. Part II focuses on the chief gods and mythical characters of the Irish Celts, as preserved in the later written collections.

Part I: Early Celtic Gods Worshipped Across Europe

Belenus
The Celtic god of agriculture, Belenus also represents the life-giving and healing power of the sun and was associated with Apollo by the Romans, who created their own “Apollo Belenus.” The great festival of Belenus, called Beltane (“bright, or goodly, fire”), was celebrated on May 1 of the Roman calendar with bonfires lit to rekindle the earth’s warmth. Animals were led past these fires to be purified and protected against disease, and some scholars believe that this practice may have been connected to the nursery rhyme line about “the cow jumping over the moon.”

Cernunnos
(pronounced
Kur-noo-nohs
) Called the “horned one,” Cernunnos (his Latin name, given by the Romans) is among the most ancient of the Celtic gods and his origins are linked with the horned figures depicted in the Paleolithic or Stone Age European cave paintings found in northern and central France and Britain. With the antlers of a stag, Cernunnos was seen as lord of the beasts, a “shape shifter” who also took the form of a snake or wolf.
A pastoral and agricultural god of both fertility and abundance, Cernunnos is thought to dispense fruit, grain, and wealth. But he is also associated with the small “solar wheels” that the Celts placed in graves, presumably as emblems of the sun to provide light in the underworld.

Epona
Known as the “horse goddess,” Epona is also associated with the earth and fertility, and is one of the most popular Celtic goddesses. In a very ancient story, it was said that Epona was born when her father, who hated women, mated with a horse. Epona is one of the few deities to whom stone monuments were erected that still survive, most of them in France. Representations of Epona usually show her with a horse, revered in the Celtic world for its beauty, speed, bravery, and sexual vigor. Sometimes Epona was shown riding sidesaddle or standing between two ponies.
When Roman cavalry officers learned of Epona, they adopted her and held an official Roman festival in her honor each year on December 18. She is the only Celtic deity to be accorded the honor of a Roman festival.