Basic Celtic Deity Types

by Alexei Kondratiev

Because today most of our exposure to mythology takes place through the literary creations
of the Greeks and Romans, we're conditioned to think of it in a literary way and to demand of
it a degree of internal logic and consistency which living mythological traditions usually don't
have (or which they approach differently). Trying to use the Irish and Welsh "mythologies"
as the basis for a consistent Celtic theology is ultimately fruitless, because they were never
designed to be functioning religious systems, but are literary creations elaborated long after
the religion in which they had originated had ceased to be practiced. Like the Arthurian
mythos, they become more internally consistent as time passes (i.e. as they become more
self-consciously literary and less in tune with religious concerns), but the different story
traditions also grow farther apart from each other.

I think a better approach is to look at how the gods would have fit into actual religious
practice. Who worshipped them, and why? Here's one way of looking at it:

I. Tribal Divinities

1. Gods of your immediate kin-group (ueniá). These would primarily be ancestral spirits,
and their worship would be confined to the home.
2. Gods of your occupational group (kerdá). These would be gods who serve as
archetypes for your occupation, as well as goddesses who give energy to that
occupation (I know it sounds sexist, but that's the way it was!). The worship would
take place partly in the home, and partly in a guild shrine if your guild is rich enough
to afford one.
3. Gods of your larger tribal area (toutá). This would include your own tutelary tribal
god, often in conjunction with intertribal divine figures of Indo-European origin
which are seen as upholding the tribal order. This is coupled with worship of the
sovereignty goddess of the Land you live on, usually identified with the main river
that flows through your territory.

II. Land Divinities

The Land itself is full of fertility divinities that are chaotic and independent of the concept of
tribal order. They are nevertheless necessary to the tribe's survival and have to be propitiated
(or tamed) as a part of the agricultural cycle.

The "intertribal" divinities are too numerous to discuss fully in this article but we can list the
main ones. One can see them going in and out of "fashion" during the Iron Age, with some
gaining in prominence while others fade away (exactly like what we see happening in
Hinduism after the Vedic period). I'll use the names of the 'interpretatio Romana', not because
I think the Romans had the right idea, but because they're consistent!

1. The Celtic "Mercury". His rise in prestige is spectacular during the later Iron Age,
until he becomes one of the main figures (if not the main figure) in the pantheon
everywhere. He is usually called 'Lugus' ("Lightning Flash" -- the name of the comic
book hero is actually a pretty close fit!) or a name similar in derivation and meaning
 (like 'Loucetios'). He is a warrior, but also a master of all the crafts and skills
necessary to society, and as such becomes a protector of society as a whole -- a role
he exercises most fully at the beginning of the Harvest, when he wrests control of the
fruits of the soil from the Land Spirits, who are also his kin. His weapon is the spear,
which is the lightning-flash and also, metaphorically, the flash of inspiration and
intuition. His principal animals are the raven, the horse, the lynx, and the wren (part
of his myth is that he is a "little" god who outwitted all his rivals). He is the divine
sponsor of human sovereigns, and as such his main consort is the sovereignty goddess
who presents sovereignty as an intoxicating drink; but as master of crafts he also
works with the Celtic "Minerva", whose festival period balances his within the
structure of the Celtic Year.
2. The Celtic "Mars". He is the god who sets the boundaries of the civilized world and
protects them by force of arms. His weapon is the sword and his animal is the dog.
Although as a warrior he is a giver of death, the mysteries of death are seen as being
closely related to the mysteries of rebirth and healing, so his main shrines are healing
shrines. The story in which he loses a hand or arm and has it replaced by a silver one
is doubtless ancient, though it's hard to tell how widespread it was in the Iron Age.
3. The Celtic "Jupiter". He is the sky god who rules the weather and brings rain.
Thunder is caused by the rolling of his wheel across the sky, and his usual name is
'Taranis' ("Thunderer"). He is particularly present in mountainous regions. Over time
his worship dwindled until he became a mere helper of "Mercury", who like him was
associated with storms and high places. In fact, Sulpicius Severus tells us that Gallo-
Romans found it easy to turn away from his worship because he was "stupid"
('hebetus'), while they found it harder to give up their affection for "Mercury".
4. The Celtic "Silvanus" or God With Antlers (Karnonos/Cernunnos). He is the god who
crosses boundaries, and the god of change. He is the interface between Tribe and
Land and between our world and the Otherworld. Through him goods can be passed
from one realm to another (hence his association with money), and valuable things
can be gotten from raw Nature. He also manifests change as adaptability, as expressed
by his antlers that drop off and grow back according to the season. Because some of
his functions overlap with those of Celtic "Mercury" they are often shown together,
although neither replaces the other, since their basic characters are quite different.
5. The Celtic "Minerva". Because in Celtic thought goddesses are primarily seen as
sources of energy (equivalent to the Hindu concept of 'shakti'), the distinctions
between them tend to blur and to be less clear-cut than in the case of the gods, as
many writers on the subject have remarked. But the one that represents all forms of
energy and provides them not only to the growth functions in the Land but to all
forms of human activity and creativity is usually well characterised. Her name usually
contains the element 'brig' ("high, exalted, rising, energetic") although it can take
other forms as well. Her animals are the cow and the oystercatcher (and by extension
all things in nature that are black, white, and red). Her flower is the dandelion. Her
experience with marriage and childbearing is usually unhappy (as with most Indo-
European "culture goddesses"), so she is often portrayed as a "virgin".

Because horses played such a large part in the Celts' military successes in Europe, the
horse was a symbol of sovereignty and political power (as opposed to cattle, which
were a symbol of the Land and of material wealth). Thus the goddess who gave
legitimacy to the power of the tribe was portrayed as riding on a horse, or as a mare
herself. This (Epona, "Great Mare") was a particular aspect of the sovereignty
goddess, distinct from, say, Rosmerta, who gives rulers the intoxicating drink of
 flaith/wlatis. The Celtic "Minerva", on the other hand, was a more general
representation of goddess-energy, who could be invoked in a far greater range of
situations: she gave the energy of rulership to rulers, but also provided every other
kind of energy wherever it was needed.

The Hindu model can be very useful in helping us understand the Celtic view of
goddesses, which was quite similar. For Hindus, goddesses are sources of energy, and
they are often referred to collectively as simply Shakti (which can be personified as
Durga, the supreme virgin goddess who is the source of all energy in the universe).
But when the energy is applied to a specific purpose, the goddesses become
differentiated: as Sarasvati (culture and creativity), Lakshmi (fertility and wealth,
material comfort) or Kali (destruction and rebirth). In the same way, virtually all the
Celtic goddesses can be said to be sovereignty goddesses, Land-goddesses, etc, but
they take on different names and attributes when required by specific circumstances.

6. 'Sucellos' ("Good Striker"). Usually portrayed as a mature man with a mallet, the head
of which is actually a barrel or cauldron (i.e. giving death with one side, life with the
other). This is evidently the same god-type that became known as the 'Dagda' "Good
(=Efficient) God" in Ireland. He is often chosen to represent the trifunctional tutelary
god of a tribal territory ('Toutatis'). His consort is the territorial river goddess. In
southern Gaul he was sometimes interpreted as "Silvanus" (both he and Cernunnos
had cauldrons).
7. 'Maponos' (meaning "Superboy", essentially!). This god is associated with youth,
vigour and growth, and particularly the power of the waxing Year as the days grow
longer, which sometimes led him to become an "Apollo" in the 'interpretatio Romana',
although the usual Celtic "Apollo" is a different god. Originally he was closely
associated with hunting and the Land. He was invoked as a source of energy and
quick growth, as illustrated by the Chamalieres inscription. His animal is the swan,
and waterfowl in general. In the later literary tradition his name appears as 'Mabon' in
Welsh and as Aengus' title 'in Mac Óac' in Irish.

I should add that the other animal specially related to Maponos (as hunter) is the boar,
and it is through his participation in the ancient mythic device of the "Cosmic Boar
Hunt" that the Light and Dark halves of the Year are defined (he dies at the threshold
of the Dark half, of course). His consort is the Flower Maiden: his marriage to her
marks the apex of his career of "growth".

8. The Divine Twins. The only literary survival of these important Indo-European
divinities consists of Nisien and Efnisien in the Second Branch of the Mabinogi. But
they were evidently an important part of early Celtic religion, as the proliferation of
temples and dedications to "Castor and Pollux" attests. As in most other Indo-
European systems, one twin was truly divine and the other was flawed. They were
associated with horses, good fortune and the protection of travellers.
9. The Celtic "Apollo". A healing god of light and warmth and the power of sight,
particularly invoked for eye problems. He also seems to have been associated with
dreaming and prophecy. His healing shrines -- which he shared with a goddess-
consort -- were important centres of pilgrimage in the early Celtic world. Although
there's no direct evidence of it in the sources, I strongly suspect that the god/goddess
pair here were brother and sister (rather than married consorts as in most other cases),
and were related to the cult of a brother/sister prophetic and healing pair that spread
 across Europe (from Central Asia, apparently) in the early Iron Age (and best known
as Apollo/Artemis).

Copyright © 1997 Alexei Kondratiev

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