Celtic mythology Celtic mythology is the body of myths belonging to the Celtic peoples.Cunliffe, Barry, (1997) ''The Ancient Celts''. Oxford, Oxford University Press , pp. 183 (religion), 202, 204–8. Like other Iron Age Europeans, Celtic peoples followed ...

, Taranis (

Proto-Celtic Proto-Celtic, or Common Celtic, is the ancestral proto-language of all known Celtic languages, and a descendant of Proto-Indo-European. It is not attested in writing but has been partly reconstructed through the comparative method. Proto-Celt ...

: *''Toranos'', earlier ''*Tonaros'';

Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through ...

: Taranus, earlier Tanarus) is the god of thunder, who was worshipped primarily in

Gaul Gaul ( la, Gallia) was a region of Western Europe first described by the Romans. It was inhabited by Celtic and Aquitani tribes, encompassing present-day France, Belgium, Luxembourg, most of Switzerland, parts of Northern Italy (only during ...

Hispania Hispania ( la, Hispānia , ; nearly identically pronounced in Spanish, Portuguese, Catalan, and Italian) was the Roman name for the Iberian Peninsula and its provinces. Under the Roman Republic, Hispania was divided into two provinces: Hi ...

, Britain, and

Ireland Ireland ( ; ga, Éire ; Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean, in north-western Europe. It is separated from Great Britain to its east by the North Channel, the Irish Sea, and St George's Channel. Ireland is the s ...

, but also in the

Rhineland The Rhineland (german: Rheinland; french: Rhénanie; nl, Rijnland; ksh, Rhingland; Latinised name: ''Rhenania'') is a loosely defined area of Western Germany along the Rhine, chiefly its middle section. Term Historically, the Rhinelands ...

and

Danube The Danube ( ; ) is a river that was once a long-standing frontier of the Roman Empire and today connects 10 European countries, running through their territories or being a border. Originating in Germany, the Danube flows southeast for , pa ...

regions, amongst others. Taranis, along with Esus and

Toutatis Toutatis or Teutates is a Celtic god who was worshipped primarily in ancient Gaul and Britain. His name means "god of the tribe", and he has been widely interpreted as a tribal protector.Paul-Marie Duval (1993). ''Les dieux de la Gaule.'' Éditio ...

, was mentioned by the Roman poet

Lucan Marcus Annaeus Lucanus (3 November 39 AD – 30 April 65 AD), better known in English as Lucan (), was a Roman poet, born in Corduba (modern-day Córdoba), in Hispania Baetica. He is regarded as one of the outstanding figures of the Imperial ...

in his epic poem '' Pharsalia'' as a

Celtic Celtic, Celtics or Keltic may refer to: Language and ethnicity *pertaining to Celts, a collection of Indo-European peoples in Europe and Anatolia **Celts (modern) *Celtic languages **Proto-Celtic language *Celtic music *Celtic nations Sports Foo ...

deity to whom human sacrificial offerings were made. Taranis was associated, as was the

Cyclops In Greek mythology and later Roman mythology, the Cyclopes ( ; el, Κύκλωπες, ''Kýklōpes'', "Circle-eyes" or "Round-eyes"; singular Cyclops ; , ''Kýklōps'') are giant one-eyed creatures. Three groups of Cyclopes can be distinguish ...

Brontes ("thunder") in

Greek mythology A major branch of classical mythology, Greek mythology is the body of myths originally told by the ancient Greeks, and a genre of Ancient Greek folklore. These stories concern the origin and nature of the world, the lives and activities o ...

, with the wheel. Gundestrup C

Many representations of a bearded god with a thunderbolt in one hand and a wheel in the other have been recovered from Gaul, where this deity apparently came to be

syncretised Syncretism () is the practice of combining different beliefs and various schools of thought. Syncretism involves the merging or assimilation of several originally discrete traditions, especially in the theology and mythology of religion, th ...

with

Jupiter Jupiter is the fifth planet from the Sun and the largest in the Solar System. It is a gas giant with a mass more than two and a half times that of all the other planets in the Solar System combined, but slightly less than one-thousand ...

Name and etymology

The

form of the name is reconstructed as *''Toranos'' ('Thunder'), which derives through metathesis (switch of sounds) from an earlier *''Tonaros'', itself from the

Proto-Indo-European Proto-Indo-European (PIE) is the reconstructed common ancestor of the Indo-European language family. Its proposed features have been derived by linguistic reconstruction from documented Indo-European languages. No direct record of Proto-Indo ...

(PIE) stem for 'thunder', *''(s)tenh₂-''. The original, unmetathesized form of the name is attested in the dative form ''tanaro'' (

Chester Chester is a cathedral city and the county town of Cheshire, England. It is located on the River Dee, close to the English–Welsh border. With a population of 79,645 in 2011,"2011 Census results: People and Population Profile: Chester Loca ...

, 154 AD), found on a votive altar dedicated by a Roman officer from Clunia (modern Burgos Province), and in the Gaulish hydronym '' Tanarus'' ('thundering' or 'thunderous'), an ancient name of the

River Po The Po ( , ; la, Padus or ; Ancient Ligurian: or ) is the longest river in Italy. It flows eastward across northern Italy starting from the Cottian Alps. The river's length is either or , if the Maira, a right bank tributary, is included. Th ...

(northern Italy). Similar European hydronyms have also been proposed to belong to the same root. The PIE ''s''-initial seems to have been retained in Celtiberian ''steniontes'', ''stenion'', and ''stena''. In the

Indo-European The Indo-European languages are a language family native to the overwhelming majority of Europe, the Iranian plateau, and the northern Indian subcontinent. Some European languages of this family, English, French, Portuguese, Russian, Du ...

context, the Proto-Celtic name *''Tonaros'' is identical to the

Proto-Germanic Proto-Germanic (abbreviated PGmc; also called Common Germanic) is the reconstructed proto-language of the Germanic branch of the Indo-European languages. Proto-Germanic eventually developed from pre-Proto-Germanic into three Germanic br ...

Thunder-god ''*Þun(a)raz'' (cf. ON ''Þórr'', OE ''Þunor'', OS ''Thunar'', OFris. ''Thuner'', OHG ''Donar''), and further related to the

Sanskrit Sanskrit (; attributively , ; nominally , , ) is a classical language belonging to the Indo-Aryan languages, Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-European languages. It arose in South Asia after its predecessor languages had Trans-cultural diffusion ...

''stánati'' and

''tono'', both meaning 'to thunder.'' According to scholar Peter Jackson, the Celtic–Germanic

isogloss An isogloss, also called a heterogloss (see Etymology below), is the geographic boundary of a certain linguistic feature, such as the pronunciation of a vowel, the meaning of a word, or the use of some morphological or syntactic feature. Major ...

*''Þun(a)raz'' ''~ *Tonaros'' may have emerged as the result of the fossilization of an original epithet (or epiclesis) of the

thunder-god *'' Perk^wunos''. The later form *''Toranos'' is attested in the Gaulish divine names ''Taranis'' and ''Taranucnos'', as well as in the personal name ''Taranutius''. The name '' Taran'', which appears in the prehistoric section of the Pictish King-List, may also be interpreted as a euhemerized god. The Hispano-Celtic ''tar(a)nekūm'' could mean 'of the descendants of Tar(a)nos'. Additional cognates may also be found in medieval Celtic languages, such as

Old Irish Old Irish, also called Old Gaelic ( sga, Goídelc, Ogham script: ᚌᚑᚔᚇᚓᚂᚉ; ga, Sean-Ghaeilge; gd, Seann-Ghàidhlig; gv, Shenn Yernish or ), is the oldest form of the Goidelic/Gaelic language for which there are extensive writte ...

''torann'' ('thunder, noise'),

Old Breton Breton (, ; or in Morbihan) is a Southwestern Brittonic language of the Celtic language family spoken in Brittany, part of modern-day France. It is the only Celtic language still widely in use on the European mainland, albeit as a member of t ...

''taran'',

Old Cornish Cornish (Standard Written Form: or ) , is a Southwestern Brittonic language of the Celtic language family. It is a revived language, having become extinct as a living community language in Cornwall at the end of the 18th century. However, k ...

''taran'', or

Middle Welsh Middle Welsh ( cy, Cymraeg Canol, wlm, Kymraec) is the label attached to the Welsh language of the 12th to 15th centuries, of which much more remains than for any earlier period. This form of Welsh developed directly from Old Welsh ( cy, Hen G ...

''taran'' (' eal ofthunder, thunderclap'). The

Gaulish Gaulish was an ancient Celtic language spoken in parts of Continental Europe before and during the period of the Roman Empire. In the narrow sense, Gaulish was the language of the Celts of Gaul (now France, Luxembourg, Belgium, most of Switze ...

word for 'thunder' has been preserved in Gascon ''taram''.

Association with the wheel

The wheel, more specifically the

chariot A chariot is a type of cart driven by a charioteer, usually using horses to provide rapid motive power. The oldest known chariots have been found in burials of the Sintashta culture in modern-day Chelyabinsk Oblast, Russia, dated to c. 2000&n ...

wheel with six or eight

spoke A spoke is one of some number of rods radiating from the center of a wheel (the hub where the axle connects), connecting the hub with the round traction surface. The term originally referred to portions of a log that had been riven (split ...

s, was an important symbol in historical

Celtic polytheism Ancient Celtic religion, commonly known as Celtic paganism, was the religion of the ancient Celtic peoples of Europe. Because the ancient Celts did not have writing, evidence about their religion is gleaned from archaeology, Greco-Roman accounts ...

, apparently associated with a specific god, known as the wheel-god, identified as the sky- sun- or thunder-god, whose name is attested as Taranis by

. Numerous Celtic coins also depict such a wheel. The half-wheel shown in the Gundestrup cauldron "broken wheel" panel also has eight visible spokes. Symbolic votive wheels were offered at shrines (such as in Alesia), cast in rivers (such as the

Seine ) , mouth_location = Le Havre/ Honfleur , mouth_coordinates = , mouth_elevation = , progression = , river_system = Seine basin , basin_size = , tributaries_left = Yonne, Loing, Eure, Risle , tributa ...

), buried in tombs or worn as

amulets An amulet, also known as a good luck charm or phylactery, is an object believed to confer protection upon its possessor. The word "amulet" comes from the Latin word amuletum, which Pliny's ''Natural History'' describes as "an object that protect ...

since the

Middle Bronze Age The Bronze Age is a historic period, lasting approximately from 3300 BC to 1200 BC, characterized by the use of bronze, the presence of writing in some areas, and other early features of urban civilization. The Bronze Age is the second pr ...

. Such "wheel pendants" from the Bronze Age usually had four spokes, and are commonly identified as solar symbols or " sun crosses". Artefacts parallel to the Celtic votive wheels or wheel-pendants are the so-called '' Zierscheiben'' in a Germanic context. The identification of the Sun with a wheel, or a chariot, has parallels in Germanic, Greek and Vedic mythology (see

sun chariot A solar deity or sun deity is a deity who represents the Sun, or an aspect of it. Such deities are usually associated with power and strength. Solar deities and Sun worship can be found throughout most of recorded history in various forms. The ...

). File:Stone Wheel from Santa Tegra.jpg, Stone wheel representation from the Santa Tegra hill-fort (

A Guarda A Guarda is a municipality in the province of Pontevedra in the autonomous community of Galicia, in Spain. It is situated in the ''comarca'' of O Baixo Miño. Demography Colors= id:lightgrey value:gray(0.9) id:darkgrey value:gray(0.7 ...

Galicia Galicia may refer to: Geographic regions * Galicia (Spain), a region and autonomous community of northwestern Spain ** Gallaecia, a Roman province ** The post-Roman Kingdom of the Suebi, also called the Kingdom of Gallaecia ** The medieval King ...

). Museo arqueolóxico do castro de Santa Tegra File:Rouelle d or Balesme Haute Marne.jpg, Golden Celtic wheel with symbols, Balesme,

Haute-Marne Haute-Marne (; English: Upper Marne) is a department in the Grand Est region of Northeastern France. Named after the river Marne, its prefecture is Chaumont. In 2019, it had a population of 172,512.Musée d'Archéologie Nationale.

Later cultural references

In 2013 a British combat drone system developed by defence contractor

BAE Systems BAE Systems plc (BAE) is a British multinational arms, security, and aerospace company based in London, England. It is the largest defence contractor in Europe, and ranked the seventh-largest in the world based on applicable 2021 revenue ...

was named Taranis in reference to the Celtic god. Taranis and

are often mentioned by characters of the ''

Asterix ''Asterix'' or ''The Adventures of Asterix'' (french: Astérix or , "Asterix the Gaul") is a ''bande dessinée'' comic book series about a village of indomitable Gaulish warriors who adventure around the world and fight the Roman Republic, wi ...

'' series. Taranis and other Celtic gods are often referred to in the EPIX television series

Britannia Britannia () is the national personification of Britain as a helmeted female warrior holding a trident and shield. An image first used in classical antiquity, the Latin ''Britannia'' was the name variously applied to the British Isles, Grea ...

MacG Racing have developed a racing car called th
Taranis
racing in th
British Endurance Championship
ref>

Footnotes

References

* Ellis, Peter Berresford, ''Dictionary of Celtic Mythology'' (Oxford Paperback Reference), Oxford University Press, (1994): * * MacKillop, James. ''Dictionary of Celtic Mythology''. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998. . * Wood, Juliette, ''The Celts: Life, Myth, and Art'', Thorsons Publishers (2002):

External links

Celtic Gods and Associates
* {{Authority control Gaulish gods Gods of the ancient Britons Thunder gods Jovian deities