![]() ![]() The Gauls gradually converted to Christianity from the third century onward. Īfter the Roman Empire's conquest of Gaul (58–51 BC) and southern Britain (43 AD), Celtic religion there underwent some Romanisation, resulting in a syncretic Gallo-Roman religion with deities such as Lenus Mars, Apollo Grannus, and Telesphorus. It is not clear what religious festivals the ancient Celts held, but the Insular Celtic peoples celebrated four seasonal festivals, known to the medieval Gaels as Beltaine (1 May), Lughnasadh (1 August), Samhain (1 November) and Imbolc (1 February). There is also some evidence that ancient Celts sacrificed humans, and some Greco-Roman sources claim the Gauls sacrificed criminals by burning them in a wicker man. There is evidence that ancient Celtic peoples sacrificed animals, almost always livestock or working animals. Celtic peoples often made votive offerings: treasured items deposited in water and wetlands, or in ritual shafts and wells. Greco-Roman writers said the Celts held ceremonies in sacred groves and other natural shrines, called nemetons, while some Celtic peoples also built temples or ritual enclosures. The priests of Celtic religion were "magico-religious specialists" called druids, but little is definitively known about them. According to Miranda Aldhouse-Green, the Celts were also animists, believing that every part of the natural world had a spirit. Some figures from medieval Irish mythology have been interpreted as iterations of earlier deities. Triplicity is a common theme, with a number of deities seen as threefold, for example the Three Mothers. Caesar says the Gauls believed they all descended from a god of the dead and underworld. ![]() Celtic healing deities were often associated with sacred springs. Deities found in many regions include Lugus, the tribal god Toutatis, the thunder god Taranis, the horned god Cernunnos, the horse and fertility goddess Epona, the divine son Maponos, as well as Belenos, Ogmios, and Sucellos. Some deities were venerated only in one region, but others were more widely known. ![]() The names of over two hundred Celtic deities have survived (see list of Celtic deities), although it is likely that many of these were alternative names, regional names or titles for the same deity. Model reconstructing the Pillar of the Boatmen in the Musée de Cluny, Paris. ![]()
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