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Certain fragments of the methods of sacred rite, which we were able to notice and discern among the legendary exaggerations, undoubtedly relied on a systematic and harmonious worldview, on a coherent teaching. In this teaching, we manage to identify several main features, and first of all - a certain idea of space and time in their connection with society: the concept of a center, major landmarks of holidays, the structure of the calendar serve us as the most important milestones in this.
The concept of equilibrium is expressed geographically by the contraction of the sacred traits of properties to the middle space: it is no coincidence that the Biturigs, the "kings of the world", lived in the center of Gaul, and the Irish kingdom of Meath, the "middle", formed by the seizure of part of the territory of the four original provinces, became the location of the capital of the high king of Tara. One of the most important settlements founded by the Gauls in Tsisalytai Gaul, Milan, is called Mediolana, the "sanctuary of the center." [401 - See "Ogam", XII, 403-404, 531-532 XIII, 142.]
The concept of a sanctuary, or nemeton, is in essence very close to the concept of “omphala.” [402 - For the etymology of the word nemeton, see Ch. J. Guyonvarc'h, "Notes d'etymologies gauloises", - "Ogam", XII, 185-197.] Both of these concepts appear either connected with each other, or identified, as, for example, in the toponym Mezunemus (Medionemeton); [403 - Rev. celt, 34, 423.] in the Galatian name, drunemeton is a sacred forest that served as a meeting place for the "council" of the entire people; [404 - Strabo, XII, 5; 1.] and also in the transmission in Latin, in the "sanctissimum templum" - "the most sacred sanctuary" among the fighters of Italy, [405 - Liv., XXIII, 24, 11.] as well as in "locus concecratus" - the "consecrated place" of the carnuts, whose territory was also considered “the center of Gaul.” [406 - Caes, B. C, VI, 13.] In mythological terms, the most famous Celtic "omphalus" was the island of Avallon, from where King Arthur was supposed to return one day to save his subjects from foreign oppression. [407 - Et celt, IV, 255 op. cit.] Differences in the forms of tradition are easily explained by its adaptation to local conditions and mentality.
On the other hand, non-meton is closely related to the tree [408 - Cm. Ogam, XI, 1.]. This, of course, explains why sacred trees are often associated with significant events: “That night on which Conn was born was blessed for Ireland, it was then that the Tortu tree, the yew Ross was born.” [409 - Bataille de Mag Lena (Cath Maighe Lens), ed. Jackson, p. 51.]
These Tortu and Yew Ross trees are among the top five trees in Ireland; another of them, the yew of Mugna, could shelter a thousand people under its canopy and three times a year gave the inhabitants of the Mugna plain three sacred fruits: an acorn, a nut and an apple. [410 - Metrical dindshenchas, III, 144-146.]
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In addition, “forest” and “sanctuary” are completely equivalent concepts, and the Druids, according to Lucan, performed worship in the forest: “You live in high sanctuaries in the middle of remote sacred forests” (nemora alta remotis incolitis lucis). [411 - Lucan, Pharsal, I, 452-454.] The Celts closely associated themselves with the forest, whether it be the choice of ethnonyms: the Eburons, the "yew people", the vidukassi, "fighting with the tree", etc., or the location of the largest sanctuaries - the forest Marseilles, destroyed by Caesar and slandered by Lucan; [412 - Lucan, Pharsal, III, 399 sqq.] The sanctuary at Anglesi destroyed by the Romans, or, finally, the inclusion of forest symbols in myths. [413 - P. Le Roux, loc. cit, 1-10 and 185-205.] The forest could even be a “city”: Ambiorix's house, as Caesar points out, “stood in the forest,since in general the Gauls, to protect themselves from the heat, build their homes mostly near forests and rivers.”[414 - Caes, B. G, VI, 30. - Per. MM Pokrovsky.]
Was it really just a matter of finding shelter from the heat? What Caesar saw was a princely residence in the Irish style, a "city", this is how, albeit very approximately, one can convey the meaning of the Irish "dun" (Gaulish "dunum"), which was dominated by earthen and wooden buildings. It is important, however, that the religious concept of the "center" adjoins the concept of the "capital" in which the leader and his advisers - religious, secular and military - live.
Celtic Druids. Book by Françoise Leroux
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