Gallic (religion)

[Mooks]

I got this usefull peice of information from Gaius Julius Casear's books "The gallic war" Translated to english

Among the gods, they most worship Mercury.There are numerous images of him : they declare him the inventor of all arts, the guide for every road and journey,and they deem him to have the greatest influence for all money making and traffic. After him they set Apollo, Mars, Jupitar , and Minerva. Of these deities they have almost the same idea as all other nations: Apollo drives away diseases, Minerva supplies the first principles of arts and crafts, Jupitar holds the empire of heaven, Mars controls wars.

So what are those other deities doing in Gaul in RTW-BI ( not so much in BI). If the gauls worshipped the same deities as the italians and greeks, where did they get those other gods in the game?

If we cant trust Julius Casear's book...Who can we trust for historical accuracy?

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

They didn't worship the same gods exactly. They all worshipped very similar gods. The Greek gods are a developement from very primal deities, but they are a logical development. All cultures in Europe tended to develope a female goddess of fertility and a male god of war etc.

These gods aren't the same but they are similar enough that when the Romans came along they simply assumed they were the same gods because the gods could choose how to present themselves to mankind.

In the ancient world religion was about observance to the gods and action, not about faith and dogma. There was no Roman "Bible" to say exactly how the gods were.

In a lot of ways pagans were far more tollerant than Christians, Muslims or Jews. Pagans belived that all the gods existed if you worshipped different ones that was fine. As to why Christians were persecuted, well they refused to worship the Imperial State Religion, Emperor Worship. The issue was really political, they also went around telling everyone else they were going to hell.

[Watchman]

I wouldn't be particularly surprised if most of those deities harked back to some common Indo-European pantheon way back in the mists of time. That a clever observer like old Julius would readily recognize mainly cosmetically differing variants from themes he was very familiar with seems quite likely.

[Atilius]

I second Wigferth and Watchman.

The Romans themselves had long ago appropriated the Greek pantheon almost whole. Janus and Quirinus are among the few deities worshipped by the Romans before contact with Greek culture who continued to be revered afterward.

[gigi]

i'm belgian and i learned at school that the belgian tribes worshipped the goddess minerva as their main god.

[Mooks]

So your saying Casear is false? In his book you got loads of facts...I would think he got something as common as religion right.

The greeks did influence the gauls. Just look at masilla on the map, that was a greek city (and it maintaned independance from Rome for a long long time)

[lars573]

They didn't worship the same gods exactly. They all worshipped very similar gods. The Greek gods are a developement from very primal deities, but they are a logical development. All cultures in Europe tended to develope a female goddess of fertility and a male god of war etc.

These gods aren't the same but they are similar enough that when the Romans came along they simply assumed they were the same gods because the gods could choose how to present themselves to mankind.

In the ancient world religion was about observance to the gods and action, not about faith and dogma. There was no Roman "Bible" to say exactly how the gods were.

In a lot of ways pagans were far more tollerant than Christians, Muslims or Jews. Pagans belived that all the gods existed if you worshipped different ones that was fine. As to why Christians were persecuted, well they refused to worship the Imperial State Religion, Emperor Worship. The issue was really political, they also went around telling everyone else they were going to hell.

That and they were to use modern terms terrorists, that may seem inflamitory but if you read up on what we know of ancient christians it's essentially accurate. The early christians were out to destroy the empire anyway they could. They condidered it evil and the work of Satan.

[Nelson]

Since you’re talking about the history of religions during the late Republic and the Empire, and not Rome:TW per se, I’m moving this to the Monastery.

Lars, I am sure those parties involved thus far would like to see evidence of early Christian terrorism against the Empire. Whether or not such evidence is forthcoming, this topic must not degenerate into something inflammatory.

Everyone be reminded that religions are a sensitive issue, especially when they are still in vogue and have a billion or so adherents.

[Meneldil]

They condidered it evil and the work of Satan.

For some reasons I doubt that. Satan wasn't a central figure of the Christian mythology back then. I doubt the early christians went around calling the Roman Empire 'work of Satan' while most of them didn't even know who was Satan.
Now, OTOH, they might have considered it evil because they were persecuted, or because the idea of a godly Emperor was against their teachings, yeah.

[Watchman]

Or because it was crawling with horrible pagans, some of whom (like a few emperors) were quite unfriendly too.

[lars573]

For some reasons I doubt that. Satan wasn't a central figure of the Christian mythology back then. I doubt the early christians went around calling the Roman Empire 'work of Satan' while most of them didn't even know who was Satan.
Now, OTOH, they might have considered it evil because they were persecuted, or because the idea of a godly Emperor was against their teachings, yeah.

Well they did. The 7 headed whore of Babylon in the book of revelations is Rome. For some reason I've never grasped the Judeo-Christians of the 1st century AD really didn't like Rome.

Lars, I am sure those parties involved thus far would like to see evidence of early Christian terrorism against the Empire. Whether or not such evidence is forthcoming, this topic must not degenerate into something inflammatory.

There is new and mounting evidence that Nero wasn't using the Christians as a scape goats. They really did set fire to the palatine hill, which then ran wild and burned the whole place. In some sort of bid to destroy the empire.

[Kralizec]

Care to share this new evidence with us?

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

Well they did. The 7 headed whore of Babylon in the book of revelations is Rome. For some reason I've never grasped the Judeo-Christians of the 1st century AD really didn't like Rome.



There is new and mounting evidence that Nero wasn't using the Christians as a scape goats. They really did set fire to the palatine hill, which then ran wild and burned the whole place. In some sort of bid to destroy the empire.

Let me give you some advice. When talking about tha ancient world don't ever speak in terms of absolutes, you don't know what happened, you can only work out what probably happened.

Certainly in the later Empire Christians were violent, after Christianity became the official religion. I am, however, unaware of any evidence of significant Christian violence in the 1st Century AD. In general Jesus' message of love and forgiveness was very much still in force at this time, remember there would still have been people who had heard him then.

Lars, are you sure you're not getting confused with the militant Zionist-Jewish group Judas belonged to? They were very violent and they were terrorists. The Romans often didn't make a distinction; they were all followers of Yaweh after all.

There are plenty of stories of non-resistant Christians being killed by the Romans. I would contend that you have religious cults mixed up.