Moreover, the Gaulish compound is made up of the self-same elements which we have in Din-ỻeu; but this latter, not being a compound, would be literally represented in Gaulish by Dūnon Lugovos, or Lleu's Town. It is highly probable, however, that it was obtained by analysing the compound name,[1] which may be supposed to have been the original in this country as well as in Gaul. Now Lyons was not the only Lugdunum, for there was one in the Pyrenees, distinguished as Lugdunum Convenarum, now called Saint-Bertrand de Comminges, in the department of the Haute Garonne; moreover, Laon, the chief town of the department of the Aisne, bore this name;[2] and so, as is generally known, did Leyden on the Rhine in Holland, for Ptolemy in his Geography gives its old name as Λουγόδουνον.[3] Look at the positions of these places on the map, and take into account those of Dinỻeu in Arvon, and Dinỻe in the Wrekin district in Shropshire, also the places where the Lugnassad were celebrated in Ireland, and you will readily admit that the name Lugus, Lug or Lleu, was that of a divinity whose cult was practised by all probably of the Celts both on the Continent and in these islands. In fact, to go more into detail, it may be inferred that the Irish Lugnassad had its counterpart at one at least of the Lugduna of the Continent, namely, the southernmost city of that name, on the Rhone; for it
- ↑ A place-name into which Lug's name enters in the Bk. of the Dun, 82a, is (in the dative) Modaib Loga, which is there explained to be the same as the compound Lugmod.
- ↑ For this I am indebted to my learned colleague, the Regius Professor of History at Oxford, who has directed my attention to Gregory of Tours, Hist. Francorum, vi. 4.
- ↑ Traces of a fifth Lugdunum, in documents belonging to the church of Le Mans, are mentioned in the Rev. Celt. vij. 399.
