Page:Origin and Growth of Religion (Rhys).djvu/51

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
I. THE GAULISH PANTHEON.
35

Irish has further a derived verb dúnaim, 'I shut or barricade,' and dunad, 'a camp, an array.' Hence it would seem that Segomo Dunates meant either Segomo the surrounder and defender, or else Segomo as the god who presided over the stronghold, the camp and the army, that is to say, a Gaulish Mars Castrensis. Lastly, two inscriptions at Bouhy,[1] in the department of the Nièvre, are dedicated to Mars Bolvinnus, and one of them to Marti Bolvinno et Duna(ti). This is a considerable distance from the place of finding the Allobrogic inscription; so that if the name is to be regarded as a topical epithet of the god, it must refer to some celebrated temple of his, like that of Mercury on the Puy de Dôme; but as no such temple has been heard of, the probability is strengthened that Dunates is to be interpreted in one of the ways suggested.

Mention has already been made of Segomo Cuntinus[2] connected with Conte; there was also a Mars Vintius, who was worshipped at Vence, near Nice, and who gave the former place its name: this is proved by an inscription found on the spot, mentioning Marti Vintio. Vintius, in Gaulish Vintjos, must have meant 'relating to the wind,' as it is of the same origin as the English word, the Welsh gwynt, Latin ventus; but, more exactly, Vintjos is an adjective from ventos, which was probably the Gaulish word for wind, and from Ventjos was produced by a modulation of the vowel the attested form. It is remarkable that the Welsh gwynt, wind, is the exact

  1. Rev. Celt. iv. 12; Congrès Arch. de France, 1873, p. 215. Can Bouhy and Bolvinnus be of the same origin?
  2. Rev. Celt. iv. 12; Mém. de la Soc. des Ant. de France (1850), xx. 59.