- Celts and Germans in the Rhineland -
Juno, and set on a base covered with classical reliefs usually depicting such deities as
Mercury, Minerva, Hercules and Juno, the column normally supports a horseman
who is riding down a giant, part man, part serpent, although in the Rhineland the
sculpture more often represents Jupiter enthroned (Figure 31.6). In either case, the
total impression is wholly alien to classical iconography, like some crucifix from
the early days of the Spanish conquest of Mexico, carved by sculptors trained in
pre-Columbian styles and techniques. 56
NOTES
1 The most lucid summary in English of the history and archaeology of the area at this
period is by John Collis, The European Iron Age (London: Batsford, 1984), see especially
pp.114-^1 5·
2 Polybius II.18; Livy v.32-49.
3 Jerome, Commentary on the Epistle to the Galatians, II.3.
4 equites Treveri, quorum inter Gallos virtutis opinio est singularis, (Caesar, Gallic War
11.24)·
5 Caesar, Gallic War 1.1,11.4, Iv.6, VI.2-3, VI.32; (Hirtius) VIII.25; Tacitus, Germania XXVIII.4.
6 Germani qui trans Rhenum incolunt, emphatic (Caesar, Gallic War u), discussed in more
detail below. An earlier interpretation of the evidence thought in terms of 'an incoming
aristocracy in the later Hunsriick-Eifel period' and possibly also 'a gradual movement of
people westwards across the Rhine', the latter leaving no trace in the archaeological record:
Edith Mary Wightman, Roman Trier and the Treveri (London: Hart-Davis, 1970), 17-18.
This hypothesis is not however required since the rich graves are perfectly explicable as a
local development, and need not have been introduced by newcomers.
7 Collis, European Iron Age, 114.
8 oppido Aeduorum longe maximo et copiosissimo (Caesar, Gallic War I.23).
9 ipsorum lingua Celtae, nostra Galli appellantur (Caesar, Gallic War 1.1).
10 See n. 5; note also references to Rhenum finesque Germanorum (Caesar, Gallic War I.27),
and continual emphasis on Germans crossing the Rhine, (I.3^1 , I.33, I.37, I.43, 1.44,1.53,
etc.); see further C.M. Wells, The German Policy of Augustus (Oxford: Oxford University
Press, 1972), 3 II-I2.
I I ingenti magnitudine corporum, incredibili virtute atque exercitatione in armis (Caesar,
Gallic War 1.39).
12 ut ante Cimbri Teutonique fecissent (Caesar, Gallic War 1.33).
13 Suebi as gens ... longe maxima et bellicosissima Germanorum omnium (Caesar, Gallic War
IV. 1); Ariovistus's wives, una Sueba natione quam domo secum duxerat, and the other from
Noricum, the sister of King Voccio, whose brother had sent her to him in Gaul to marry,
(Gallic War T.53); Ariovistus speaking Celtic longinqua consuetudine (Gallic War 1.47)·
14 Insubrian chieftain, Florus 1.20.4; on the name Ariovistus, D.E. Evans, Gaulish Personal
Names: a study of some continental Celtic formations (Oxford: Oxford University Press,
1967), 54-5, 14 1- 2; d. R. Much, arguing against Sigmund Feist, Germanen und Kelten in
der antiken Oberlieferung (Halle: Niemeyer, 1927), in Zeitschrift fur deutsches Altertum
und deutsche Literatur 65 (1928): 11-13,30-2.
15 Cotinos Gallica, Osos Pannonica lingua coarguit non esse Germanos (Tacitus, Germania
XLIII. I).
16 John Collis, Oppida: earliest towns north of the Alps (Sheffield: Department of Prehistory
and Archaeology, University of Sheffield, 1984), maps, with gazetteer and bibliography,
229-5^0.