- Chapter Twenty-Three -
the Latin alphabet and consisting of strokes or notches which were cut into wood,
bone or stone (McManus 1991: Iff.). It seems highly likely that it originated as a
system of magical symbols, and some scholars have maintained that it originated
as long ago as C.500 BC as a sign language used by the continental druids. This
argument is based on the fact that the symbols are clumsy as written letters but are
well suited to mobile fingers (McManus 1991: 8f.). The Irish god Ogma is credited
with having invented this system of writing.
Oaths sworn before druids were regarded as sacred and binding. Oaths were
sworn on many things, including the elements, which, if the oath were to be violated,
would be expected to turn upon the guilty one and destroy him. The magical power
of the pagan oath made it unacceptable to the early Christian church. A reference to
pre-Christian oath-taking occurs in the sixth-century First Synod of Saint Patrick.
This synod ordained that a Christian who swore before a druid in the pagan manner
had to do a year's penance (Kelly 1988: 198f.).
It is of especially great interest to consider the text of the Chamalieres tablet. In
1971 a lead tablet with a Gaulish magico-religious text of some sixty words in Italic
writing was found at the Source-des-Roches de Chamalieres, Puy-de-Dome, France.
It has been dated to the early first century BC, an important period for pagan Celtic
religion and rites. It is in the nature of a defixio (meaning 'bewitch', 'curse'), and is
an important document for information on Celtic deities and magical formulae
(Lejeune and Marichal 1977). The god Maponus is invoked as the Arvernian
Maponus; and Lugus, the most widely venerated and important of all the Celtic
deities, would seem to be present in the context of an oath, which is a kind of magical
restraint, and had great powers in the early Celtic world. Perhaps the most striking
feature is the magical formula for swearing by a god which, in Ireland, occurs as
tongu do dhia tonges rno thuath, 'I swear by the god by whom my people swear'.
The Old Irish word for oath is lugae, luige; and Sayers, in his important article
on enchainment (1990), states: 'More attractive is the hypothesis ... that Old Irish
lugae, luige, 'oath', and the theonym Lug are related, with the latter possibly a tute-
lary divinity of contractual bonds' (1990: 234). There is a similar formula in Early
Welsh, and the word for oath in Welsh is llw. In the Chamalieres defixio we are in
the very presence of active druidic ritual, and we are also able to envisage some small
fragment of the myth of the pan-Celtic god Lugus.
ASSEMBLIES/OENAICH AND CALENDAR
FESTIVALSCaesar's comments on the religion of the Celts are astute, informed and well attested
by the vernacular tradition. Perhaps his most important statement is his account of
a great national assembly held annually under the aegis of the druidic orders. Its sig-
nificance is such that it bears quoting in full:
These Druids, at a certain time of the year, meet within the borders of the
Carnutes, whose territory is reckoned as the centre of all Gaul, and sit in
conclave in a consecrated spot. Thither assemble from every side all that have