To a certain extent Massilia must have been influenced by her surroundings. ‘Massilia’, says the consul in Livy,[45] ‘inter Gallos sita traxit aliquantum ab accolis animorum’. Her inhabitants must have learned much of the physical features and culture of the land from the barbarians. But the overwhelming strength of influence was on their side. The fact that they were not swamped is in itself a striking testimony. It meant that they possessed a culture which was destined not only to hold its own, but to win increasingly as time went on. It was owing to them that the Gauls appointed professors and doctors,[46] and many of their teachers are mentioned in ancient literature. Telon and Gyareus are called by Lucan[47] ‘gemini fratres, fecundae gloria matris’, and together with Lydanus, Pytheas, Eratosthenes, Eudimenes, are famous for mathematics and astronomy[48] in the early days of Massilia. Seneca mentions a rhetorician Moschus, who had been found guilty of poisoning and taught at Massilia,[49] and notices also Agroitas as a rhetorician of distinction.[50] Natural philosophy was not neglected. Plutarch[51] mentions Euthymenes of Massilia, whose opinion he quotes on the overflowing of the Nile, and refers to the famous Pytheas on the causes of the tides. Of the eight recensions of Homer, which were known before Zenodotus, one was the famous διόρθωσις Μασσαλιωτική[52] to which Wolf assigns an honourable place.[53]
As for their proficiency in languages, it is well known that they were called trilingues,[54] speaking Greek and Latin and Celtic. The Greek of Massilia left its mark on the French language after a lapse of many centuries, especially on the proper names of Aquitaine,[55] and Christian times afford many instances in literature and inscriptions of this influence. To name two only, the Acta Martyrum were written in Greek, the language of Irenaeus (second century), by the order of the Churches of Vienne and Lyons,[56] and as late as the sixth century Caesarius[57] could make the people of his congregation at Arles sing in Greek. As late as the Middle Ages the territory around Massilia was called Graecia, and its sea Mare Graecum.[58]
Such was the great part played by Massilia. Tradition tells how the leaders of the Phocaeans, Protis and Simos, when they landed in Gaul, went to the local King Nannus for help. They were invited to attend a ceremony at which the daughter of the king extended a cup of water to the suitor whom she favoured. She bestowed the token on Protis, who thus married a daughter of the soil on which he was to establish Massilia.[59] So Massilia ruled the household of Gaul and set in order its culture. In imperial times there was a decline,[60] and the Massilians found their pre-eminence shaken and their trade ruined by the colony which Caesar sent to Arles (destined to develop into a commercial centre) under Tiberius, father of the Emperor.[61] Under Marcus Aurelius they had to give up their ancient constitution and fall into line with the other imperial cities.[62] But their work was accomplished. They kept the torch of civilization burning until they could pass it on to Romanized Gaul. Even then they retained their culture, and retained it longer than the other towns. The capture of Massilia in 477 by the Goths completed the separation of Gaul from Rome and prepared the way for the Gallo-Frankish state.
As she had given the impetus to letters, so, in later times, she proved their salvation. At the time of the great invasions at the beginning of the fifth century, and at its end when the Visigoths were encroaching more and more, Massilia was a refuge for Christian monks to whose labours literature owes so much. The Monastery of St. Victor ranked with Lérins as a centre of Christian education, and many famous men found a refuge there during the menace of troublous times. Victorinus, Prosper of Aquitaine, Gennadius, Musaeus, Salvian, were among those who sought its peace.[63]
Justinus tells of the Celtic chief Catumandus who was chosen by the neighbouring tribes to lead an army against the prosperous Massilia. Being terrified, however, by the figure of a fierce-looking woman whom he saw in a dream, he made peace with the Massilians and begged to be allowed to enter their city and worship their gods. In the portico of the temple he saw the statue of Minerva and exclaimed that that was the figure of his dream.[64]
Thus it was that the goddess of culture saved Massilia, and through Massilia, Gaul.
3. Celtic Influence
Bouquet[65] refers to a legendary account given by one Pezronius to explain the rise of culture among the Gauls. On the death of Pluto, Jupiter gave to Mercury the Empire of the West and he, by his wit and eloquence, civilized the people. ‘Populorum sibi subditorum ferocitatem emollivit, leges statuit, artes adinvenit, commercia inter Occidentales populos instituit’. For this service the Celts of Gaul were so thankful that for two thousand years they worshipped Mercury with the greatest veneration.
This story is a fable and an afterthought, but it is significant of the sort of culture that later people conceived of as having existed among the ancient Gauls. Long before the days of Roman rule the elder Cato had testified to the trend of their genius in the well-known words: ‘Pleraque Gallia duas res industriosissima persequitur, rem militarem et argute loqui’,[66] and it is quite certain that Mercury (and before the Romans his Celtic counterpart) was actually and almost universally worshipped in Gaul. ‘Galli’, says Caesar,[67] ‘Deum maxime Mercurium colunt’, a statement which is abundantly supported by the inscriptions. An inscription at Chalon-sur-Saône shows the figure of Mercury with his three favourite animals, a cock, a tortoise, a goat, and the words ‘Deo Mercurio Augu ... Sacro’,[68] while at Lyons there were three altars with the words ‘Mercurio Augusto et Maiae Augustae’. An inscription of Poitiers, which is as late as the third century, is dedicated to ‘the god Mercurius’.[69] Even in the barbarous North there is a large number of inscriptions referring to Mercury, especially around Trèves.[70] The worship of Minerva, too, is established by many inscriptions, e.g. the twenty on bowls and cups found at Andecavi in Lugdunensis.[71]
Thus the Gauls singled out for special worship the subtlest and cleverest of the gods,[72] and the fact may be connected with their undoubted culture in early times. Out of the darkness in which pre-Roman Gaul is shrouded we gather hints here and there concerning the first known teachers of the Gallic Celts, the Druids. One or two points may be noticed.