[1254] H. Gaidoz, Esquisse de la rel. des Gaulois, p. 18.
[1255] J. Evans, Coins of the Anc. Britons, p. 98. The pentagram, which, says Professor Tylor (Ency. Brit., xv, 1883, p. 203), is ‘an interesting proof of tradition from the Pythagoreans’, has also been found on a more recently discovered British coin (J. Evans, Coins, &c.,—Suppl., p. 573); on a bucket in Carnarvonshire (Archaeol. Cambr., 6th ser., v, 1905, p. 256); on a pebble in a broch at Burrian, Orkney (ib.); and on Gallic coins of the Carnutes, Senones, Suessiones, and Remi (A. Blanchet, Traité des monn. gaul., pp. 331, 360, 378, 385-6).
M. d’Arbois de Jubainville (Études sur le droit celt., i, 1895, p. 5), referring to Mela, iii, 2, § 19 (unum ex his quae praecipiunt in vulgus effluxit, videlicet ut forent ad bella meliores, aeternas esse animas vitamque alteram ad manes. Itaque cum mortuis cremant ac defodiunt apta viventibus), asserts that the teaching of the Druids differed from that of Pythagoras: they did not inculcate metempsychosis, but merely the immortality of the soul. He also insists, quoting Valerius Maximus, ii, 6, § 10, that, in the belief of the Gauls, the life to come was analogous to life upon earth (cf. N. Fréret, Œuvres complètes, xviii, 1796, pp. 182-8). But it is not proved that Caesar, whose authority is higher than that of Mela, and whose testimony is not really contradicted by him, was misinformed when he said that the Druids taught non interire animas, sed ab aliis post mortem transire ad alios; and Valerius Maximus himself remarks that the belief of the Gauls was identical with that of Pythagoras. Many Christians, who believe in the immortality of the soul, also believe, or fancy that they believe, in the transmigration of souls. Still, as I have suggested in the text, it is quite possible that even the Druids did not preach the Pythagorean doctrine of metempsychosis, and that Caesar did not intend to convey that they did.
[1256] E. B. Tylor, Prim. Culture, ii, 1903, pp. 75-83.
[1257] Ib., pp. 63-5, 77; Rev. de l’hist. des rel., xiv, 1886, p. 61; G. Dottin, La rel. des Celtes, pp. 35-7.
[1258] B. G., vi, 14, § 6.
[1259] See Rev. celt., iv, 1879-80, pp. 51-2.
[1260] B. G., vi, 18, § 2; Pliny, Nat. Hist., xvi, 43 (95), § 250. The Germans had the same notion as the Gauls about night and day (Tacitus, Germ., 11). Cf. N. Fréret, Œuvres complètes, xviii, 1796, p. 222, and Rev. internat. de l’enseignement, Août, 1895, p. 159.
[1261] See Rev. des études anc., v, 1903, p. 127; Rev. celt., xxv, 1904, pp. 115, 118, 121, 131-2, 160; and J. Rhys, Celtae and Galli, 1905, pp. 1-4, 8, 21, 35, 46. Of course we have no right to assume that the calendar of Coligny, which was not earlier than the first century of our era, was identical with that of the Britons; but this caution does not invalidate the statements in the text.
The language of the calendar is a subject of dispute. Prof. Rhys and M. Camille Jullian (Rev. des études anc., v, 1903, p. 127) unhesitatingly treat it as Celtic: M. d’Arbois de Jubainville regards the association of qu with p (see pp. 227-8, supra) as proof of its being Ligurian. [Prof. Rhys’s latest view (Celtic Inscr. of France and Italy, p. 99) is that ‘it becomes more and more a question of names, whether it is to be called Celtic or Ligurian’. But the fact remains that history and physical anthropology tend to show that the Ligurians were utterly different from the people among whom the Celtic language came into being. See my Caesar’s Conquest of Gaul, 1899, pp. 275-81.]