The Gods and their Croziers
The Gods of the Celtic pantheons have long resisted accurate comparison against their famous counterparts in the Norse, Mediterranean, and Indo-Iranian religions. What remains might be only the garbled re-imaginings of bored Christian monks, stripped of authenticity.. But what if it’s not as dismal as we thought? What if we can validate that these stories are actually remarkably faithful? And, what if there are many, many more of them awaiting discovery?
Recent work using the methods of Dumézilian comparative mythology has already helped accurately re-identify characters from Gaelic and Welsh mythology. By applying the same methods to the Hagiography of the Celtic Saints, I’ve found something amazing: nearly every Early Celtic Saint is based on a character from native mythology, preserving character attributes, narratives, familial relationships, and even original names and epithets.
By finding their parallel stories in native mythology or in related religions, we can restore them to their original identities. Learning from them, we can also better-understand the faithfully kept mythological material we already enjoy.. but some of these Saints also represent Gods that were forgotten or fully suppressed, only now identifiable by comparison to other related religions. We can finally restore what was lost, keeping it authentic to Celtic tradition.
I’m compiling this work for a book, or perhaps a series of books. But, I want to share the work as early as I can! Join me as I explore the Comparative Mythology of the Celtic Saints, uncovering the Gods and their Croziers.
