The Celts lived far to the west of Greece, so they rarely feature in Greek mythology. They were composed of nations such as the Gauls, the Britons, the Irish, the Celtiberians and others. What does Greek mythology have to say about the origin of the Celts?
There are two main legends in Greek mythology that deal with the origin of the Celts. One of them is little more than a reference to a mythological genealogy. Interestingly, this story has a connection to the Odyssey, Homer’s story of Odysseus’ efforts to return home after the Trojan War.
In the Odyssey, Odysseus encounters a Cyclops named Polyphemus who lives on an island. The Greek historian Appian, writing in the second century CE, wrote in his Illyrian Wars about how Polyphemus was the forefather of the Celts. Regarding Illyria, Appian wrote:
“They say that the country received its name from Illyrius, the son of Polyphemus; for the Cyclops Polyphemus and his wife, Galatea, had three sons, Celtus, Illyrius, and Galas, all of whom migrated from Sicily; and the nations called Celts, Illyrians, and Galatians took their origin from them.”
According to this brief account, the Celts were descendants of Polyphemus the Cyclops. They migrated to their lands in Gaul from Sicily.
The fact that Appian associated the Celts with the Galatians is not surprising. After all, the Galatians were actually just a subgroup of the Celts, being Gaulish tribes that had migrated to Anatolia.
However, it is interesting to note that this myth recorded by Appian makes the Illyrians close relatives of the Celts. This is surprising because historically the Illyrians were not Celts at all. They had their own distinct language, which was not Celtic, and archaeology makes their differences clear.
Nevertheless, as the Celts migrated east from c. 400 BCE onwards, the Illyrians were Celticized to a significant degree. They adopted various aspects of Celtic culture, both in terms of physical artifacts and also cultural practices.
Therefore, by virtue of this significant cultural influence, it makes sense that the Greeks of Appian’s time considered them to be relatives.
This may, perhaps, indicate that the alleged origin of the Celts in Sicily according to Greek mythology was partially inspired by the strong Greco-Italic cultural influences that the Celts themselves experienced from the sixth century BCE onwards.
The other major story in Greek mythology about the origin of the Celts comes from Parthenius of Nicaea. In the first century BCE, Parthenius wrote Erotica Pathemata, also known as Love Romances. In the thirtieth story, we read about an incident involving Heracles (also commonly known as Hercules).
The story in its entirety reads:
Hercules, it is told, after he had taken the kine [cattle] of Geryones from Erythea, was wandering through the country of the Celts and came to the house of Bretannus, who had a daughter called Celtine. Celtine fell in love with Hercules and hid away the kine, refusing to give them back to him unless he would first content her. Hercules was indeed very anxious to bring the kine safe home, but he was far more struck by the girl’s exceeding beauty, and consented to her wishes; and then, when the time had come round, a son called Celtus was born to them, from whom the Celtic race derived their name.
According to this, Hercules met a king named Bretannus while travelling through the land of the Celts after stealing the cattle of Geryon. Since the Greeks generally placed Geryon in Spain, this makes sense. Hercules would indeed have needed to pass through Gaul, the principal land of the Celts, to return to Greece.
Hercules had relations with Bretannus’ daughter, Celtine. Their son was named Celtus, and he became the forefather of the Celts.
This account in Greek mythology is concerned with the origin of nations, in this case the Celts. This is why the name of Celtus’ mother is Celtine, a figure who appears nowhere else in Greek mythology.
Given this context, it is evident that the name of Bretannus is significant too. Like Celtine, it is not a name that we see elsewhere in Greek mythology. With this in mind, it seems that he is meant to be the forefather of the ancient Britons.
While the Greeks never explicitly called the Britons ‘Celts,’ this is likely because their identity was linked more closely to their island, Britain, than to the wider people of whom they were a part. By way of comparison, Tacitus never explicitly called them Gauls even though that is what he believed that they were.
Nevertheless, this account of the origin of the Celts in Greek mythology clearly links them to the Britons. This shows that the Greeks did have a notion of the Britons and the Celts sharing an origin.
While it is a shame that the available sources do not expand on Bretannus’ role in Greek mythology, Parthenius’ account provides us with a valuable insight into what the Greeks believed about the origin of the Celts.
