Toutatis

Toutatis or Teutates, ancient god of Celts and Gauls, whose name means father of the tribe. He was a god of war, growth and prosperity.

He represented the unity and the harmony of the tribe (often confused with Ogmios).

Each tribe had its own Toutatis.

Alternative: Albiorix ("king of the world"), Caturix ("king of the battle"), Loucetius, Rigisamos

Was this god the Celtic Mercury?

The difficulty of working out to which deity inhabitants of Roman Britain are referring when they mention Mercury is profound. A well-known section in Lucan's Bellum civile talks about the gory sacrificial offerings proffered to a triad of Celtic deities: Teutates, Esus, and Taranis. Among a pair of later reviewers on Lucan's work, one identifies Teutates with Mercury and Esus with Mars. The continental Celtic deity “Mars” plainly exemplifies the problem with finding syncretism between Roman and Celtic gods. The likely reason for this ostensible muddle in equating Roman with Celtic gods, occurring in other instances, is that Celtic deities are not constrained to specific functions. The Celtic peoples seem to have believed in immanence, seeing a single divine spirit, character or power as typical of many different aspects of reality, a belief emblematic of animism.So “Mercury” as a spirit of interaction may be a characteristic of the warrior, while “Mars” as the spirit of martial character may serve to shield the tribe from invasion. This is one explanation of how a spirit of transit such as Mercury may have come to be equated with such a spirit of tribal unity as Teutates.


Also, an asteroid: see 4179 Toutatispl:Toutatis

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