Mythology

Celtic mythology

Celtic mythology is known for being a series of religiously based stories that the Celts maintained during the Iron Age. It is worth mentioning that the Celts were not a very unified group that was aware of their ethnic identity. Nor did they form an empire. Their world was a collection of different chiefdoms and diverse families that were linked by different languages and a common culture. Adventure, heroism, romance and magic are some of the elements that make Celtic mythology one of the most fascinating mythologies in Europe. At a certain point in history, some powerful people dominated much of Europe, the Celts were then reduced to a few groups after the Roman invasions. However, their mythology survived, thanks to the efforts of the medieval Irish and Welsh monks who wrote the stories.

What is Celtic mythology?

Celtic mythology is a series of stories based on religion and full of adventure, heroism, romance and magic performed by the Celts during the Iron Age, making it one of the most important and fascinating mythologies throughout Europe.

History of Celtic mythology

Although it is well known, there are several reasons why it has not been possible to gather more information regarding its history than what is already known, and one of the main reasons was that the Celts mistrusted writing and did not master it very well. For them, the fact of writing a text paralyzed them, and myths had to survive. And, for this reason, the Druids learned long poems by memory in order to be able to teach later. Another reason why there is little information is that there was not just one Celtic people, but several of them. Therefore, we can say that Celtic mythology is multiple and that each region that formed it had its own local gods.

Symbols

The symbols used by Celtic mythology were used as a tool for protection, to give courage to their warriors, to defeat their enemies, to have luck in love or to delimit the right path to follow. These are some of the most popular Celtic symbols:

Gods of Celtic mythology

Their main gods were the following:

Creatures of Celtic mythology

Heroes of Celtic mythology

Monsters

Some of the most feared monsters in Celtic mythology were:

Featured stories and legends

Written by Gabriela Briceño V.
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How to cite this article?

Briceño V., Gabriela. (2019). Celtic mythology. Recovered on 23 February, 2024, de Euston96: https://www.euston96.com/en/celtic-mythology/

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