SUCELLUS

Sucellus (or Sucellos) was the Gaulish hammer god. He is shown wielding a long-handled hammer and nicknamed “The Good Striker.” In the south of Gad he was given some of the attributes of the woodland god Silvanus as protector of harvest and cattle. At some locations at least he is paired with the goddess Nantosuelta.

He was a very popular god in Gaul, though, from the evidence we have, less popular in Britain. An inscription in the Rhone Valley reads “ Sucellum propitium nobis" (Sucellus is favorably disposed to us).

It has been pointed out that the “hammer” is really a mallet and that it has an unusually long handle. This suggests that it is not a real, earthly hammer, but has some supernatural use. Perhaps the hammer or mallet was seen as useful for symbolically banging bad luck on the head.

SULK

The healing spring goddess worshiped at Bath, known to the Romans as Minerva. One of Minerva’s epithets is Sdevia. Jnlins Caesar lists her as one of the principal deities of the Gauls. She was especially popular among ordinary people as the patroness of domestic crafts, and fhis devotion continued into the Christian period.

In the seventh century AD, St. Eligius rebuked people for invoking the pagan goddess Minerva when they were weaving or dyeing, which shows that it was an ingrained custom.

The nearest equivalent in Ireland is the goddess Brighid.

SUN GOD

The sun god is represented in a variety of ways. One is the wheel god, with the wheel as an obvious symbol of the sun. But the sun is also represented by the swastika, with the legs of the swastika apparently representing the rotating movement of the sun. It is not clear, though, how people in antiquity could have arrived at the idea that the sun rotates. We now know that the sun spins on its axis, but how could people have known that 2,000 years ago? The legs on the swastika may instead represent the sun’s ability to travel, to “walk,” right across the sky each day.

There are quite a few images where wheels, swastikas, and dedications to a sky god occur together. Sometimes the wheel stands as a symbol on its own, decorating the front surface of an altar, like the one found at Gilly, near Nimes.