The Aedui are classified as a Celtic tribe. They lived in Gaul along the Rhone and Saone Rivers around present-day Autun in east-central France and are discussed as Celts or Gauls. Because of their location along the Rhone and their trade contacts with Mediterranean peoples, they were one of the more powerful and influential of the Gallic tribes. Some Germanics may have settled among them. Their chief town of Bibracte at Mont Beuvray was the location of a school run by the Druids, where Celtic nobility sent their young to be educated. Their allies probably included the Ambarri, Ambivariti, Brannovices.
After 120 b. c.e., an alliance with the Aedui against the Allobroges and the Arverni gave the Romans control of the Rhone Valley In 71 B. C.E., the Celtic-Germanic Sequani and the Germanic Suebi, allied under the Suebian Ariovistus, defeated the Aedui and probably Helvetii allies. The Aedui supported Julius Caesar in the Gallic Wars of the 50s b. c.e. Divitiacus, a ruler as well as a Druid, was a friend to the Romans. They at first did not support Vercingetorix of the Arverni in his rebellion of 52 B. C.E. Their aid at Gergovia, however, enabled the rebels to drive back the Romans and delay ultimate Roman victory Some among them again rebelled in 20 C. E. along with the Treveri.
Augustodunum on the site of Autun was a civitas capital of the Aedui during the Roman occupation lasting until the fifth century C. E. During the reign of Claudius I in 41-54 C. E., Aeduan aristocrats became the first Gauls to serve in the Roman Senate.
World History
