Cernunnos - Lord of the Forest

Cernunnos, Lord of the Forest
Stag and Wolf, Come!
Guardian of the Grove,
Lord of the Trees,
Horned One, Come!

Bring us the Fruits of Your Wisdom,
Bring us the Fruits of Your Wisdom.

(Author unknown)

Horned Stag, Run Though the Wood,
The Wood of Gold and Green
Lead Us Down the Ancient Path
To Mysteries Unseen.

Horned Stag, Run Through the Wood,
The Wood Both New and Old
Teach us of the Ancient Ways
Your wisdom to Unfold.

(Author unknown)

Overview of Cernunnos

Cernunnos is believed to be the Celtic god of beasts and wild places and is also known as the ‘Forest God’ or the ‘Stag God.’ As with many of the Celtic tales, Cernunnos’s origin stories have been lost to time, and we have to base our information around Celtic arts pieces and scraps of knowledge that have survived the passage of time.

If we start by looking at Cernunnos’ name, we can get an idea about his appearance. Cernunnos is the ancient Garlic word for ‘horned’ or ‘horned one.’ The etymology of his name was suggested by Alfred Holder (1840 – 1916), an Austrian language scholar who was a prolific producer on work based on classical, medieval Latin, Germanic, and Celtic studies.

He suggested that ‘Cern’ could be likened to the proto-Indo-Europeans ‘kerh’ meaning ‘horn or hoof.’ He, therefore, proposed his name as ‘horned god.’ This connected well with the icons and art found relating to Cernunnos.

Other language scholars suggested different etymology. Ernst Windisch and Leo Weisgerber suggested that the ablaut root form of the word from proto-Indo-European in Celtic was ‘karno; rather than kerno, which could mean ‘top of the head.’ It could therefore be argued that his name could be interpreted as ‘the one who has the top of his head like a deer.’ Although it is a different root word, it could be argued that both these interpretations bring us to the same conclusion, that Cernunnos had horns.

This fits with the icons and art what remain of him.

It is generally agreed that Cernunnos is the god of nature, wilderness, animals, and fertility and that his appearance is a mixture of human and animal traits, which shows his representing both the human and natural world.

Cernunnos was a popular figure in Celtic Britain, and due to this when Christianity began to get a stronger hold over the lands, they were opposed to him, and he was a strong pagan influence over the Britons. Therefore, he was transformed within Christian iconology and medieval writing to represent the Antichrist and the devil.

Unfortunately, his stories have not survived as so he is a mysterious, yet powerful deity.

Iconography

The Gundestrup Cauldron

The Gundestrup Cauldron is a surviving artifact on which there is a representation believed to be of Cernunnos.

The cauldron is made of silver and was discovered in Gundestrup in Denmark in 1891. The cauldron is made of gilded silver, and it is believed that it originated in the Balkans, possibly sometime in the 1st century BC. It is an incredibly artifact and it contains art that is heavily influenced by the Celtic world.

Within the Celtic religions, cauldrons were important instruments as they were used at feasts and they became common within the mythology and folklore where they gained more magical abilities which would be linked to abundance, regeneration, and fertility. These abilities are common throughout many other stories, including fairy tails where we find stories such as ‘The Magic Porridge Pot,’ which produced unending porridge and is a story many people will have heard in their childhoods.

The cauldron has the following dimensions -

It is 14 inches high and 27 inches in diameter. It is capable of holding 107 litres of fluid and it weighs just over 9kgs. As mentioned above, the cauldron is made from gilded silver and is 96% pure.

Its construction is interesting as it has a plain basin which is made out of a single sheet of silver. The sides are made out of five inner and eight outer curved rectangle silver plates. Each of the panels are 21 cm in height. Unfortunately, one of the panels are now missing.

All of the panels are different, but there is only one that is related to Cernunnos, and this is the ‘Horned Figure Panel.’ On this panel the figure is seen wearing horns and a torc, which was a common symbol in Celtic mythology and stories. You can see that the figure is also holding an additional torc and has a long snake with a rams head. It is believed that both of these could be there to represent strength and abundance. On the left side of the panel there is a stag and a deer, both animals that represent Cernunnos in mythology.

The Pillar of the Boatmen

The Pillar of the Boatmen, or Pilier des nautes, is a pillar which would have originally stood in a temple in the Gallo-Roman city of Lutetia which would be there modern-day Paris is in France. It is one of the earliest pieces found to have an inscription that whilst written in Latin, has Gaulish language within it. There is a mixture of Roman and Celtic gods represented which is also unique.

Part of the inscription enabled the pillar to be dated as it is dedicated to Emperor Tiberius Caesar Augustus, who became emperor in 14 AD. It is believed that the pillar was dedicated in around 25AD.

The main dedications on the pillar are to Jupiter and Emperor Tiberius and are written in the dative case. The remaining inscriptions are written in nominative representing individual depictions of different gods. The gods shown are: Jove, Tarvos Trigaranos (the Bull with Three Cranes), Volcanus (Vulcan), Esus, Cernunnos, Castor, Smertrios, and Fortuna.

Cernunnos’ image on the pillar shows him with horns on which two individual torcs hang. It is presumed that he is in a cross-legged sitting position as this is the normal way he is presented.

The image on this pillar is an important record that Cernunnos was indeed a deity as he is represented by name amongst the other Roman gods and not as a vague horned god who could be any of the other horned gods.