In ancient Celtic religion

Celtic polytheism

Celtic polytheism, commonly known as Celtic paganism, refers to the religious beliefs and practices adhered to by the Iron Age peoples of Western Europe now known as the Celts, roughly between 500 BCE and 500 CE, spanning the La Tène period and the Roman era, and in the case of the Insular Celts...

, Sucellus or Sucellos was the god

God

God is the English name given to a singular being in theistic and deistic religions who is either the sole deity in monotheism, or a single deity in polytheism....

 of agriculture

Agriculture

Agriculture is the cultivation of animals, plants, fungi and other life forms for food, fiber, and other products used to sustain life. Agriculture was the key implement in the rise of sedentary human civilization, whereby farming of domesticated species created food surpluses that nurtured the...

, forest

Forest

A forest, also referred to as a wood or the woods, is an area with a high density of trees. As with cities, depending where you are in the world, what is considered a forest may vary significantly in size and have various classification according to how and what of the forest is composed...

s and alcoholic drink

Alcoholic beverage

An alcoholic beverage is a drink containing ethanol, commonly known as alcohol. Alcoholic beverages are divided into three general classes: beers, wines, and spirits. They are legally consumed in most countries, and over 100 countries have laws regulating their production, sale, and consumption...

s of the Gauls, also part of the Lusitanian mythology

Lusitanian mythology

Lusitanian mythology is the mythology of the Lusitanians, the Indo-European people of western Iberia, in the territory comprising most of modern Portugal, Extremadura and a small part of Salamanca....

. Sucellus may also have been thought of as a creator god, and was particularly revered by the Arverni and the Boii.

Sculptures

He is usually portrayed as a middle-aged bearded man, with a long-handled hammer

Hammer

A hammer is a tool meant to deliver an impact to an object. The most common uses are for driving nails, fitting parts, forging metal and breaking up objects. Hammers are often designed for a specific purpose, and vary widely in their shape and structure. The usual features are a handle and a head,...

, or perhaps a beer barrel suspended from a pole. His wife, Nantosuelta

Nantosuelta

In Gaulish religion, Nantosuelta was a goddess of nature, the earth, fire, and fertility. The Mediomatrici depicted her in art as holding a model house or dovecote, on a pole . Nantosuelta is attested by statues, and by inscriptions. She was sometimes paired with Sucellus. Nantosuelta was also the...

, is sometimes depicted alongside him. When together, they are accompanied by symbols associated with prosperity and domesticity.

In this relief from Sarrebourg

Sarrebourg

Sarrebourg is a commune in the Moselle department in Lorraine in north-eastern France. It lies in on the upper course of the river Sarre.It should not be confused with Saarburg in Germany....

, near Metz

Metz

Metz is a city in the northeast of France located at the confluence of the Moselle and the Seille rivers.Metz is the capital of the Lorraine region and prefecture of the Moselle department. Located near the tripoint along the junction of France, Germany, and Luxembourg, Metz forms a central place...

, Nantosuelta, wearing a long gown, is standing to the left. In her left hand she holds a small house-shaped object with two circular holes and a peaked roof – perhaps a dovecote – on a long pole. Her right hand holds a patera

Patera

A patera was a broad, shallow dish used for drinking, primarily in a ritual context such as a libation. These paterae were often used in Rome....

 which she is tipping onto a cylindrical altar.
To the right Sucellus stands, bearded, in a tunic with a cloak over his right shoulder. He holds his mallet in his right hand and an olla

Olla (Roman pot)

In ancient Roman culture, the olla is a squat, rounded pot or jar. An olla would be used primarily to cook or store food, hence the word “olla" is still used in some Romance languages for either a cooking pot or a dish in the sense of cuisine...

in his left.
Above the figures is a dedicatory inscription and below them in very low relief is a bird, of a raven. This sculpture was dated by Reinach (1922, pp. 217–232), from the form of the letters, to the end of the first century or start of the second century.

Inscriptions

At least eleven inscriptions to Sucellus are known (Jufer & Luginbühl p. 63), mostly from Gaul. One (RIB II, 3/2422.21) is from York

York

York is a walled city, situated at the confluence of the Rivers Ouse and Foss in North Yorkshire, England. The city has a rich heritage and has provided the backdrop to major political events throughout much of its two millennia of existence...

 in England

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

.

In an inscription from Augst

Augst

Augst is a municipality in the district of Liestal in the canton of Basel-Country in Switzerland.It was known as Augusta Raurica in roman times-History:...

 (in antiquity, Augusta Rauricorum) Sucellus is assimilated to Silvanus

Silvanus (mythology)

Silvanus was a Roman tutelary deity of woods and fields. As protector of forests , he especially presided over plantations and delighted in trees growing wild. He is also described as a god watching over the fields and husbandmen, protecting in particular the boundaries of fields...

 (AE 1926, 00040):

In honor(em) /

d(omus) d(ivinae) deo Su/

cello Silv(ano) /

Spart(us) l(ocus) d(atus) d(ecreto) d(ecurionum)

The assimilation of Sucellus to Silvanus can also be seen in artwork from Narbonensis. (Duval 78)

Etymology

In Gaulish

Gaulish language

The Gaulish language is an extinct Celtic language that was spoken by the Gauls, a people who inhabited the region known as Gaul from the Iron Age through the Roman period...

, -cellos is interpreted as 'striker'. It is derived from Proto-Indo-European

Proto-Indo-European language

The Proto-Indo-European language is the reconstructed common ancestor of the Indo-European languages, spoken by the Proto-Indo-Europeans...

 *-kel-do-s whence also come Latin per-cellere ('striker'), Greek klao ('to break') and Lithuanian kálti ('to hammer, to forge'). The prefix su- means 'good' or 'well' and is found in many Gaulish personal names. Sucellus is therefore widely glossed as 'the good striker.' The name is a systematically corresponding

Comparative method

In linguistics, the comparative method is a technique for studying the development of languages by performing a feature-by-feature comparison of two or more languages with common descent from a shared ancestor, as opposed to the method of internal reconstruction, which analyzes the internal...

 cognate

Cognate

In linguistics, cognates are words that have a common etymological origin. This learned term derives from the Latin cognatus . Cognates within the same language are called doublets. Strictly speaking, loanwords from another language are usually not meant by the term, e.g...

 of Early Irish sochell ('kindness') and Old Irish soichell ('liberality, generosity, open-handedness')
.