Note: cross-reference with Carthage Must Be Destroyed. This book has an excellent chapter on the Heraklean Way and its connection with Carthage.
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Original Post
Every once in awhile one comes across a book that is simply the "cat's meow." For me, The Discovery of Middle Earth appears to be one such book.
I happened to see it in an obscure location on the very top shelf -- almost out of my reach -- in the corner of the museum bookstore at the Getty Museum, Santa Monica, California, yesterday. I was simply looking for a new book to read; there were several possibilities but then I saw this one, and that ended the search. I was only going to buy one book and this would be the book.
I am only a few pages into the book but I can already tell I am really, really, going to enjoy this book for so many reasons.
The premise is this: while planning a cross-European bicycle riding route, the author claims to have discovered the Via Heraklean to be the Celtic backbone of Europe. I do not know if this is an original thought with this author, but early on he met with his editor/publisher and swore them to secrecy, when asking their opinion whether it was worth pursuing as a publishable book.
If so, I put this book among the handful of books that opens up an entirely new world for me:
- Mrs Dalloway, Virginia Woolf
- The Truth Will Out: Unmasking the Real Shakespeare, Brenda James
- Thh Discovery of Middle Earth, Graham Robb
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The Celts: not a race; a culture held together by common language (with dialects); from Scotland/Ireland southwest to tip of Iberian Peninsula, east through Spain, Gaul (France), and Germany; probably including Switzerland, perhaps into Austria, northern Italy; their history/past completely destroyed/covered by the Romans. Stonehenge (2400 to 2200 BC) long before the Celts; the Druids banned all written expression of their wisdom.
Celts: Iron Age (age of precision instruments, high-speed transport, crop rotation and land management, intellectual education of the young and the first European towns; possibly as early as the late Bronze Age; both ages come under the heading of 'pre-history.' The author likes to call the Celts protohistory
I have only begun reading; I have only begun taking notes.
ix
while writing the book, author living in Oxford, England
Matthew Arnold's Scholar Gypsy
a spindle tree; it is interesting -- the author happening to mention this tree (see link)
Iron Age
straet
escarpment
Uffington White Horse -- Iron Age hill figure
Bablock Hythe, a ferry crossing; would have been much like the one described in The Lord of The Rings, no doubt; described in Matthew Arnold's Scholar Gypsy
x
Cumnor Village
flood plain of the Thames at Farmoor
Via Heraklea -- fabled route of Hercules
"Sacred Promontory" to the Alps
Roman Via Domitia, modern A9 autoroute
Alpine pass of Montgenevre (Matrona, Celtic)
Matrona: spring of the mother goddesses
xi
ancient cultures -- Celts, Etruscans, occasionally the Romans -- angled temples, tombs, streets -- NE -- rising sun solstice
21 June
21 December
several days the sun appears to stand still (solstice) -- rising, setting exactly same spot
ancient cultures afraid sun would disappear forever if not worshipped
author noted two coincidences, and, later a third:
1) the diagonal of Via Heraklea
2) orientation of Celtic, Etruscan, Roman structures (NE)
3) Mediolanum -- an enigmatic name; Celts called about 60 locations between Britain and Black Sea: Mediolanum
xii
Mediolanum
our sacred sites on Middle Earth correlate to places in the upper and lower worlds
Midgard: the word for Middle Earth /Mediolanum in Norse and Germanic mythology
1974: Yves Vade -- scholar who noted a Celtic network of these "middle places" -- Mediolanum -- each site equidistant from two other sites; on the Via Heraklea there are no less than 6 places found to named Mediolanum
author started to connect the dots; finds ancient birth of modern Europe
the geography of the western world had been organized into a grid of "solstice lines"
the network was based on the Via Heraklea
much of this was lost; Romans destroyed so much
xiii
a solar-lunar calendar discovered near a lake in the Jura, the Coligny Calendar; 2 AD; considered the earliest map of the world; it is very, very possible, per this author, that the Via Heraklea is an even earlier map (it had its genesis around 700 - 600 BC) -- seven centuries before the Roman calendar/map of the world
author claims the Heraclean Way and all that follows from that is the earliest map of the world
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Chapter 1: The Road From the Ends of the Earth
The Greeks had heard of the Celts, from the 6th century BC on ... remember, Homer about 800 BC; Marathon 500 BC; Salamis 481 BC
Early 5th century: Herodotus
The Celts: not a race; a culture; a common language (with dialects) held them together
Hercules trek: Sacred Promontory (land's end, western Iberian peninsula), east across Pyrenees, through Andorra; across the mouth of the Rhone; to the Matrona Pass in the Alps
Most sacred city of the Celts: Alesia; at/near the origin of the Seine; princess Celtine; Celtine was the daughter of King Brittanus; the union between Hercules and Celtine was Celtus (also called Galates), the man who gave his name to the Celts. Hercules had passed through the land of King Brittanus/Princess Celtine when he was herding the cattle of Geryon, going home to Mycenae. Celtine hid his cows until he made love to her. (10th labor -- bring cattle of Geryon back home; he traveled across Libyan desert; sailed across sea towards Cadiz (Spain) to the island of Erytheia (the "red one" / the red sunset island).
Alesia is the city where the Romans under Julius Caesar finally conquered the Celts once and for all.
The story ("myth") about Marseille being founded by Greeks from Phoenicia around 600 BC turns out to be true.
Ogmios: Gaulish name for Heracles (p. 10).
the Heraklean Way: followed the summer / winter solstice. Dawn to the east; sunset to the west.
oppida: Celtic hill forts
Points on the compass / directions, Gaulish:
- are: "in front of," also meant "east"
- dexsuo: "behind," also meant, "in the west"
- dheas: to head south, to the right (dheas, dextro)
- teuto: to head north, to the left
Solstice: sol-stice -- sun-stand still -- the sun appears to stay the same spot for several days
Halfway between the two solstices, the sun rises due east and sets due west
Carthaginian counterpart to Herakles, Melqart; both sun gods; Herakles, the sun, passing through the 12 constellations annually; the 12 constellations lining up with the 12 labors of Hercules
emporia: Greek, for trading posts
......
Chapter 2: News Of The Iron Age
Asterix cartoons, p. 29; exact mileage; Julius Caesar and the Romans ended up using the standardized Gaulish league instead of the Roman mile.
... in Britain, any road in open country called "Street" is invariably Roman; in France are conveniently ascribed to "Jules Cesar" or to a semi-mythical Queen Brunehaut.
Road map of France looks more Gaulish (Celtic) than Roman. Explains why Roman legions could march so fast and conquer Gaul (Celts) so easily. And remember, the Romans wrote the history.
Chapter 3: The Mediolanum Mystery, I
Sacred locations?
Chapter 4: The Mediolanum Mystery, II
Coordinates?
Chapter 5: Down the Meridian
The cycling expedition sets off. Northern France; Amiens. Lugdunum.
Part Two
Chapter 6: The Size of the World
Antikythera ship wreck off Athens, 80 BC.
The Antikythera Mechanism: often referrred to as the first analog computer.
The story of the explorer Pytheas, producing a map of the world, 4th century BC. Knew how to calculate latitude.
Eratosthenes: map of the world; estimated the circumference of the earth within 2 - 3%.
The Celts also involved in world exploration at this time.
Pytheas: Peri tou okeanou" -- on the ocean, the book Pytheas wrote after circumnavigating Europe, about 325 BC. Time of Aristotle, Alexander the Great. Book was lost; never found. Know of it only because other texts quote from it.
Wrote the book at his home in Massalia (Marseilles).
Gnomon: marker that casts sun's shadow.
Pytheas marked off the gnomon in 120 section -- calculated latitude of Cap Croisette (43.2° -- one-tenth of a degree south of Massalia.
1st voyage:
to Pillars of Hercules
turned south; returned east along the northern border of Africa all the way to the Nile.
2nd voyage:
thru the Pillars of Hercules
north along the Iberian/French coast -- all along the coast of France
he reached Belerion (Land's End and the Lizard, England)
called Prettanike at the time
entered southern Britain: Kantion (Kent)
walked all the way through Britain
eight degrees above the horizon -- mid-winter sun-- meant he was probably in the Peak District and the Yorkshire Dales
next reading: solar elevation of only about six degrees --> Moray First in Sutherland -- from wiki --
Sutherland is a historic county, registration county and lieutenancy area in the Highlands of Scotland. Its county town is Dornoch.[1] Sutherland borders Caithness and Moray Firth to the east, Ross-shire and Cromartyshire (later combined into Ross and Cromarty) to the south and the Atlantic to the north and west. Like its southern neighbour Ross-shire, Sutherland has some of the most dramatic scenery in the whole of Europe, especially on its western fringe where the mountains meet the sea. These include high sea cliffs, and very old mountains composed of Precambrian and Cambrian rocks.
reached northernmost Prettanike -- a place called Orka -- possibly Duncansby Head -- looks over the Orkneys
set sail again
Six days out from Orka -- an island called Thoule 9the Faroes or Iceland)
midnight sun
further north -- neither land nor sea -- mixture of all elements; fog banks and pack ice of the Arctic
returned through amber-rich Baltic
probably followed the Dnieper to the Black Sea
circumnavigated Europe
Betamists: professional walkers, p. 96
klimata: division of the terrestrial spere into zones of latitude
Navigation, early sailing
followed straight land along latitude until they reached land, then north to next known latitude, then east to land;
the diagonal is called the rhumb line, p. 98
Druids: Iron Age
Celts: Iron Age
Romans: Iron Age
Time frame:
1200 BC: end of Late BronzeAge --> Iron Age
279 BC: high-water point of the Celtic tide -- p. 176
125 / 124 BC -- Romans defeated the Celts
Aquae Sextiae / Battle of Aquae Sextiae -- 102 BC -- Romans finally defeat the Celts
Right triangle, the run was 11 steps; the rise was 7 steps; angle exaclty matches tilt of earth: 57.53°
tan 7/11 = 32.47°
90 - 32.47 = 57.53°
11/7 = 1.57
one-half of 3.14 (pi) = 1.57
very, very coincidental. The Celts (Pythagorean) would have loved it.
Chapter 7: The Druidic Syllabus, I: Elementary
Diviciacus the Aeduan (Druid) stood before the Roman Senate, 58 - 53 BC time frame. The Aedui claimed Trojan descent, like the Romans.
Well-to-do Roman citizens were known to send some of their children to Gaul for education with the Druids.
Names of many Heculean children, and in the matrilineal Celtic tradition, their mothers would then have formed a geographical roll call of the Celtic tribes: Celtus, progenitor of the Celts; Galates, progenitor of the Gauls; Sardus, who gave his name to the Pyrenean Sardones; Bretannos, whose daughter gave birth to the Pretani. - p. 115
Etymology of "druid." -- p. 115
Map of the greatest extent of the Celts -- p. 116.
Chapter 8: The Druidic Syllabus, II: Advanced
The tree that gave the Druids their name: the oak. Oak-wreathed head of the Greek sun god appears on many Celtic coins -- Hellenic influence?
Two forms of Celtic sacrifice: chthonic (under the earth) and Olympian or ouranian (heavenly). -- p. 126
Part Three
Chapter 9: Paths of the Gods
Mediolanum Biturigum -- the unlikely hub of the Gaulish wine trade, now called Chateaumeillant -- the sacred center of Gaul in the time of the Bituriges.
Did the Celts have "pi" earlier than Archimedes? -- p. 142
The map.
Chapter 10: The Forest and Beyond
The Hercynian Forest -- a Celtic word.
Chapter 11: Cities of Middle Earth
The expedition to Delphi in 279 BC marked the high-water mark point of the Celtic tide. Less than a century later, the Celts of northern Italy were defeated by the Romans, who then advanced along the Mediterranean into southern Gaul. In 125 and 124 BC, Roman armies crossed the Matrona in the footsteps of Herakles. The ostensible aim was to defend their old allies, the Massaliots, against the troublesome tribes of the hinterland. In exchange, the Romans were granted a narrow strip of land running all the way from Italy to Hispania.
Chapter 12: The Gods Victorious
Gallic War: 58 - 51 BC.
Gergovia, p. 197
Alesia, p. 200. On a hill above today's Alise-Sainte-Reine, the Roman town that replaced the oppidum. At Alesia, the Gaulish cause was lost; 51 BC.
Part Four
Chapter 13: The Poetic Isles
Defeat of the Gauls at Alesia, 51 BC, and the flight of Druids to Britain.
It was not until 43 BC that the Romans had first foothold in Kent.
Etymology of the name of Britain. "There is, in fact, a trace of Druidry in the Celtic name of the islands, though its meaning has been lost for almost two thousand years. 'Prettanike' was the name heard by Pytheas in the fourth century BC; 'Britannia' was the form familiar to Caesar. The inhabitants would originally have been the 'Pritani' or 'Pretanoi.' The name belongs to a grop of words whose Indo-European root means "to cut," "to form," "to shape." In early medieval Ireland, the "figured folk" of Britain were assimilated to the "painted" or "tattoed" Picts of Scotland. Convention has sealed the interpretation, and the accepted history of Britain now begins with a population of barbarians who smeared themselves with the blue dye of woad." -- p. 216
A list of Celtic tribes.
In ancient Celtis, 'pritios' has the same dual meaning as the Greetk 'poietes': a creator, a craftsman, an enchanter and a poet. -- p. 216
There was only one Mediolanum in Britain, in a corner of the county of Shropshire ,in teh lands of the Cornovii.
The Whitchurch Meridian.
The British Druidic system -- begins at bottom of page 226.
Oxford stood at the intersection of three major tribal territories: the Catuvellauni of Verlamion 9St Albans), the atrebates of Calleva (Silchester), and the Dobunnin of Corinium (Cirencester). Oxford itself may have been a neutral enclave like Alesia, its protected status guaranteed by its strategic imporntance. The small Mandubbi tribe of Alesia is known only from a solitary reference in Caesar's Gallic War. Perhaps an equally small tribe of Oxubii has disappeared entirely.
Chapter 14: The Four Royal Roads
Conquest of Gaul: 58 - 51 BC (Gallic wars).
Claudian invasion of Britain: 43 BC
Ykenild Strete: St Albans, Bury St Edmunds, Salisbury
The Fosse Way
Watling Street -- p. 262; London -- St Albans -- Fenny Stratford (nr Milton Keynes) -- High Cross
Ermine Street
The four royal roads probably followed old Celtic roads.
Chapter 15: The End of Middle Earth
Antonine Wall, built, 142 - 154 AD; Firth of Forth (east) to Firth of Clyde (west).
The end of middle earth. Agricola defeats the Brits at Mons Graupius (about 83 AD). From wiki: The Caledonii were the last unconquered British tribe (and were never fully subdued). After many years of avoiding the fight, the Caledonians were forced to join battle when the Romans marched on the main granaries of the Caledonians, just as they had been filled from the harvest. The Caledonians had no choice but to fight, or starve over the next winter.
Chapter 16: Return of the Druids
Eventually the Romans pulled back to Hadrian's Wall. Caledonians re-occupied region between Antonine Wall and Hadrian's Wall. Not much known about them. Said to have red hair and long limbs, considered by Tacitus to be Germanic in origin. Since the German tribes had no Druids, this might explain why, in vivid contrast to southern Britain, there are few signs of a solar network in Caledonia.
Because Ireland was never conquered by the Romans, its pastures are prolific in tales dating back to the days of the ancient Celts. They were first recorded in the early Middle Ages.
Eventually, a transition from pagan Druids to Christian Druids, p. 279. The word "Druid" was applied to Christian saints and hermits, and even to the Son of God.
Epilogue: A Traveller's Guide to Middle Earth
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