Gauls, Galatians, and Galileans: Celts in the Holy Lands

Just as Julius Caesar conquered Gaul before crossing the Rubicon and flirting fatally with kingship, Jesus Christ comes out of Galilee before being baptized in the river Jordan and then being executed as “king of the Jews”. Although Galilee in Hebrew supposedly means “district of the goyim”, evidence suggests that the Jewish bible was originally written in Greek and the etymological connection between Galilee and Galatia should not be ignored. Galatia, north of Galilee in Anatolia, was named after Gaul, ever since Celts invaded coincident with Alexander the Great and established a large ethnic island in modern Turkey. Galatia was also very important to Paul as the home of one of the first Christian churches. Unfortunately for Hebrew fans, the ancient historian Polybius proves that Galilee is also named after Celts.

Strabo was the first historian to talk about Galatia per se, but 150 years earlier Polybius introduced the word “Galatis” in his description of Galilee. First Polybius demonstrates the etymological connection by naming a Celtic king of Gaul as “Galatus” (Histories 2.21). Later he mentions “the district of Galatis” where Antiochus III invaded Syria and Phoenicia: “Philoteria is situated right upon the shores of the lake into which the river Jordan discharges itself, and from which it issues out again into the plains surrounding Scythopolis.” Antiochus continues his campaign “and, arriving in the district of Galatis, made himself master of Abila” (Histories 5.70-71).

The lake Polybius describes is now known as Galilee; the region later became known as the Decapolis and Polybius mentions two of its cities. Thus Polybius reveals that there was a Celtic district in Israel in 218 BC without ever mentioning Israel, Judah, Jews, or Hebrews. Likewise neighboring Golan Heights was originally Gaulonitis.

Strabo doesn’t discuss Galilee, but he spills a lot of ink over Galatia, the land that used to be Phrygia. Strabo says of “the Galatæ or Gauls” that their migrations “are not so generally known” (Geography 1.3.21.) Translator H.C. Hamilton notes, “few nations have wandered so far and wide as the Galatæ. We meet with them in Europe, Asia, and Africa, under the various names of Galatæ, Galatians, Gauls, and Kelts. Galatia, in Asia Minor, was settled by one of these hordes.” Later Strabo says the Galatians “migrated into Phrygia, and spread themselves as far as Lycaonia” (Geography 12.1.1).

One of Strabo’s major usages, aside from Galatia, is the “Galatic gulf” on the south coast of modern France, known since the 13th century AD as the Lion Gulf. Here Marseilles, supposedly a colony of Ionic Greece, had long been a melting pot for Hellenes and Celts. Strabo writes, “this city for some little time back has become a school for the barbarians, and has communicated to the Galatæ such a taste for Greek literature, that they even draw contracts on the Grecian model” (4.1.5).

Strabo identifies both Trojans and Galatians as living in Phrygian territory while coining the term “Gallo-Graeci” (or Celtic Hellenes): “Paphlagonians, Bithynians, Mysians, and Phrygia on the Hellespont, which comprehends the Troad; and on the side of the Ægæan and adjacent seas Æolia, Ionia, Caria, and Lycia. Inland is the Phrygia which contains that portion of Gallo-Græcia styled Galatia, Phrygia Epictetus, the Lycaonians, and the Lydians” (Geography 2.5.31). Gallo Graecia literally means “white Greece” since gal- is the Greek prefix for milk.

Strabo also offers a delightful insight into Celtic metallurgy in Spain, noting that Posidonius described the country as “every mountain and wooded hill seemed to be heaped up with money by a lavish fortune”:

“The Galatæ affirm that the mines along the Kemmenus mountains and their side of the Pyrenees are superior; but most people prefer those on this side. They say that sometimes amongst the grains of gold lumps have been found weighing half a pound, these they call palæ; they need but little refining. They also say that in splitting open stones they find small lumps, resembling paps. And that when they have melted the gold, and purified it by means of a kind of aluminous earth, the residue left is electrum. This, which contains a mixture of silver and gold, being again subjected to the fire, the silver is separated and the gold left.”

-Strabo, Geography 3.2.8

Strabo says of the Celts and Germans: “The entire race which now goes by the name of Gallic, or Galatic, is warlike, passionate, and always ready for fighting, but otherwise simple and not malicious. (Geography 4.4.2). “Next after the Keltic nations come the Germans who inhabit the country to the east beyond the Rhine; and these differ but little from the Keltic race, except in their being more fierce, of a larger stature, and more ruddy in countenance; but in every other respect, their figure, their customs and manners of life, are such as we have related of the Kelts” (7.1.2).

Perhaps most interesting of all, Strabo tells us about the “Oak Senate” that governed Galatia. This Senate of 300 persons met somewhere near Pessinus, and should always be remembered together with the Jewish and Roman senates that supposedly existed alongside it. It is curious that in the works of Philo, the Alexandrian governor Flaccus addresses his letter to Caligula “to the governors of the Ephesians”.

“The Council of the twelve Tetrarchs consisted of three hundred persons, who assembled at a place called the Drynemetum. The council determined causes relative to murder, the others were decided by the tetrarchs and the judges. Such, anciently, was the political constitution of Galatia” (Geography 12.5.1).

I have little doubt that Celtic influence extended all the way to Jerusalem, and that Jesus Christ is indeed a symbol of that influence. In coming from Galilee not only is he coming from the “capital” of the nations, he is coming from a Celtic enclave.

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