ARTIO

In Gallo-Roman religion, 'Artio' was a goddess of the bear, and was worshipped at Berne, which actually means "bear".

Contents

Representations

Inscriptions

Etymology

See also

References

Representations

A bronze sculpture from Muri, near Berne in Switzerland shows a large
bear facing a woman seated in a chair, with a small tree behind the
bear. The woman seems to hold fruit in her lap, perhaps feeding the
bear. (Deyts p.48, Green pp.217-218). The sculpture has a large rectangular bronze base, which bears an inscription.

Inscriptions

The Muri sculpture has the inscription (CIL 13, 05160)
:Deae Artioni / Licinia Sabinilla
''To the Goddess Artio'' (or ''Artionis''), ''from Licinia Sabinilla''. If the name is Gaulish but the syntax is Latin, a dative Artioni would give an i-stem nominative ''
★ Artionis'' or an n-stem nominative ''
★ Artio''. That would perhap produce a Gaulish ''
★ Artiu''.
Another inscription from Trier (Wightman p.217, CIL 13, 04113) also refers to Artio.

Etymology

Her name is derived from the Gaulish word ''artos'', bear (Delamarre 2003 p. 55-56). Other Celtic languages have similar words, such as Old Irish ''art'', Welsh ''arth'' - which may also be the source for the modern name Arthur.

See also

★ Artio-Obscure Goddess Online Directory

★ picture @ Stefan Rebsamen Bern Historical Museum

References

★ Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum (CIL) vol XIII, The Gauls and Germanies.

★ Delamarre, X. (2003). ''Dictionnaire de la Langue Gauloise'' (2nd ed.). Paris: Editions Errance. ISBN 2-87772-237-6

★ Deyts, Simone (1992) ''Images des Dieux de la Gaule''. Paris, Editions Errance. ISBN 2-87772-067-5.

★ Green, Miranda (1992) ''Animals in Celtic Life and Myth''. London, Routledge. ISBN 0-415-18588-2

★ Wightman, E.M. (1970) ''Roman Trier and the Treveri'' London, Hart-Davis. ISBN 0-246-63980-6