Alaunus or Alaunius (

Gaulish Gaulish is an extinct Celtic languages, Celtic language spoken in parts of Continental Europe before and during the period of the Roman Empire. In the narrow sense, Gaulish was the language of the Celts of Gaul (now France, Luxembourg, Belgium, ...

: ''Alaunos'') is a Gaulish god of healing and prophecy . His name is known from inscriptions found in

Lurs, Alpes-de-Haute-Provence Lurs is a commune in the Alpes-de-Haute-Provence department in the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region in southeastern France. It is noted for the triple murder nearby of Sir Jack Drummond and his wife and daughter in 1952. Population The ...

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and in

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in western

Germany Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It lies between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea to the north and the Alps to the south. Its sixteen States of Germany, constituent states have a total popu ...

. In the latter inscription, Alaunus is used as an epithet of Mercury.''L'Arbre Celtique''.
Alaunus
and
Alaunius
. The feminine form ''Alauna'' (from an earlier *''Alamnā'') is at the origin of many place-names and

hydronyms A hydronym (from , , "water" and , , "name") is a type of toponym that designates a proper name of a body of water. Hydronyms include the proper names of rivers and streams, lakes and ponds, swamps and marshes, seas and oceans. As a subset of top ...

across Europe, including the Roman-era names of

Valognes Valognes () is a commune in the Manche department in Normandy in north-western France. Geography Valognes is situated in the Cotentin Peninsula, southeast of Cherbourg. Valognes station has rail connections to Caen, Paris and Cherbourg. His ...

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Maryport Maryport is a town and civil parishes in England, civil parish in the Cumberland (unitary authority), Cumberland district of Cumbria, England. The town is on the coast of the Solway Firth and lies at the northern end of the former Cumberland Co ...

and Watercrook in

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, Ardoch in

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, and Learchild and the

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Name

The Gaulish

theonym A theonym (from Greek (), 'god', attached to (), ) is a proper name of a deity. Theonymy, the study of divine proper names, is a branch of onomastics, the study of the etymology, history, and use of proper names. Theonymy helps develop an und ...

''Alaunos'' stems from a

Proto-Celtic Proto-Celtic, or Common Celtic, is the hypothetical ancestral proto-language of all known Celtic languages, and a descendant of Proto-Indo-European. It is not attested in writing but has been partly Linguistic reconstruction, reconstructed throu ...

form reconstructed as *''Alamnos''. The etymology remains uncertain. It has been traditionally derived from the root *''al''- ('feed, raise, nurture'), and compared with the Latin ''alumnus'' ('nursling') and with names of rivers such as ''Almus'' in

Moesia Moesia (; Latin: ''Moesia''; ) was an ancient region and later Roman province situated in the Balkans south of the Danube River. As a Roman domain Moesia was administered at first by the governor of Noricum as 'Civitates of Moesia and Triballi ...

, '' Yealm'' (*''Almii'') in England, or '' Alme'' in

Westphalia Westphalia (; ; ) is a region of northwestern Germany and one of the three historic parts of the state of North Rhine-Westphalia. It has an area of and 7.9 million inhabitants. The territory of the region is almost identical with the h ...

. *''Alamnos'' could thus be translated as 'the Nourishing One'. A Gallic tribe named '' Alauni'' (Αλαυνοί) is also attested in

Noricum Noricum () is the Latin name for the kingdom or federation of tribes that included most of modern Austria and part of Slovenia. In the first century AD, it became a province of the Roman Empire. Its borders were the Danube to the north, R ...

, and linguist

Xavier Delamarre Xavier Delamarre (; born 5 June 1954) is a French linguist, lexicographer, and former diplomat. He is regarded as one of the world's foremost authorities on the Gaulish language. With linguist Romain Garnier, Delamarre is the co-publishing edi ...

has argued that the root ''alǝ''-, meaning 'to wander', "would suit river names as much as ethnic ones". In this view, *''Alamnos'' may be compared with the Celtic stem *''alamo''- ('herd'; cf. Old Irish ''alam'', Welsh ''alaf''), and the

ethnonym An ethnonym () is a name applied to a given ethnic group. Ethnonyms can be divided into two categories: exonyms (whose name of the ethnic group has been created by another group of people) and autonyms, or endonyms (whose name is created and used ...

''Alauni'' rendered as the 'errants' or the 'nomads', contrasting with the name of the ''Anauni'' ('the Staying Ones').

References

;Bibliography * *

External links

Proto-Celtic — English lexicon
{{Celtic mythology (ancient) Gaulish gods Health gods Oracular gods Solar gods

Name

See also

References

Further reading

External links