Artaius is a

Celt The Celts (, see pronunciation for different usages) or Celtic peoples () are. "CELTS location: Greater Europe time period: Second millennium B.C.E. to present ancestry: Celtic a collection of Indo-European peoples. "The Celts, an ancien ...

ic epithetXavier Delamarre (2003). ''Dictionnaire de la langue gauloise.'' Paris: Editions Errance, p.56 applied to the Roman god Mercury during the Romano-Celtic period. It is known from a single inscription from

Beaucroissant Beaucroissant () is a commune in the Isère department in the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region of south-eastern France. The inhabitants of the commune are known as ''Manants'' or ''Manantes''. Geography Beaucroissant is located some 32 km s ...

in the Isère: ::MERCVRIO ::AVG ARTAIO ::SACR ::SEX GEMINIVS ::CVPITVS ::EX VOTO :''"To the august Mercury Artaius, Sextus Geminius Cupitus (has dedicated this) sacred (stone) in fulfillment of a vow."'' In

Gaulish Gaulish was an ancient 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, most of Switzerl ...

, the word ''artos'' means ‘bear’, and ''artaios'' would have been a derivative (meaning something like ‘ursine’). Miranda Green considers Mercury Artaius to have been a bear-god. It is also possible that Artaius is derived from a place name (so that, as an "Artaian Mercury", he would only indirectly have any association with bears). Based on the inscription found at Beaucroissant, Auguste Longnon surmised that the location was once called Artay; there is a similarly named town,

Artaix Artaix is a commune in the department of Saône-et-Loire in the Bourgogne-Franche-Comté region in eastern France. Population See also *Communes of the Saône-et-Loire department The following is a list of the 565 communes of the Saône-e ...

, in Saône-et-Loire.Longnon, Auguste, ''Les noms de lieu de la France'', Paris, 1920, p. 114.

Curiosity

Artaius
is also the name of an Italian Melodic/Folk metal band.

References

Gaulish gods Votive offering Mercurian deities Bear deities {{Celtic mythology (ancient)