Note 783 — Chapter XVI · FATHER JOVE AND MOTHER VESTA

Giraldus Cambrensis, The Topography of Ireland, chaps. xxxiv.-xxxvi., translated by Thomas Wright; P. W. Joyce, Social History of Ancient Ireland, i. 334 sq. It is said that in the island of Sena (the modern Sein), off the coast of Brittany, there was an oracle of a Gallic deity whose worship was cared for by nine virgin priestesses. They could raise storms by their incantations, and turn themselves into any animals they pleased (Mela, iii. 48); but it is not said that they maintained a perpetual holy fire, though Ch. Elton affirms that they did (Origins of English History, p. 27). M. Salomon Reinach dismisses these virgins as a fable based on Homer’s description of the isle of Circe (Odyssey, x. 135 sqq.), and he denies that the Gauls employed virgin priestesses. See his article, “Les Vierges de Sena,” Revue Celtique, xviii. (1897) pp. 1-8; id., Cultes, mythes, et religions, i. (Paris, 1905) pp. 195 sqq. To me the nuns of St. Brigit seem to be most probably the successors of a Celtic order of Vestals. That there were female Druids is certain, but it does not appear whether they were virgins. See Lampridius, Alexander Severus, 60; Vopiscus, Aurelianus, 44; id., Numerianus, 14 sq.