The Celtic Cult of the Head

Did the ancient Celts worship severed heads?

From Classical writers describing Celtic head veneration practices to discoveries of Celtic stone head sculptures, there is evidence, both historical and archaeological, to suggest the existence of a Celtic cult of the head.

And this evidence is bolstered by the abundance of severed heads in both Irish and Welsh mythology, including severed heads that are preserved and kept as trophies, or even turned into projectiles, as well as supernaturally imbued severed heads that can continue talking despite being, you know, separated from the bodies they belonged to. 

It has also been theorized that the ancient Irish practice of carving faces into turnips on Samhain, from which our modern Halloween tradition of carving jack-o’-lanterns was derived, may have been inspired by Celtic severed head worship. 

But look at me, getting ahead of myself.

Because in order to understand how a Celtic cult of the head may have developed, we need first to understand the unique attitude the ancient Celts had toward heads.

Pssst. You can watch a video adaptation of this essay right here. Text continues below.

The Head or the Heart? (Cephalocentrism vs. Cardiocentrism)

Whereas most ancient Greeks and Egyptians and practitioners of the Abrahamic religions subscribed to the cardiocentric hypothesis, meaning they viewed the heart as the seat of a person’s wisdom, and in some cases, the repository of a person’s soul, the ancient Celts were clearly in the cephalocentric camp, believing a person’s wisdom and immortal soul were centered in the brain or head.

To be fair, the Greek philosopher Pythagoras also subscribed to cephalocentrism and, in fact, many of his views on philosophy and spirituality are similar to those of the ancient Celts, leading some to believe that he borrowed these ideas from them—a theory I explored in my essay/video on Celtic Otherworlds.

Speaking of the Otherworld, here’s how the archaeologist Anne Ross described the spiritual significance of the head in ancient Celtic culture:

“[T]he Celts venerated the head as a symbol of divinity and the powers of the otherworld, and regarded it as the most important bodily member, the very seat of the soul,” (source: Pagan Celtic Britain).

How do we know this about the Celts?

Classical Evidence for a Celtic Head Cult

Some of the strongest evidence comes from Classical writers, including the Roman historian Livy.

Writing in the first century BCE, Livy gave an account of a third-century BCE battle featuring a Celtic tribe called the Boii who successfully slew a Roman general. Here’s what happened next.

“The Boii stripped the body of its spoils and cut off the head, and bore them in triumph to the most sacred of their temples. According to their custom they cleaned out the skull and covered the scalp with beaten gold; it was then used as a vessel for libations and also as a drinking cup for the priest and ministers of the temple,” (source: The History of Rome, Book 23).

Also writing in the first century BCE, Greek historian Diodorus Siculus noted the following about the Gaulish Celts:

“When their enemies fall they cut off their heads and fasten them about the necks of their horses; and turning over to their attendants the arms of their opponents, all covered with blood, they carry them off as booty, singing a paean over them and striking up a song of victory, and these first-fruits of battle they fasten by nails upon their houses, just as men do, in certain kinds of hunting, with the heads of wild beasts they have mastered.

“The heads of their most distinguished enemies they embalm in cedar-oil and carefully preserve in a chest, and these they exhibit to strangers, gravely maintaining that in exchange for this head some one of their ancestors, or their father, or the man himself, refused the offer of a great sum of money.

“And some men among them, we are told, boast that they have not accepted an equal weight of gold for the head they show, displaying a barbarous sort of greatness of soul; for not to sell that which constitutes a witness and proof of one’s valour is a noble thing, but to continue to fight against one of our own race, after he is dead, is to descend to the level of beasts,” (source: Bibliotheca Historica, Book 5).

Now, obviously this is a biased account of the Celts, but that doesn’t mean the head veneration rituals described were fabricated. 

Archaeological Evidence for a Celtic Head Cult

Indeed, researchers have discovered, via chemical analysis, traces of conifer resins on Iron Age skulls (source: The Guardian). This was at the site of a former Gaulish settlement in the south of France.

Other Gaulish sites have yielded a sculpture of a mounted warrior with a head slung around the horse’s neck, as well as “skull niches,” which are essentially stone pillars with cavities in which human skulls could be displayed.

Then we have Celtic carved stone heads. 

Like this three-faced stone head discovered on Corleck Hill in County Cavan, Ireland, which has been dated to the first or second century CE.

And this three-headed specimen, dated to the third century BCE, which was discovered just north of Marseille, France at the Acropolis Roquepertuse.

But perhaps the most famous head of all is the so-called Mšecké Žehrovice Head, dated to between 150 and 50 BCE, which was discovered northwest of Prague in what is now the Czech Republic.

It’s important to note that these Celtic stone heads did not belong to stone busts or bodies, i.e., they were not lopped off of statues. The heads were crafted as standalone idols and/or pieces of art that may have been displayed on pedestals, which again points us in the direction of a Celtic mustache cult.

Sorry, head cult. I meant head cult.

And when we look at the myths of the Goidelic-/Gaelic-speaking Celts and the Brythonic-/Brittonic-speaking Celts, specifically those who settled in Ireland and Wales respectively, we find further evidence of such a cult.

Mythological Evidence for a Celtic Head Cult

For starters, the Irish myths are filled with tales of warriors ceremoniously removing the heads of their defeated foes and stringing them to their horses, sort of like how my daughter adorns her backpack with colorful keychains.

Sort of.

Notably, Cú Chulainn, hero of the Ulster Cycle of Irish mythology, slays the three sons of Nechta Scéne in his very first foray into battle—at the age of seven, no less—and carries their three severed heads home in his chariot. 

Cú Chulainn later presents himself to his enemies so that they can marvel at his “comely appearance.” And in addition to being decked out in his finest clothes, jewelry, and weaponry, here’s how the author describes him: 

“Nine heads he bore in one of his hands and ten in the other, and these he brandished before the hosts in token of his prowess and cunning.”

This according to the Táin Bó Cúailnge, or Cattle Raid of Cooley.

Cú Chulainn also happens to play a central role in the story Fled Bricrenn, or Bricriu’s Feast, in which we find the earliest known example of the beheading game, a Celtic storytelling motif.

The game consists of a knight/giant/enchanter challenging heroes to cut off his head with an axe on the condition that he get to return the blow.

The kicker (header?) here is that once beheaded, the knight typically picks up his severed head and puts it back on his body. 

And yes, if this sounds exactly like the plot of the Arthurian legend Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, that’s because it is. 

It’s also worth mentioning the presence of brain-balls in Irish myth and legend. These are brains or heads, usually of slain enemies, that have been calificed by mixing them with lime and letting them dry in the sun.

The most famous brain-ball is made from the head of the Leinster king Mesgegra, and is displayed proudly by the Ulster king, Conchobar mac Nessa. 

That is until the Connacht warrior Cet, who has recently been upstaged by an Ulster warrior (as detailed in the story Scéla Muicce Meicc Da Thó, or The Tale of Mac Da Thó’s Pig) gets his hands on the brain-ball and uses it as a sling stone, firing it into Conchobar mac Nessa’s head.

Incidentally (or perhaps not incidentally) the aforementioned upstaging that precedes the brain-ball incident involves the Ulster warrior, Connal, throwing the severed head of Cet’s brother in Cet’s face.

And I’d be remiss not to mention that before doing so, Connal describes himself as never having slept without the severed head of a Connachtman under his knee.

(Don’t you just love Irish mythology?)

And while the Cet/Mesgegra brain-ball tale belongs squarely to the realm of mythology, archaeologists have uncovered stone balls in ancient Irish tombs, some of which may have contained brains.

Of course, there can be no discussion of severed head reverence in Celtic myth without a discussion of talking heads.

The Talking Heads of Welsh and Irish Mythology

In Welsh mythology, specifically the Mabinogion, we’re introduced to Brân the Blessed, high king of Britain.

A literal high king, as it were, because he’s a giant. 

After wading across the Irish sea to rescue his sister from her abusive husband, an Irish king, Brân is ambushed in a hostel and eventually sacrifices himself by bursting out of and destroying a magical cauldron that the Irish king was using to bring his soldiers back to life—a cauldron Brân had actually gifted to the Irish king after Brân’s half-brother mutilated a bunch of the king’s horses after learning about the proposed marriage of his half-sister.

It’s a long story.

Anyway, with his dying breath, Brân instructs his compatriots to cut off his head and bring it back to Britain. And for the next seven years Brân’s severed head entertains said compatriots by continuing to speak.

This narrative is mirrored in (and perhaps based on) the Irish tale Togail Bruidne Dá Derga (or The Destruction of Da Derga’s Hostel), in which the High King of Ireland, Conaire Mór, is ambushed in a hostel. 

Specifically, he’s trapped inside and the hostel is repeatedly set fire to. Fortunately, his compatriots repeatedly put out the fires, and Conaire is able to slay some 1,200 foes. 

Unfortunately, Conaire has been cursed with a magical thirst and all that slaying gets him quite parched. Alas, all of the water has been used to extinguish the aforementioned fires. 

Conaire’s champion Mac Cécht has to travel across Ireland to find water (as the nearby rivers won’t yield him any), and he returns just in time to see his king get his head chopped off.

The high king Conaire Mór’s severed head is still thirsty, however, so it drinks the water and recites a poem praising the deeds of Mac Cécht.

There’s one final Irish tale about a severed head with the gift of the gab that I feel needs mentioning.

The story features Cú Chulainn’s (human) father Sualtam rushing to Emain Macha on horseback to warn of an impending invasion.

(Don’t you hate when that happens?)

Here’s the thing though: Sualtam’s severed head continues to shout warnings, so in an effort to calm it down, the Ulstermen place the head up on a pillar.

Eventually, the persistence of the severed head’s shouting pays off, the curse is broken, and the Ulstermen are roused to battle.

The Samhain/Jack-O’-Lantern/Celtic Head Cult Connection

Now, the notion of an ostensibly deceased person continuing to communicate with living persons seems to have a Samhain-esque quality to it, as Samhain was believed to be a time when the veil between the land of the dead and the landing of the living was at its thinnest and thus spirits and monsters and other supernatural beings were wont to crossover.

Frightful appearances and decorations were adopted to ward off and/or blend in with these uninvited guests, and it’s possible the practice of carving faces into vegetables arose as a result.

At least in part.

Because Samhain was also celebrated with communal druidic bonfires, from which people would take embers to ceremonially relight their own hearth fire at home.

And how did they transport those embers?

With lanterns, some of which were made from hollowed out vegetables, including turnips. 

The question we’re then faced with is: did form follow function or vice versa?

I.e., did the Gaelic-speaking Celts carve faces into their vegetable lanterns, or did they look at their carved vegetables on display and think hey, these would make great lanterns.

I tend to lean toward the former, but regardless, the end result was the invention of the jack-o’-lantern.

And some scholars consider the jack-o’-lantern another data-point we can put in the pro Celtic head cult column.

But looking back at all of the evidence I’ve laid out here, I think it’s hard to conclude definitively that there was a Celtic cult of the severed head.

Cult of the Head or Cult of the Godhead?

Of course, the term “cult” carries a lot of negative connotations these days, but even opting for a more benign definition and thinking of a cult as a religious system centered around the veneration of a particular object or figure, I’m not sure those conditions have been satisfactorily met. 

Did Celtic warriors engage in head hunting?

Yes, as did warriors from many other cultures.

Was the head a favored decorative motif among the Celts? 

It sure was. But many other cultures favored the motif too.

And, as archaeologist Miranda Aldhouse-Green put it, amongst the Celts, was the head “clearly venerated as the most significant element in a human or divine image representing the whole?”

Absolutely.

But as Aldhouse-Green continued, that doesn’t mean “that the head itself was worshipped,” (source: The Gods of the Celts).

Generally speaking, the Celts worshiped their gods. Those were the figures at the centers of their religious systems.

Stone heads, like the three-faced Corleck Head, were likely representations of those Celtic deities.

And perhaps the jack-o’-lanterns they carved on Samhain were representations of those deities as well.

So if you find yourself standing over a gourd on Halloween, knife in hand, give a thought to the Celtic gods that may have helped inspire this practice.

And whatever you do, don’t ride a horse with a sharp-edged shield on your back. I think that’s advice we can all live by.

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Want to learn the rest of the Samhain story? Check out…

Samhain in Your Pocket

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Irish Monsters in Your Pocket

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Neon Druid: An Anthology of Urban Celtic Fantasy

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