Mogons: a Brythonic and Gaulish God (The Great One)

Synonyms: Mogounus, Moguns, Mogonino
Gaul, Bryth: The Great One

Mogons is a deity known from inscriptions found in northern Britain. Though there are homonymic theonyms that suggest a wider distribution of his cult. At the Habitancvm (Risingham, Northumberland [RIB 1225]) where an altar dedicated to this deity and bearing the following inscription was found: DEO MOGONITO CAD... ET N D N AVG M G SECVNDINVS B F COS HABITANCI PRIMA STAT PRO SE ET SVI POSVIT (To the god Mogons Cad[...], and the divine spirit of our Lord the Emperor, Marcus Gavius? Secundinus, on his first posting as Beneficiarius Consularis at Habitancum, placed (this) for himself and his household). A further inscription to this deity was discovered on an altar at the fort of Voreda (Old Penrith, Cumbria RIB 0921]): DEO MOGVNTI PRO SALVE ...STI VSLM (To the god Mogons, for the well-being [...]stus, willingly and deservedly fulfilled his vow). The final inscription was found on an altarstone at Castra Exploratorum (Netherby, Cumbria [RIB 0971]) reading: DEO MOGONT[i] VITIRE SAN[cti] AEL[ius] SECVND[us] V[otum] S[olvit] L[ibens] M[erito] (To the venerable god Mogons Vitiris, Aelius Secundus willingly and deservedly fulfilled his vow.). Here Mogons is assimilated with the deity Vitiris. An inscription to the same deity, invoked as Moguntis is known from the fort and settlement of Vindolanda, (Chesterholm, Northumberland [AE 1975, 567]) which reads: DEO MOGVNTI ET GENIO LOCI LVPVL V S M (For the god Moguntis and the Guardian Spirit of This Place, Lupulus deservedly fulfils his vow). A possible additional variant of this deity's name may be Mogounus and an inscription to this deity was found at Harbourg-Wihr, Haut-Rhin, France (Holder II 616) where he is equated with Apollo Grannus. The same god is also known from Old Penrith (RIB 0922) and High Rochester (RIB 1269), England. The deity known as Mogonino from an inscription found at Cabeza del Griego in Spain may represent a Celtiberian instance of the same deity. Mounus (probably Mo[g]unus) is also known from an inscription found at Lezoux, Puy-de-Dôme, France.

The deity's name is probably derived from the rexonstructed proto-Celtic elements: *mak-o- (increase), or *magyo- (great) both words have the sense of increase and majesty and lead us to the standard interpretation of the name as 'The Great One'. The Mogounus form of the name contains the deific particle -ou- but is otherwise identical in meaning and interpretation.

The Risingham inscription was probably dedicated by a cohort of Vangiones and the dedicators of the altars there may have been from the Cadeni tribe, whose capital was Moguntiacum (modern Mainz in Germany). As such it has been proposed by some that Mogons was a Germanic deiry. However, the Cadeni were a Gaulish peoples and the presence of dedications to this deity outside their main sphere of influence of this tribe strongly indicates that the worship of this god was spread through northern Gaul, Celtiberia, and northern Britain at the very least.

The intrerpretation of the god's name and his assimilation with a number of deities: Vitiris, Apollo Grannus, Genius Locus and the otherwise unknown god known only from a partial inscription at Risingham where his name is given as Cad... has led to the proposition that Mogons might be a title applied to several gods rather than being the name of a single deity. Indeed, based on the various assimilations Mogons could be described as a solar deity (Apollo) and a form of the triple horned deity (Vitiris). The fragmentary name Cad... may be a battle god, related to the reconstructed proto-Celtic roots *katu- (battle) and *kādo(s)- (anger). There is, however, a commonality in that Apollo was an archer and the horned god was the god of the hunt. Was Mogons therefore a title for archer/hunter deities? This is merely speculation but it does make some sense on the basis of existing inscriptions and associations.

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