peated
washings, they commit the residue to the furnace for smelting. In this
way they amass an immensity of gold, and use it up for ornaments, not
merely for the women, but the men. For round their wrists and arms they
wear bracelets, round their necks thick circles of solid gold, and
finger-rings of marvellous size, and even golden breastplates. There
is a peculiar and extraordinary custom prevailing amongst the Gauls in
the interior with regard to the temples of their gods. In these sacred
grounds and in the shrines there lies thrown upon the ground gold in
abundance, dedicated to the deities, which, out of superstition, none
of the natives dares to touch, although the Celts are naturally
extremely covetous."
When the Consul Cœpio took Tolosa, the capital of the Tectosages (b.c. Π
2), he seized upon the treasure deposited in the temple of Minerva
there, amounting to the enormous sum of 15,000 talents (about 3,000,000l.)
A large portion of this was the spoils of the Greek shrines, the
offerings of the returning troops of the second Brennus,* some two
centuries before. This sacrilege brought so much evil upon Cœpio that
"aurum Tolosanum" passed into a proverb for all ill-gotten gains
attended with a curse.
The
tradition of the riches of these Gallic temples has been of late
singularly confirmed. A peasant (1832), digging for treasure in a
ruined Druidical circle near Yieuxbourg, S. Quentin, was for once lucky
enough to hit upon what he was seeking after in the shape of a hoard of
tores. They were ten in number, with one bracelet,
