A Complete Good Works Translation from Res Gestae 15.9.1-8

Ammianus' fifteenth book pauses the imperial narrative to introduce Gaul. His source-unit draws on Timagenes and gathers several origin traditions: indigenous Gauls, arrivals from islands and beyond the Rhine, Trojan and Herculean stories, Phocaean Massilia, and the learned orders of bards, euhages, and Druids. It is a late Roman witness, dependent on earlier authorities, but it preserves a compact classical account of Gaulish memory, learned classes, and the doctrine of immortal souls.

Translation

Subsection 1

Therefore, since, as the Mantuan poet foretold, I am moving a loftier work and a greater order of events is being born for me, I think it is now timely to show the regions and position of the Gauls. Otherwise, while explaining things unknown to some people amid burning campaigns and the varied chances of battles, I might seem to imitate lazy sailors forced to mend worn sails and ropes among waves and storms, though they could have been prepared more safely beforehand.

Subsection 2

Ancient writers, wavering about the first origin of the Gauls, left knowledge of the matter half-complete. But afterward Timagenes, Greek in diligence and in language, gathered from many books things that had long been unknown. Following his trustworthiness, and with the obscurity removed, we will teach the same things distinctly and openly.

Subsection 3

Some have affirmed that the first inhabitants seen in these regions were aborigines, called Celts from the name of a beloved king and Galatians from the name of his mother, for the Greek language calls the Gauls by that name. Others say that Dorians, following the older Hercules, inhabited the places bordering the Ocean.

Subsection 4

The Druids record that in truth part of the people was indigenous, but that others also flowed together from the farthest islands and from districts across the Rhine, driven from their seats by the frequency of wars and by the flood of the raging sea.

Subsection 5

Some say that a few Greeks, fleeing after the fall of Troy and scattered everywhere, occupied these places when they were then empty.

Subsection 6

But the inhabitants of the regions assert this more than all the rest, something we have also read carved in their monuments: that the son of Amphitryon, Hercules, hurried to destroy Geryon and Tauriscus, savage tyrants, of whom one troubled the Spains and the other the Gauls. After overcoming both, he united with noble women, received several children, and named after them the parts over which they ruled.

Subsection 7

From Phocaea, moreover, an Asiatic people, avoiding the cruelty of Harpalus, prefect of King Cyrus, sailed to Italy. One part of them founded Velia in Lucania, another founded Massilia in the territory of Vienne. Then, in following ages, when their strength had increased, they established not a few towns. But variety, often joined to satiety, must be avoided.

Subsection 8

Through these places, as people were gradually cultivated, studies of praiseworthy teachings flourished, begun through bards, euhages, and Druids. The bards sang, with the sweet measures of the lyre, the brave deeds of famous men composed in heroic verses. The euhages, searching into the order and high things of nature, tried to open them. Among them the Druids, loftier in mind, as the authority of Pythagoras decreed, bound themselves in fellowships and associations, were lifted up by questions of hidden and deep matters, and, looking down on human things, declared souls immortal.

Colophon

This page translates Ammianus Marcellinus, Res Gestae 15.9.1-8 from Latin for the Celtic continental expansion of the Good Work Library. Ammianus writes as a late Roman historian and source-compiler; the translation keeps that frame visible while preserving the complete Gaulish origins and learned-orders unit.

Compiled and formatted for the Good Work Library by the New Tianmu Anglican Church, 2026.

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Source Text: Ammianus Marcellinus, Res Gestae 15.9.1-8

Latin source text from The Latin Library's text of Ammianus Marcellinus, Res Gestae, Book 15. This page gives the complete Gaulish origins and learned-orders source-unit: Timagenes, origin traditions, Druids, bards, euhages, and the immortality of souls.

Subsection 1

Proinde quoniam ut Mantuanus vates praedixit excelsus maius opus moveo maiorque mihi rerum nascitur ordo, Galliarum tractus et situm ostendere puto nunc tempestivum, ne inter procinctus ardentes proeliorumque varios casus ignota quibusdam expediens imitari videar desides nauticos, adtrita lintea cum rudentibus, quae licuit parari securius, inter fluctus resarcire coactos et tempestates.

Subsection 2

Ambigentes super origine prima Gallorum scriptores veteres notitiam reliquere negotii semiplenam, sed postea Timagenes et diligentia Graecus et lingua haec quae diu sunt ignorata collegit ex multiplicibus libris. Cuius fidem secuti obscuritate dimota eadem distincte docebimus et aperte.

Subsection 3

Aborigines primos in his regionibus quidam visos esse firmarunt, Celtis nomine regis amabilis et matris eius vocabulo Galatas dictos ita enim Gallos sermo Graecus appellat alii Dorienses antiquiorem secutos Herculem oceani locos inhabitasse confines.

Subsection 4

Drasidae memorant re vera fuisse populi partem indigenam, sed alios quoque ab insulis extimis confluxisse et tractibus transrhenanis, crebritate bellorum et adluvione fervidi maris sedibus suis expulsos.

Subsection 5

Aiunt quidam paucos post excidium Troiae fugitantes Graecos ubique dispersos loca haec occupasse tunc vacua.

Subsection 6

Regionum autem incolae id magis omnibus adseverant, quod etiam nos legimus in monumentis eorum incisum, Amphitryonis filium Herculem ad Geryonis et Taurisci saevium tyrannorum perniciem festinasse, quorum alter Hispanias, alter Gallias infestabat: superatisque ambobus coisse cum generosis feminis suscepisseque liberos plures et eos partes quibus imperitabant suis nominibus appellasse.

Subsection 7

A Phocaea vero Asiaticus populus Harpali inclementiam vitans, Cyri regis praefecti, Italiam navigio petit. Cuius pars in Lucania Veliam, alia condidit in Viennensi Massiliam: dein secutis aetatibus oppida aucta virium copia instituere non pauca. Sed declinanda varietas saepe satietati coniuncta.

Subsection 8

Per haec loca hominibus paulatim excultis viguere studia laudabilium doctrinarum, inchoata per bardos et euhagis et drasidas. Et bardi quidem fortia virorum illustrium facta heroicis conposita versibus cum dulcibus lyrae modulis cantitarunt, euhages vero scrutantes seriem et sublimia naturae pandere conabantur. Inter eos drasidae ingeniis celsiores, ut auctoritas Pythagorae decrevit, sodaliciis adstricti consortiis, quaestionibus occultarum rerum altarumque erecti sunt et despectantes humana pronuntiarunt animas inmortales.

Source Colophon

The Latin source was captured from The Latin Library on 2026-05-13 and inspected on disk at Tulku/Tools/celtic/sources/continental_batch_2026-05-13/ammianus_15_latin_library.html. The English translation is a New Tianmu Anglican Church Good Works Translation made from the Latin source.

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