Since we have come to the place, it does not appear to be foreign to our subject to lay before the reader an account of the manners of Gaul and Germany , and wherein these nations differ from each other. In Gaul there are factions not only in all the states, and in all the cantons and their divisions, but almost in each family, and of these factions those are the leaders who are considered according to their judgment to possess the greatest influence, upon whose will and determination the management of all affairs and measures depends. And that seems to have been instituted in ancient times with this view, that no one of the common people should be in want of support against one more powerful; for, none [of those leaders] suffers his party to be oppressed and defrauded, and if he do otherwise, he has no influence among his party. This same policy exists throughout the whole of Gaul; for all the states are divided into two factions.
Throughout Gaul there are two classes of men of some dignity and importance ….One of the two classes is that of the Druids, the other that of the Knights. The Druids are concerned with the worship of the gods, look after public and private sacrifice, and expound religious matters. A large number of young men flock to them for training and hold them in high honor. For they have the right to decide nearly all public and private disputes and they also pass judgment and decide rewards and penalties in criminal and murder cases and in disputes concerning legacies and boundaries. When a private person or a tribe disobeys their ruling they ban them from attending at sacrifices. This is their harshest penalty. Men placed under this ban are treated as impious wretches; all avoid them, fleeing their company and conversation, lest their contact bring misfortune upon them; they are denied legal rights and can hold no official dignity….It is thought that this system of training was invented in Britain and taken over from there to Gaul, and at present time diligent students of the matter mostly travel there to study it.
Julius Ceasar, Gallic Wars, 11 and 13. circa 55 b.c.e.
Iggy screamed. Images flooded his mind. A severed stone head. A wooden figure rough carved and ancient. A spinning woman in gold on a placid lake, her eyes fierce and predatory, a mighty headdress of pearl and lacquer reflecting the light of the sun. A great silver bundle of endlessly flowing pleasure and pain seething throughout the empty spaces between all that there is.
Every nerve ending in his body fired in sympathy.
Medusa herself could not have frozen him more effectively.
Iggy twisted, unable to move. He saw himself bound, hands behind his back, only, he was not a he. She. She felt herself bound, unable to move, a cruel fist wound in her hair, bending her head back. The knife cutting her jugular. She died.
Iggy twisted, unable to move. The hag smiled.
“You’ll do.” She said.
