Symbolism and Celtic Women

Women have always been more closely associated symbolically
with nature and magic than men, and this is nowhere clearer
than in Celtic women. Women were the source of life, the
beginning and the end, and sometimes the land itself. Unlike
women of other cultures, Celtic women were part of a
matriarchal tradition that had land and property passing
through the female line rather than the male. Women held a
power different from that of men or from modern women.
They were not just the bringers of life, but the living
symbols of the earth, the mystical owners of the land and
the spirits of the land as well as its inhabitors.

The complex symbol of Celtic women is clearest in the
Arthurian cycle of stories, and especially in the earliest
sets of Arthurian tales. In the most modern version, the
central female figure Guinevere is little more than a plot
device and figurehead, the woman whose betrayal of the King
becomes the pivot upon which the downfall of Camelot is
played out – an Eve figure, rather than an independent
character in her own right.

But in the earlier versions of the tales, Guinevere is a powerful
figure in her own right, not just the necessary bookend of
“queen” but the bringer of power, the land itself. This makes
her a figure of power equal to Morgan le Fay, the figure of
chaos opposing Arthur's Christian order, and to Nimue, the
betrayer of Merlin. When one recognizes the link between
Celtic women and the land, a link in which marrying a
Celtic woman did indeed bring her land to the groom,
the struggle over who held Guinevere – king, Lancelot,
or one of the many villains who kidnapped her throughout
the Arthurian cycles – makes much more sense.

Alas, this powerful woman was conquered, first when the
Romans conquered most of Europe and then when Christianity
spread throughout the Gaelic-speaking lands, starting with
the Celts of France and Germany. The Christians were the
inheritors of Roman traditions by the 5th century, including
the Roman patrilineal rules of inheritance, and this more
than anything else destroyed the rich Celtic tradition of
strong women. Perhaps the most outstanding moment of this
was the defeat of the Celtic queen Boadicea by the Romans.
She raised half of England against the Roman conquerers after
they insisted on not just her fealty but also her possessions,
and then raped her two young daughters and heirs to make the
point that Rome was their master. Her ultimate defeat was the
last time Celtic women were to show themselves in their original
powerful form.
At least, it was until today. The ancient traditions of strong
women are being reclaimed by the women of today who are re-embracing
the Celtic tradition of women who are both beautiful and strong,
wise and crafty, powerful and feminine. It is an alternate path for
modern women who sometimes feel pulled between the demands of the
traditional role of wife and mother, and the demands of feminism
that sometimes seem to demand women seek power in things that are
specifically male. Celtic women understand the alternate path:
strength AND beauty, power AND nurturing motherhood.
Perhaps the most central theme of Celtic women is that, like the earth,
they are strong and loving and beautiful and living. The complexities
that are woman can all be found in the powerful figures of Celtic myth.