This document is written in my own rather crude, simplified dialect of Gaulish, in 2010. I still use long and short vowels, which are essential to the rhythm of it, though not the official metre. I wrote it during a long and boring meeting, in which I was not expected to speak. I have not checked the vocabulary in Delmarre’s Dictionnaire de la Langue Gauloise, nor in Matasovic’s Etymological dictionary of Proto-Celtic. In any case, this is an artistic conceit, and not to be taken too seriously. The myth is proto-Indo-European, from Bruce Lincoln’s Death, War, and Sacrifice, and not Celtic, though Ariomanus is a real Gaulish name, found in inscriptions in Pannonia and Noricum. I’m using him here as a stand in for the proto-Indo-European Manu.
The poem is written in a rather simplified Saturnian metre, for the first 4 stanzas, though the last is non-metrical. I use too much repetition to make it work, but it works nonetheless. The scheme is essentially four lines per stanza, each line of 13 syllables, divided into half-lines separated by a caesura. Each half-line has 7 to 8 syllables. It alliterates fairly adequately.
So, on to Adbertos Yemoni:
Wer noxtion cinton nebuwânt bitus tirroswe Nebuwânt in wiryî sâwelios lugrâwe Nebuwânt ander nemon caitoi abonâswe Nebuwânt ander nemon sleiboi swâ lânoiwe In noxtiobi cintobi buwânt tri cawâroi Buwântyos Aryomanus, Yemonos, Tritiosc Buwât bous co eyobi myolkobous co eyobi Tri cawâroi bousc in noxtiobi cintobi In notxtiobi cintobi tri cawâroi âwont Cawâroi âwont bitun es credê Yemoni Seueyon credon swâ Yemonos adbertât Sueeyon bîwin in noxtiobi cintobi In noxtiobi cintobi cawâroi adbertânt Aryomanus adbertât Yemonon adbertât Sueeyon bratren Aryomanus adbertât Bratren adbertâtis in noxtiobi cintobi Au eyon cnamobi krakus âwonto Au eyon cîcî talamun âwoto Au eyon waitê morin âwoto Au eyon anatlî weton âwoto Au eyon râdiyins nellus âwonto Au eyon enequon sâwelion âwoto Au eyon anatiyin tenon noibon âwoto On the first night there were not world or land There were not, in truth sun or moon There were not, under heaven forests or rivers There were not, under heaven mountains or plains In the first nights there were three heroes Who were Aryomanus, Yemonos, and Tritios There was a cow with them a milk-cow with them Three heroes and a cow in the first nights In the first nights the heroes made The heroes made the world from the body of Yemonos His own body, so Yemonos sacrificed His own life in the first nights In the first nights the heroes sacrificed Aryomanus sacrificed Yemonos he sacrificed His own brother Aryomanus sacrificed The brother he sacrificed in the first nights From his bones the stones were made From his flesh the ground was made From his blood the sea was made From his breath the wind was made From his thoughts the clouds were made From his face/honor the sun was made From his soul the sacred fire was made
