The god with the hammer is a gracious bearded figure, clad in Gaulish dress, and he carries also a cup.  His plastic type is derived from that of the Alexandrian Serapis, ruler of the underworld, and that of Hades-Pluto.[82] His emblems, especially that of the hammer, are also those of the Pluto of the Etruscans, with whom the Celts had been in contact.[83] He is thus a Celtic Dispater, an underworld god, possibly at one time an Earth-god and certainly a god of fertility, and ancestor of the Celtic folk.  In some cases, like Serapis, he carries a modius on his head, and this, like the cup, is an emblem of chthonian gods, and a symbol of the fertility of the soil.  The god being benevolent, his hammer, like the tool with which man forms so many things, could only be a symbol of creative force.[84] As an ancestor of the Celts, the god is naturally represented in Celtic dress.  In one bas-relief he is called Sucellos, and has a consort, Nantosvelta.[85] Various meanings have been assigned to “Sucellos,” but it probably denotes the god’s power of striking with the hammer.  M. D’Arbois hence regards him as a god of blight and death, like Balor.[86] But though this Celtic Dispater was a god of the dead who lived on in the underworld, he was not necessarily a destructive god.  The underworld god was the god from whom or from whose kingdom men came forth, and he was also a god of fertility.  To this we shall return.

2.  A bearded god, probably squatting, with horns from each of which hangs a torque, is represented on an altar found at Paris.[87] He is called Cernunnos, perhaps “the horned,” from cerna, “horn,” and a whole group of nameless gods, with similar or additional attributes, have affinities with him.

(a) A bronze statuette from Autun represents a similar figure, probably horned, who presents a torque to two ram’s-headed serpents.  Fixed above his ears are two small heads.[88] On a monument from Vandoeuvres is a squatting horned god, pressing a sack.  Two genii stand beside him on a serpent, while one of them holds a torque.[89]

(b) Another squatting horned figure with a torque occurs on an altar from Reims.  He presses a bag, from which grain escapes, and on it an ox and stag are feeding.  A rat is represented on the pediment above, and on either side stand Apollo and Mercury.[90] On the altar of Saintes is a squatting but headless god with torque and purse.  Beside him is a goddess with a cornucopia, and a smaller divinity with a cornucopia and an apple.  A similar squatting figure, supported by male and female deities, is represented on the other side of the altar.[91] On the altar of Beaune are three figures, one horned with a cornucopia, another three-headed, holding a basket.[92] Three figures, one female and two male, are found on the Dennevy altar.  One god is three-faced, the other has a cornucopia, which he offers to a serpent.[93]

(c) Another image represents a three-faced god, holding a serpent with a ram’s head.[94]