{Celtic Art: The Sacred Head [continued (4)]}[19th February 1991]

[Redbook8:272][19910219:1155l]{Celtic Art: The Sacred Head [continued (4)]}[19th February 1991]

19910219.1155

[continued]

‘Celtic religion did not require natural representations of the gods, or of the other world and its supernatural beings. This does not mean that religious ideas are not expressed in abstract and decorative designs. The large numbers of votive offerings found in sanctuaries, rivers* and meres* suggests that they were. In monumental carving in stone and wood the religious dimension becomes explicit. Here again there are opposing tendencies, towards both the abstract and the natural, and there is a concentration on the head, severed** or attached, as there is in Celtic literature and legend.’

*R~

**R~

***– ibid [Encylopaedia of Visual Art 2: 217]

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