Sir John Rhys
The Hibbert Lectures, 1886

Sir John Rhys in 1886 presented the Hibbert Lectures, in which he advanced the concept of Samhain being the Celtic New Year. The lecture series was published in 1892 by Williams and Norgate, London.

Abstracted faithfully below are the steps Sir John Rhys took to make his case, together with comments.

"Lectures on the Origin and Growth of Religion as Illustrated by Celtic Heathendom".

In this review of the 1886 Hibbert Lectures, we find that only as recently as 1886 has there been a claim for Samhain marking the start of the Celtic year.

J.Rhys begins his argument as follows: on page 360 he states, "The Celts reckoned Dis the father of all, and regarded darkness and death as taking precedence over light and life ; so in their computation of time they began with night and winter (footnote), and not with daylight and summer."

The footnote reads, "This is probably the key to reckoning years as winter, of which we have instances in Med(ieval) Welsh literature, as when Kulhwch's horse is described as 'four winters' old (R.B. Mab. p.102). The habit appears to have been also English and Gothic, not to mention that it is Icelandic to this day."

J. Rhys states that this information about Dis is taken from Julius Caesar's The Conquest of Gaul, [VI.18], for on pp.84-85 he writes, "The notion that their Pluto was reckoned by the Gauls the fons et origo of all things, the gods included, is countenanced by Caesar's words, which connected with the god the Gaulish habit of reckoning the night before the day".

The Dis Pater statement by Caesar does not at all say that winter preceded summer. It does say that the Celts of Gaul measured periods of days from sunset to sunset, which was also true for the Celts of Britain and Ireland: Here is Caesar's full Dis Pater paragraph, published by Penguin books in "Caesar The Conquest of Gaul Translated by S.A. Handford" in 1951 (1982 edition, p. 142): No reference to winter or summer is made in this passage.

"VI.18. The Gauls claim all to be descended from Father Dis, declaring that this is the tradition preserved by the Druids. For this reason they measure periods of time not by days but by nights; and in celebrating birthdays, the first of the month, and new year's day, they go on the principle that the day begins at night. As regards the other usages of daily life, the chief difference between them and other peoples is that their children are not allowed to go up to their fathers in public until they are old enough for military service; they regard it as unbecoming for a son who is still a boy to stand in his father's sight in a public place."

With regards to birthdays, months and new year's day, Caesar is saying that these occasions begin at sunset, in precisely the way the West today celebrates Christmas Eve and New Years' Eve, and for that matter, Hallowe'en.

Sir John Rhys states that Caesar's comment "is probably the key to reckoning years as winters". It is therefore an absolute requirement for this "key" to be a valid argument. He has forced upon the words of Caesar the inclusion of winter and summer "so in their computation of time they began with night and winter, and not with daylight and summer" p. 360, for which there is no basis. This interpretation is unfounded as Caesar recorded only that the Celtic day was reckoned from sunset: "they [the Gauls] go on the principle that the day begins at night".

With regards to Culhwch's horse, elsewhere the Mabinogion clearly states that Pryderi's horse is born on May Eve, Beltaine, the beginning of Summer (Pwyll: see The Mabinogion, translated by Jeffrey Gantz, 1976,Penguin Classics, London, p.61). Culhwch and Pryderi are similar characters, as is also true for Cú Chulaind in Ireland also associated with colts, and thus their horses may be compared. Pryderi's horse is a ' winter older' on its birthday at Beltaine; and so also would be the case with Culhwch's horse.

The entire array of evidence that Sir John Rhys presents in the Hibbert Lectures is based on his interpretation of Caesar. This is a clear case where extrapolation from an unfounded premise can lead to an altogether false conclusion. The lack of critical reading of the Hibbert Lectures of 1886 produced a series of subsequent publications that perpetuated the fallacy as outlined in the main exposition. Rhys was not finished with his reasoning, which takes the unfounded premise to a generalised theory about the Indo-European culture, outlined as follows.

Page 514 is the page that should be very carefully read by anyone asserting that Samhain is the Celtic New Year - for this is where the formal argument is made by Sir John Rhys that Samhain is the Celtic New Year. It reasserts the incorrect claim that Caesar noted winter taking precedence over summer, draws in the equivalent Welsh cross-quarter and in a footnote meddles with Cormac's Glossary to make it saywhat he wanted it to say. This is this the page upon which rests a century of unreferenced statements saying that Samhain is the Celtic new year.

On p. 514 he continues his proposal, reiterating his Dis Pater misinterpretation, and proceeds to reinterpret a passage in an Irish manuscript and amend Cormac's Glossary to support his argument. Interestingly, the reinterpretation is performed in a footnote:

[Main text:] Now as the Celts were in the habit formerly of counting winters, and of giving precedence in their reckoning to night and winter over day and summer (p.390) [J.Rhys' internal reference], I should argue that the last day of the year in the Irish story of Diarmait's death meant the eve of November or all-Halloween, the night before the Irish Samhain, and known in Welsh as Nos Galan-gaeaf, or the Night of the Winter Calends" (my emphasis in italics). He continues immediately with, "But there is no occasion to rest on this alone, as we do have the evidence of Cormac's Glossary that the month before the beginning of winter was the last month (footnote); so that the first day of the first month of winter was also the first day of the year.

Note that here is the formal pronouncement of the idea that Samhain marked the Celtic New Year; But the footnote is required to justify it.

Here is the footnote on p. 514:

This is accepted by O'Donovan in his Introduction to the Bk. of Rights p. 1v; but in Stokes's Three Irish Glossaries, p. 20, precedent is given to another MS. which reads Fogamur .i. donmís derid is ainm isin fogamur .i. fogham .i. gaeth 7 mur &c. This is rendered as follows in O'Donovan's translation, p.74: 'Fogamur it is a name for the last day in the autumn,' &c. but the Irish, which has been tampered with by somebody who did not understand the ancient reckoning, only means, as it stands, 'for the last month is it a name in the autumn.' I should propose to mend the original very slightly thus: Fogamur .i. donmis derid is ainm isin . fogamur .i. fogham, &c. 'Fogamur, (to wit) for the last month that is a name,' &c. (my emphasis in italics).

On the footnote on page 360 J.Rhys says that the Dis Pater paragraph of Caesar is 'probably the key to reckoning years as winters'. The same word, namely "probably", was still used in the 1934 book by Henri Herbert in referring to Samhain. Here is the full sentence by Herbert: "There were four chief feasts. Samhain (1st November) marked the end of summer (samos) and probably the beginning of the year". It is probable that Herbert specifically and tentatively used the word "probably" with Sir John Rhys' footnote in mind.

So far, Sir John Rhys has misrepresented Caesar, altered the text of Cormac's Glossary, and made a spurious reference in a footnote to the Mabinogion. To finish off his forced and unsubstantiated argument that Samhain began the Celtic year, he provides a 'roughly drawn' comparison of Celtic and Greek festivals on pp.515 - 521 . In this comparison, he takes his argument to the extreme, suggesting that not only the Celts, but also the Greeks and indeed, 'some or all' of the Indo-European cultures began their year at the onset of winter! Here is his 'roughly drawn' comparison:

On p.514 he presents the formal proposal that Samhain is the Celtic new year, as described above.
On p.515 he links the Irish hearth lighting to the Greeks: "From Tlachtga all the hearths in ireland are said to have been annually supplied, just as the Lemnians had once a year to put their fires out and light them anew from that brought in the sacred ship from Delos".
On p.516 he points out that the "the night in question was regarded as the saturnalia of all that was hideous and uncanny in the world of the spirits....when the Sun-god...succumbed to his enemies the powers of darkness and winter".
On p.517 he connects the feast of Samhain with Athens, "For at Athens that was the time of the Chalceia, an ancient feast in honour of Hephaestus and Athene...that is approximately the last day of October....preceded, as it is supposed, by the Apaturia, which was the meeting-time of the phratriae or the tribes..."
On p.518 he connects the Chalceia festival footraces with Wales, ie "The nearest Celtic parallel is to be found in the racing away from the bonfires in Wales..."
On p.519 he connects Lughnasa with Athenian games, ie "it follows...that the Panathenaea, with its great variety of games and contests in honour of the goddess Athene...must have taken place at the same time as the Lugnassad, said to have been established by Lug in honour of ... his foster-mother."
On p.519 he also connects Beltaine to Athens, ie "So one has to be content with an approximation in the Athenian Thargelion...at least six days later than one could wish for a feast to match the Goidelic Beltaine, or the first of May."
On p.520 he makes an incredible circular argument: "The parallel which has been roughly drawn here between the Celtic and the Greek calendar suggests that at one time the Greeks regarded the old year as ending with the Apturia, and the new one beginning with the Chalceia...".
On p.521 he justifies his entire argument thus, "Lastly, a year which was common to Celts with Greeks is not unlikely to have once been common to them with some or all of the other branches of the Aryan family."

In summary, Sir John Rhys has used his unjustified assertion of the meaning in Caesar's Dis Pater paragraph first to assert the Celtic year began at Samhain, and has gone even further by "roughly drawn" comparisons of the Celtic fire-feasts with Greek festivals to assert that the Greek calendar began with the Chalceia. What he has achieved through this long, complex and confusing set of pages, though, is enjoined the reader to accept his proposition that Samhain began the Celtic new year without question, and extended his contention to include "some or all" of the Indo-European cultures. Impressive. It would be only fair to all who claim Samhain is the Celtic New Year to draw the attention of their audience or readership to the basis of their claim.

Sir John RhysThe Hibbert Lectures, 1886

Sir John Rhys
The Hibbert Lectures, 1886