Galatians in 218 B.C.

Galatians — 218 BC · The Gauls of Asia.

Galatia — Gaul in the heart of Asia. A generation ago, three Celtic tribes crossed out of Europe at the call of Nicomedes I of Bithynia, who hired them to fight his wars; once over, they fell upon Asia Minor with fire and sword, and for years the Greek cities and even the great kings paid them tribute to be spared. Beaten at last and penned by the powers around them, the Gauls settled in the bleak uplands about the Halys and the Sangarius, the land the Greeks call Gallograecia — and there they keep their Celtic tongue, their tribal law, and their warrior pride in a Phrygian country. Three nations divide the land, each split into four tetrarchies, twelve tetrarchs in all, who take counsel together with a council of three hundred at the oak-sanctuary they call Drynemeton. They are the most coveted mercenaries of the age, and head-hunting raiders feared by every neighbour — yet of late Attalus I of Pergamon has broken them in battle and won his crown by it, and this very year a fresh band of Gauls, the Aegosagae, has been ferried across from Europe to serve his wars.

For half a century the name of the Gauls has been a terror from the Danube to the Taurus. They sacked their way through Macedon and Greece and struck even at Delphi; then Nicomedes I of Bithynia ferried three tribes of them across into Asia to fight his rival, and once loosed they ranged the whole peninsula, burning, plundering and exacting tribute, until the Seleucid kings and the cities bought peace with silver. Driven back at length, they were settled in the uplands of old Phrygia, where they now hold a wide land athwart the Halys and the Sangarius. But the day of free plunder is passing. Attalus I of Pergamon refused the tribute, beat them in the field, and took the title of king and Saviour for it — and so the Gauls of 218 BC sell their swords to the highest king and watch the Greek powers, once their tributaries, grow strong against them.