Carnyx

The carnyx was a wind instrument of the Iron Age Celts, used between c. 200 BC and c. AD 200. It was a type of bronze trumpet with an elongated S shape, held so that the long straight central portion was vertical and the short mouthpiece end section and the much wider bell were horizontal in opposed directions. The bell was styled in the shape of an open-mouthed boar's, or other animal's, head. It was used in warfare, probably to incite troops to battle and intimidate opponents, as Polybius recounts. The instrument's upright carriage allowed it to be heard over the heads of the participants in battles or ceremonies. The carnyx was not used by Celts exclusively; its use is attested for Dacia, and it was probably common all over Iron Age Europe.

Etymology

The word “carnyx” is derived from the Gaulish root, "carn-" or "cern-" meaning "antler" or "horn," and the same root of the name of the god, Cernunnos.

Historical record

Archaeology

Until 2004, fragments of only five carnyces had been preserved, from modern Scotland, France, Germany, Romania and Switzerland, but in November 2004 archaeologists discovered a first-century-BC deposit of five far more complete and well preserved, though deconstructed, carnyxes under a Gallo-Roman fanum at Tintignac in Corrèze, France. Four had boar's heads, the fifth appears to be a serpent-like monster; they appear to represent a ritual deposit dating to soon after the Roman conquest of Gaul. The Tintignac finds enabled some fragments found in northern Italy decades before to be identified in 2012 as coming from a carnyx.