Think of the Seine and you may picture Notre Dame, the Louvre, a ballet of boats under bridges next to the Eiffel Tower. “Under the sky of Paris / runs a joyous river,” sang Edith Piaf. Hollywood blockbusters and hit pop songs have certainly ensured the river’s international celebrity status. Yet few people know about the Gallo-Roman goddess for which the Seine is named. Celtic in origin, the healing deity Sequana was honored in cult worship after the Roman conquest of Gaul in the first century B.C.
Sculptures of arms, pelvises, internal organs… This was the treasure trove that awaited 19th-century archaeologists when they discovered remnants of a Gallo-Roman sanctuary at the Seine’s source in Burgundy. Excavations from 1836 to 1967 unearthed some 1,500 stone, bronze, and wood ex-votos (votive offerings) that pilgrims presented to Sequana. It’s thought that the body parts depicted injuries or illnesses that needed healing.
“One such ex-voto represents a leg with a sponge placed on the ankle, not unlike a sponge you’d use today in the shower,” explains Franck Abert, curator of the Dijon Archaeological Museum, where the collection is housed. Dating from 40 B.C., the wooden ex-votos are exceedingly rare, having been preserved in marshy, humid conditions for more than two millennia. Unique in France are the stone ex-votos of hands formed in the shape of a stirrup and holding a round fruit. What’s more, statuettes included puppy-toting children, what Abert says could reflect the ceremonial processions ending in the animal’s sacrifice. (Such a ritual was a custom in ancient Rome.)
Dedications to Sequana were found in multiple inscriptions, such as the magnificent sealed jar—brimming with 300 coins, 120 ex-votos, and four gold rings—offered by a hopeful believer named Rufus. References to the goddess have not been found outside the Seine’s source. Yet despite this highly localized context, Sequana may have had a profound influence beyond the immediate vicinity. “The economic importance of the river perhaps gave Sequana an extra-regional reputation,” writes archaeologist Sylvie Robin in the catalog for the Seine exhibit currently showing at the Île de la Cité archaeological crypt in Paris.
After all, the goddess gave her name to France’s famous river, the word evolving over time into the “Seine” moniker that’s universally recognized today. This is additional evidence of Sequana’s Gallic origins. “It’s a feminine name, whereas generally the Romans gave masculine names to watercourses,” explains Abert. “The river was already attributed as feminine in the Gallic era.” Archaeologists believe that Celts brought offerings to the river goddess to ask for a cure or to give thanks for fulfilled wishes—a practice that evolved in the Gallo-Roman era with a sprawling stone temple complex with pools and terraces. The ruins are still visible today.
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Merging Celtic and Roman mythologies
As they conquered myriad peoples, the ancient Romans adopted local deities and absorbed them into their pantheon. Sequana thus represents a fusion of cultures. “As Caesar noted, the Gauls were known for having a lot of gods—they had gods for everything,” says Abert. “But they didn’t make statues of them like the Romans did. We had the first representations of Gallic gods with Romanization.” Sometimes these gods are pictured side by side, such as Celtic Cernunnos and Roman Jupiter depicted on the iconic Paris sculpture known as the Pillar of the Boatmen. Worship of Epona, a Gallic goddess associated with fertility and horses, spread beyond Gaul to the edges of the Roman Empire.
The only surviving personification of Sequana is immortalized in a first-century bronze statue that’s a jewel in the Dijon Archaeological Museum’s collection. Discovered with a fawn statue near the Seine’s source in 1933, the crowned goddess in a flowing robe stands astride a boat, its prow fashioned as a duck or swan’s head. “She is young, with large eyes and refined features, and wears a look of anticipation,” writes author Elaine Sciolino in The Seine: The River That Made Paris. Apparently the statue was first created as a goddess of abundance, later dismantled to insert a boat atop the pedestal. The horn of plenty was removed from her hands, and voilà!—a clever Gallo-Roman craftsman conjured the divinity. The boat is what defines Sequana, the aquatic bird often evoked as the animal protector of children and the family. In the ruins of a Gallo-Roman necropolis near Port-Royal in Paris, archaeologists found similarly shaped children’s toys and talismans.
The pilgrims’ ancient gestures at the Seine’s source inspire artist and filmmaker Yan Tomaszewski. His recent project centered on contemporary ex-votos: a series of cotton-shrouded sculptures containing activated charcoal. As part of an artistic ceremonial procession, they were immersed in the river for several weeks. “Like the charcoal sticks you put in carafes to purify water and make it drinkable, the charcoal absorbs pollutants and impurities,” he explains. “The idea is that these sculptures both concretely and symbolically healed the river.” The pollution-saturated charcoal was then sent to a scientific lab for pollution analysis, and the sculptures were showcased in various museum exhibits. One can be seen now at the Île de la Cité archaeological crypt.
Tomaszewski’s small-scale effort—inspired by an age-old Sequana ritual, laden with symbolism—mirrors the colossal Seine cleanup project that aims to make the Seine swimmable again for the Olympics. “The idea is one of offering,” he says. “A gift for a gift.”