1) Damona (‘Cow Goddess’)

The goddess Damona is known from sixteen inscriptions. She is partnered with the god of the healing springs Borvo (‘the Bubbling one’) in nine inscriptions from Bourbonnes-les-Bains (Haute-Marne) and in four dedications from Bourbon-Lancy (Saône-et-Loire). In Chassenay, near Aignay-le-Duc (Côte d’Or), she is coupled with the god Albius, while in Alise-Sainte-Reine (Côte d’Or), she is associated with the god Moritasgus. Finally, she is honoured on her own and given the epithet Matuberginni in an inscription from Saintes (Charente-Maritime).

The name Damona is based on a Celtic word damos meaning ‘ox’, ‘cow’ or ‘stag’, cognate with Old Irish dam, ‘ox’, ‘cow’, ‘stag’, Welsh dafad, ‘sheep’, ‘ewe’ and Breton dañvad, ‘sheep’.²⁰⁰⁵ Damona is therefore ‘the Cow Goddess’ or ‘the Divine Cow’, which indicates she was worshipped in bovine shape in ancient times. This relates her to the goddess Borvoboendoa honoured in Utrecht (Germany),²⁰⁰⁶ whose name can be broken down as *Borvo-bō-vinduā, that is ‘the Seething White Cow’,²⁰⁰⁷ and related to the Irish river-goddess Bóinn, whose name was originally *Bou-vindā, that is the ‘Cow-White (Goddess)’ or ‘the Bovine Wise (Goddess)’.²⁰⁰⁸ As explained above, the cow-shaped motif seems to have been specific to water-goddesses, for in ancient times the cow was used as a metaphor for the river; its streams symbolizing the milk flowing from the goddess in the shape of a supernatural cow.²⁰⁰⁹