Gomarian Giants (Cont.)
Documentation for this genealogy appears in Pezron's book, The Antiquities of Nations. First translated into English in 1706, this remarkable volume leads us through a shadowy past even back to the overthrow of the tower of Babel. To prove that Gomer was the father of the Celts, Pezron uses a wide range of early historical sources, ancient poems, and postdiluvian monuments, along with his knowledge of several tongues, including the Celtic, and his ability to trace Celtic migrations through the names they gave their people, towns, mountains, plains, rivers, and bays. Along the way, he also shows that the Titans of Roman and Greek mythology were far from mythical. In truth, these giants at one time possessed many provinces in Asia Minor, and all those in Greece and the neighboring countries.80 And though first called Titans, they were in reality just another tribe of greatly oversized Celtic warriors who, by their legendary exploits, made a great name for themselves in ancient times.
Pezron's first clue to the origin of the Titans and their blond Gallic descendants came, incidentally, from reading Josephus' histories. Concerning this discovery, he reports:
"Josephus in his first book of the antiquity of the Jews, makes a kind of a comment upon the tenth chapter of Genesis, where Moses sets down the fathers and heads of each nation; and when he comes to speak of Gomer, who was the eldest son of Japhet, he says directly, and without any hesitation, that he was the founder, condi-dit, of those people anciently called Gomarians, to whom the Greeks now give the name of Gauls.81 It's very plain from the words of this learned Jewish historian, that Gomer was the father and founder of the Gomarians or Gomerites, and that these ancient people were no other than what the Greeks afterwards called Galatians, which was the same as Gauls, so that there is no need of contesting this matter any farther.
"Now," he continues, "it's proper, to inquire where those people were, named Gomarians, of whom Josephus speaks; Are they to be found in any part of Europe? No: Where then could they be, but in Asia? Let us but cast our eyes a little upon the books and maps of Ptolemy,82 the famous geographer, and survey but for a moment the provinces of Higher Asia, I mean those between Media, Bactriana and the Caspian Sea, there we shall easily find the Chomarians or Comarians, who are no other than the Gomarians of Josephus. ... The Gomarians therefore, according to Josephus, were the Galatians or Gauls: but how could he know a thing which at this day appears to us so obscure and dark? It's not at all strange for him to say, that Gomer was the founder of the Gomarians; the likeness of names makes that easily out. But who could inform him that the Gauls came from the Gomarians, but either the truth of ancient history, or the tradition of his fathers, the Hebrews?"83
While pursuing his studies, Pezron soon discovered that Josephus was not the only early writer to make Gomer the father of the Gauls. Eustathius of Antioch, author of the Commentary upon the Hexameron, also held this opinion. He relates that Gamer (the Greek Septuagint's spelling for Gomer) was the founder of the Gamarians, "whom we now call Galatians or Gauls." Jerome, one of the most learned men of his time and the one who gave us the Vulgate or Latin version of the Bible, agrees with Eustathius' statement and declares with him mat the Galatians, or Gauls, descended according to Hebrew traditions from Gomer. The kinship between the Galatians and the Gauls, says Pezron, was also confirmed by St. Isidore, bishop of Seville. In his famous book, Origines, which endured for many centuries as one of the most important of all reference books, Isidore wrote: "We find that Japhet had seven sons, which Gomer the eldest was the father of the Galatians, that is to say, the Gauls." Yet another witness, the Chronicle of Alexandria, said that it was Gomer "from whom the Celtae had their origin."
If anyone requires still more testimony, Pezron cites an early Jewish historian named Joseph Goronidis, "who has said somewhat concerning the origin of nations many ages ago: The sons of Gomer are the Franks, that dwell towards the Seine in France. These are the words of that Jew, and 'tis very manifest that by the sons of Gomer he means the Gauls, whom he calls Franks, or French dwelling near the Seine, in order to distinguish them from the Franks in Germany. In short, my design in producing all these evidences of truth, has no other tendency than to show that Josephus, the Jewish historian, had reason on his side in making the Gauls to be the descendants of Gomer."84
By consulting the most famous ancient geographers, such as Ptolemy, Pliny, Pomponius Mela, and Dionysius of Alexandria,85 Pezron also learned that after the fall of the tower of Babel Comer's people settled in Bactnana and Margiana, lands to the southeast of the Caspian Sea. Ptolemy, he notes, divided the Gomarians into two clans. Those called Chomarians he placed in Bactnana, "pretty near the Oxus." Some old maps of Bactriana that Pezron looked at confirmed this, for on them he found a city called Chomara, which he took to be "the capital of these people." As for their cousins, called Comarians, Ptolemy located them "towards the most eastern boundaries of Sogdiana, not far from the sources of the Jaxartes, and in the country of the Sacae." Mela, the earliest Latin geographer, also separated these kindred peoples, but on his map he settled the Comarians toward Sogdiana and Bactriana, while locating the Chomarians a little above the Caspian Sea and toward the Massagetae. Pezron sees no contradiction in this. '"Tis clear enough from hence," he says, "that both these people came from the same stock; that at first they were founded by Gomer towards the countries of Margiana and Bactriana, and that in process of time they separated from one another; that one continued in Bactriana, their ancient habitation, and that the other moved towards those countries that lay to the east, beyond the Jaxartes, between the spring of that river and Mount Imaus."86
In these lands, watered by large rivers and described by Strabo as the most agreeable and fruitful parts of all Asia, Gomer's descendants apparently came in contact with the surviving Nephilim and began intermarrying with them. For certain, it was here that the exceptionally tall Gomarians developed into a fierce warlike people and even fought among themselves over the land. Although these civil wars occurred in the most obscure times, ancient historians have been able to piece together some of what happened. Pezron summarizes what they found, in these words:
'This people in process of time increasing to a vast multitude could not always live in repose and tranquility; the seeds of dissensions and jealousies began to spring up amongst themselves: Amid these factions and difficult commotions, those who proved the weakest either in number or strength, were expelled by the other, and forced to seek for a retreat in the neighboring countries; so that passing over those vast mountains, which are to the south of Margiana, they entered into a country then in possession of the Medes, who were known by the name of Arii. Those fugitives fixed themselves either by force or consent in this country they had made their way to, which was surrounded by high mountains: And as they were a people that had been driven out of their native country, they were called Parthians; the same signifying as much as persons separated from others, exiles or banished people; and it was from this name, which is very ancient, and sticks to them to this day, that that province was called Parthia, where these fugitives fixed their habitation. This is the true origin of the Parthians, which is ancienter than that of the Persians, who came from them. Trogus Pompeius has given an ample account of them in his 41st book, of which we have but a small abridgment: We find what he says confirmed by Arrian in his Parthicis, by Stephen of Byzantium, and some others."87 Even though the ancient historians knew about the Parthians' separation from the Gomarians, they could not pinpoint when. But Pezron says it certainly took place before the days of Ninus and the founding of the Assyrian empire, and so even long before Abraham's time.
As for the name Parthians, which the Gomarians gave to those they drove away from among them, it comes, Pezron tells us, from the word Parthu, "which to this very day in the Celtic signifies to divide or separate." These exiled Parthians, out of spite, also stuck a derisive name on their victorious Gomarian cousins. Seeing that they could not otherwise take revenge on them except by abusive language, they called those giants who drove them off their own land the Sacae. In the Celtic, Sacae denotes a thief, robber, or the like.88 He also points out that after the Gomarian exiles assimilated with the Persians, a great number of Celtic or Gallic words found their way into the Persian language--a thing that still baffles many modern Celtic experts who are not aware of this ancient connection between the Celtics and those Gomarians who became the Parthians.89
Moreover, adds Pezron, "it will be proper [here] to observe, that those, who at first had the opprobrious name of Sacae given them, were Gomarian Scythians, who dwelt, as aforesaid, in Margiana.... Here I pray you take notice that these Margians or Amyrgians wore breeches according to Herodotus, and it was from them that the Celts, who afterwards came into the west brought them into Gaul, insomuch, that some part of their people there were called Galli Braccati;90 to which we may add the arms of these Amyrgians, set forth by the same historian, which were like unto those born by the ancient Gauls: Wherefore we may upon the whole find in the Gomarians of Margina, the language, arms, habit, with the restless and warlike nature of our ancient Celtae."91
While tracing their origins for his geography, Ptolemy found that some Sacae also continued to refer to themselves as Gomarians.92 Those who settled near the Jaxartes in the vast plains that lie between that river and Mount Imaus he identified as the Nomadan Sacae. "These people," Pezron learned, "always led a vagrant and savage life, and that was the reason why they were called Nomadan Sacae. . . It is very likely the Cimbrians, Cimmerians, or Celtick people, came from them, of whom we shall speak hereafter."93
When the provinces of Margiana, Hyrcania, and Bactriana became too small for their growing numbers, the Gomarian Sacae also began spilling over into other lands in Asia Minor and the Fertile Crescent. These expansions usually took the form of invasions. One of the first countries they overran, according to the ancient authors, was Armenia, a province of great beauty and fertility. But not content with having seized the best part of Armenia, they soon after crossed over into Syria and probably made inroads as far as Arabia. They also became neighbors to the Chaldeans. "Having gone thus far," concludes Pezron, "we have no cause to wonder that the Celtick tongue, even at this day, is full of Syriack, Chaldee and Arabick words."94 Pezron could find no evidence to prove that the Sacae also invaded nearby Canaan, but he firmly believes they did. "I am strangely mistaken," he remarks, "if they were not these Giants . .. meant by the Hebrew word Rephaim"95 who took over many parts of God's land long before Abraham came to sojourn there.
But even these conquests failed to satiate the giants' ravenous appetite for new lands to conquer and places to plunder. Delightful Cappadocia on Armenia's western border fell next under their covetous gaze. The Cappadocians no doubt opposed, as best they could, the ensuing influx of Gomer's mighty hordes, and they probably retained some land the choosey invaders did not want. But they proved no match for the huge Sacae, who afterward settled in the most desirable parts, particularly those areas bordering upon the Black Sea.96 To this country they gave their name, calling it Sacastena.97 "Sacastena," explains Pezron, "properly signifies the country of the Sacae: For start and tan in the Celtick tongue implies a region. This word we find in that of Brittania, for so it should be writ, as should Aquitania, Lusitania, and many more after the same manner. . . The Persians and Parthians, who make use of stan instead of tan, as you may see in the words Chusistan, Indostan, and the like, have had it as well as many others, from the Asiatick Sacae: Which still is a pregnant proof that the language of the Sacae or Gomarians was the Celtick tongue."98
Graveyards of the Giants
Following their successful campaign in Cappadocia, the Gomarian giants passed over into Pontus and Upper Phrygia and also brought those lands under their dominion. With these conquests, they now exercised complete control over a large area of Asia Minor, including all the southern shores of the Black Sea. Now only the narrow Strait of Bosporus separated them from the early Greeks' eastern coast. And now beyond that strait lay all the spoils of Europe, waiting for them to take. (See Abraham and the Giants; Giants and the Flood; Giants Who Became Gods; Origin of the Giants--Biblical Account)
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