Gaul was the ancient designation for the land south and west of the Rhine, west of the Alps, and north of the Pyrenees. The name was extended by the Romans to include Italy from Lucca and Rimini northwards, excluding Liguria. This extension of the name is derived from its settlers of the 4th and 3d cent. B.C.—invading Celts, who were called Gauls by the Romans. Their cousins in Gaul proper (modern France) probably had been there since 600 B.C., for the Greeks of Massilia (Marseilles) knew them.


Gauls first ran into the Romans in 387 B.C. when it is said that they invaded Rome. According to Livy, it was an inhabitant of Clusium named Aruns who went to the Gauls and asked them to help him avenge his betrayal by his wife and adopted son. The Gauls then advanced southward led by a man named Brennus. The first Brennus, as he is called, sacked Rome and as the Romans were paying tribute to him, he noticed they were trying to slight him. It is said that Brennus threw his sword onto the pile saying "Vae Victus" (woe to the vanquished).


After the death of Alexander, many of the Gaulish mercenaries decided that Macedonia would be an ideal place because of the dissaray left there. The Gauls split into 3 groups, one of which marched in Macedonia under the command of Bolgios, possibly a Belgian, and crushed the army of Ptolemy Keraunos. The king of Macedonia was killed and his head borne aloft on a spear. Bolgios ordered a human sacrifice, but there things rested.

It was then that the second Brennus made his first appearance. According to Pausanias the geographer, Brennus succeeded in crossing his whole army over the river Sperchios. He then laid seige to the town of Heraclea and, having driven out the garrison there, marched on to Thermopylae where he defeated an army raised by a confederation of Greek cities.

Brennus then advanced across Greece, looting everything he could find. Disatisfied with the paltry loot, he decided to go on to Delphi which was reported as the treasure house of Greece. Without waiting for Kicharos, Brennus and his army of 40,000 set off to attack the temple of Apollo, the ultimate goal of his expidition.

Here it is said that Brennus was defeated by earthquakes, thunderbolts which reduced the soldiers to ashes, snow storms, showers of great stones, and "ancient heroes appearing from the heavens". It appears that after a long battle the Gauls were forced to retreat before they could reach the Delphic treasures.


These attacks were not forgotten by the Romans and after a long period of collective memory, the Cisalpine Gauls were defeated in 100 B.C. by Gaius Marius. Although this was only a minor victory, the whole of Gaul wasn't conquered until 58 B.C. by Gaius Julius Caesar.