Segusiavi

The Segusiavi (Gaulish: *Segusiauī/Segusiawī) were a Gallic tribe dwelling around the modern city of Feurs (Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes) during the Iron Age and the Roman period.

A map of Gaul in the 1st century BC, showing the relative positions of the Celtic tribes.

Name

They are named in Latin as Segusiavi by Caesar (mid-1st c. BC)^[1] and Pliny (1st c. AD),^[2] and in Greek as Segosianoi (gen. Σεγοσιανῶν) by Strabo (early 1st c. AD)^[3] and as Segousiantoi (gen. Σεγουσιάντων) by Ptolemy (2nd c. AD).^[4][5]

The etymology of the Gaulish ethnonym *Segusiauī/Segusiawī is unclear. It probably stems from the Gaulish root sego- ('victory, force'),^[6] but the second element is problematic.^[5] Irish folklorist Dáithí Ó hÓgáin tentatively translates their name as the 'Victorious Ones'.^[7] Since the Segusiavi possessed a wide area just north of the Greek colony of Massalia (Marseille) at the time of Aristotle, he has proposed to see their name as an alternative ethnonym of the Segobriges, the tribe involved in the foundation myth of Massalia.^[7]

The city of Feurs, attested by Ptolemy as Phóros Segousiántōn (Φόρος Σεγουσιάντων, 'forum, market of the Segusiavi'; Forum in 950, Fuer in 1227), is indirectly named after the tribe.^[8][5]

Geography

The chief town of the Segusiavi was known as Forum Segusiavorum (modern Feurs), erected on a pre-Roman settlement which had been occupied from the 2nd century BC onwards. The city lost its local preeminence in the 3rd–4th centuries AD. Under Diocletian, in 297–298, Forum Segusiavorum was incorporated into the province of Lugdunensis Prima.^[9]

The Segusiavi also held a fortress at Lugdunum (modern Lyon).^[10]