Coelerni

The Coelerni were an ancient Celtic tribe of Gallaecia in Hispania (the Iberian Peninsula), part of Calaician or Gallaeci people, living in what was to become the Roman Province of Hispania Tarraconensis, in what is now the southern part of the province of Ourense (in Galicia).

Some sources, like Alarcão,[1] also state that the Coelerni lived in the north of modern Portugal, in the province of Trás-os-Montes, in the mountains between the rivers Tua and Sabor - this seems to be incorrect and predates the finding of the Tessera Hospitalis of Castromao.

However there was a lusitanian people of the Colarni (inscription of Alcantara) living near the Douro river in Lamego, that could have some link with the galician Coelerni.

The Coelerni are known from few literary sources, such as Pliny and Ptolemy, and because they appear as one of the ten civitates of the convent Bracarensis that are cited in the Inscription of the Peoples of Chaves (the Roman Aquae Flaviae), a column in the Roman bridge in Chaves where those people rend homage to Emperor Vespasian.

The results of a census he passes on to us informs about the following: «The jurisdiction of Lucus contains 15 peoples both unimportant and bearing outlandish names, excepting the Celtici and the Lemavi, but with a free population amounting to about 166,000.

In a similar way the 24 states [civitates] of Braga contain 285,000 persons, of whom besides the Bracari themselves may be mentioned, without wearying the reader, the Biballi, Coelerni, Callaeci, Equaesi, Limici and Querquerni (Naturalis Historia, III, 3, 28).

A Tessera Hospitalis was found stating a pact of hospitality between the tribe of the Coelerni, thus accepting their peaceful integration in Hispania Citerior, and the Roman military commander of the Legion VII Gemina Civitas Limicorum, Gneo Antonius Aquilus Novaugustanus, in exchange for their defence under Emperor Hadrian.