Veleda

[1] The name may be Celtic and generic title for a prophetess (from Proto-Celtic *welet- "seer", a derivative of the root *wel- "to see").

[2][3] The ancient Germanic peoples discerned a divinity of prophecy in women and regarded prophetesses as true and living goddesses.

In the latter half of the 1st century AD Veleda was regarded as a deity by most of the tribes in central Germany and enjoyed wide influence.

The Roman garrison at Novaesium (now Neuss) surrendered without a fight, as did the one at Castra Vetera (near modern Xanten in Niederrhein, Germany).

Other 19th-century works incorporating Veleda/Velleda/Welleda included Friedrich de la Motte-Fouqué's 1818 novel, Welleda und Gemma; Eduard Sobolewski's 1835 opera Velleda; E.H. Maindron's 1843–44 marble sculpture Velleda; Franz Sigret's drawing Veleda, Prophetess of the Bructeri, and Paul Dukas' cantata Velléda.

More recently, Veleda's story was fictionalized by Poul Anderson in Star of the Sea (1991), and by Lindsey Davis in The Iron Hand of Mars (1992) and Saturnalia (2007).