The Goddess having her hair braided on the Gundestrup silver cauldron (dated 150-1 BC) might be Rhiannon of the Mabinogion, famous for her birds, whose songs could awaken the dead & lull the living to sleep, Goddess of the Otherworld. The 2 birds of prey... 1/2 #FolkloreThursday

...above her shoulders might indicate the Celtic Mother Goddess, the Morrigan who in her war-goddess form appeared to warriors slain in battle as a bird of prey or more often a raven. This harness decoration from north-eastern Bulgaria is strikingly similar.
#FolkloreThursday 2/2

The Celtic peoples seemed to have practised excarnation – the ritual exposure of corpses to the elements & scavengers. Birds of prey, ravens etc would devour the flesh of bodies, which allowed for metempsychosis – the transmigration of the soul & its reincarnation after death. 3/