Editing Verbeia (section)

==Origins==
The stone bearing the image thought to represent Verbeia now stands inside [[All Saints' Parish Church, Ilkley|All Saints' Parish Church]] and an altar stone dedicated to the goddess is on display in [[Ilkley Manor House]]. Both buildings are situated on the site of a [[Ilkley Roman Fort|Roman fort]]. The fort has been claimed to be named 'Verbeia' (not Olicana, as is generally thought).<ref>[http://www.roman-britain.org/places/verbeia.htm Verbeia] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080925115608/http://www.roman-britain.org/places/verbeia.htm |date=2008-09-25 }}, www.roman-britain.org</ref> It was the Second Cohort of [[Lingones]] troops<ref>[http://www.roman-britain.org/military/coh2lin.htm ''Cohors Secundae Lingonum''] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080606183330/http://www.roman-britain.org/military/coh2lin.htm |date=2008-06-06 }}, www.roman-britain.org</ref> stationed here during the second century AD who inscribed the above-mentioned altar-stone.<ref name="rombritrib635">[http://www.roman-britain.org/places/verbeia.htm#rib635 RIB 635] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080925115608/http://www.roman-britain.org/places/verbeia.htm |date=2008-09-25 }}, www.roman-britain.org</ref>

Anne Ross<ref>''Pagan Celtic Britain'', Anne Ross, Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1967, p. 279</ref> compares this image with one of a goddess found in [[Mavilly-Mandelot]], France, portrayed with a similar pleated garment, holding two snakes in one hand, on an altar associated with aquatic cults. Ross fails to mention that this region of France is where the Lingones, a Gaulish tribe from which the Roman troops were recruited, originated. It seems possible that the Mavilly altar is a precursor of the Verbeia altar.

Some sources state,<ref name="rombritrib635"/> however, that the Ilkley troops were recruited from the Lingones in northeast Italy; some of the tribe migrated across the Alps in around 400 BC [[Lingones]].