 During the times of Ancient Rome, Suetonius, in The Twelve Caesars, noticed that, in Latin, rooster ("gallus") and Gauls ("Gallus") were homonyms.However, the association of the Gallic rooster as a national symbol is apocryphal, as the rooster was neither regarded as a national personification nor as a sacred animal by the Gauls in their mythology and because there was no "Gallic nation" at the time, but a loose confederation of Gallic nations instead.But a closer review within that religious scheme indicates that "Mercury" was often portrayed with the cockerel, a sacred animal among the Continental Celts.