Etymology
It is unknown whether the Latin and Gaulish usages are cognates, or if the former should be considered a Celtic loanword. The word may be derived from a PIE root *wāt- " to inspire, spiritually arouse"; however that root cannot be shown to go back to Proto-Indo-European, since it is only certainly attested for Celtic and Germanic (though it may be present natively in Italic). Virgil uses the Latin vannus "winnowing fan" (from *wat-nos, compare Old High German wadal, modern German Wedel, with the same meaning, from *wat-lo-) for something borne about in the Bacchic festival, suggesting that the root may have had an ecstatic sense in Italic also.
In pagan Rome the vates resided on the Vatican Hill, the Hill of the Vatii. Indeed, the Vatican Hill takes it name from the Latin word Vaticanus, a vaticiniis ferendis, in allusion to the oracles, or Vaticinia, which were anciently delivered on the Vatican Hill.
Rübekeil (2003) suggested that the name of the Germanic god *Wōđinaz may in fact be an early loanword, an adjective *vatinos based on Celtic vates.
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“The universal principle of etymology in all languages: words are carried over from bodies and from the properties of bodies to express the things of the mind and spirit. The order of ideas must follow the order of things.”
—Giambattista Vico (1688–1744)
“Semantically, taste is rich and confusing, its etymology as odd and interesting as that of “style.” But while style—deriving from the stylus or pointed rod which Roman scribes used to make marks on wax tablets—suggests activity, taste is more passive.... Etymologically, the word we use derives from the Old French, meaning touch or feel, a sense that is preserved in the current Italian word for a keyboard, tastiera.”
—Stephen Bayley, British historian, art critic. “Taste: The Story of an Idea,” Taste: The Secret Meaning of Things, Random House (1991)