Mena: According to Nigerian Historian Catherine Acholonu the Druid Priests were Ibo Priests from West Africa. The name Druid is Duru Idu in Ibo. Ireland is Eri land name after the Ibo God Eri. The English magician name Merlin is Mel Erin in Ibo meaning the black God Erin.
In the Celtic religion, the modern words Druidry or Druidism denote the practices of the ancient druids, the priestly class in ancient Celtic societies through much of Western Europe north of the Alps and in the British Isles. Druidic practices were part of the culture of all the tribal peoples called Keltoi and Galatai by Greeks and Celtae and Galli by Romans, which evolved into modern English "Celtic" and "Gaulish". Modern attempts at reconstructing practicing Druidism are called Neo-druidism.
From what little we know of late druidic practice it appears deeply traditional, and conservative in the sense that the druids were conserving repositories of culture and lore. It is impossible now to judge whether this continuity had deep historical roots and originated in the social transformations of late La Tene time, or whether there had been a discontinuity and a druidic religious innovation. The etymological origins of the word druid are varied and doubtful enough that the word may be pre-Indo-European. The most widespread view is that "druid" derives from the Celtic word for an oak tree (doire in Irish Gaelic), a word whose root also meant "wisdom."
From what little we know of late druidic practice it appears deeply traditional, and conservative in the sense that the druids were conserving repositories of culture and lore. It is impossible now to judge whether this continuity had deep historical roots and originated in the social transformations of late La Tene time, or whether there had been a discontinuity and a druidic religious innovation. The etymological origins of the word druid are varied and doubtful enough that the word may be pre-Indo-European. The most widespread view is that "druid" derives from the Celtic word for an oak tree (doire in Irish Gaelic), a word whose root also meant "wisdom."
Their influence was as much social as religious. Druids used not only to take the part that modern priests would, but were often the philosophers, scientists, lore-masters, teachers, judges and councillors to the kings. The Druids linked the Celtic peoples with their numerous gods, the lunar calendar and the sacred natural order. With the arrival of Christianity in each area, all these roles were assumed by the bishop and the abbot, who were never the same individual, however, and might find themselves in direct competition.
Our historical knowledge of the druids is very limited. Druidic lore consisted of a large number of verses learned by heart, and we are told that sometimes twenty years were required to complete the course of study. There may have been a Druidic teaching center on Anglesey (Ynys Mon) centered on magical lakes, but what was taught, whether poetry, astronomy or whether possibly even the Greek language, is conjecture. Of their oral literature of sacred songs, formulas for prayers and incantations, rules of divination and magic, not one verse has survived, even in translation, nor is there even a legend that we can call purely druidic, without a Christian overlay or interpretation.
Much traditional rural religious practice can still be discerned beneath Christian interpretation, nevertheless, and survives in practices like Halloween observances, corn dollies and other harvest rituals, the myths of Puck, woodwoses, "lucky" and "unlucky" plants and animals and the like. Orally-transmitted material may have exaggerated deep origins in antiquity, however, and is constantly subject to influence from surrounding culture.
Roman Sources
Julius Caesar and Duridism
In Caesar's Gallic Wars, are found the first and fullest account of the Druids. Caesar notes that all men of any rank and dignity in Gaul were included either among the Druids or among the nobles, two separate classes.
The Druids constituted the learned priestly class, and they were guardians of the unwritten ancient customary law and had the power of executing judgment, of which excommunication from society was the most dreaded. Druids were not a hereditary caste, though they enjoyed exemption from service in the field as well as from payment of taxes. The course of training to which a novice had to submit was protracted. All instruction was communicated orally, but for ordinary purposes, Caesar reports, the Gauls had a written language in which they used the Greek characters.
No druidic documents have survived. "The principal point of their doctrine", says Caesar, "is that the soul does not die and that after death it passes from one body into another". This led several ancient writers to the unlikely conclusion that the druids must have been influenced by the teachings of the Greek philosopher Pythagoras. Caesar also notes the druidic sense of the guardian spirit of the tribe, whom he translated as Dispater, with a general sense of Father Hades.Writers like Diodorus and Strabo with less firsthand experience than Caesar, were of the opinion that this class included Druids, bards and soothsayers.
Pomponius Mela is the first author who says that their instruction was secret and carried on in caves and forests. We know that certain groves within forests were sacred because Romans and Christians alike cut them down and burned the wood. Human sacrifice is sometimes attributed to Druidism; it was an old inheritance in Europe, (although this might be Roman propaganda). The Gauls were accustomed to offer human sacrifices, usually criminals.
Britain was a headquarters of Druidism, but once every year a general assembly of the order was held within the territories of the Carnutes in Gaul.
Cicero remarks on the existence among the Gauls of augurs or soothsayers, known by the name of Druids; he had made the acquaintance of one Divitiacus, an Aeduan. Diodorus informs us that a sacrifice acceptable to the gods must be attended by a Druid, for they are the intermediaries. Before a battle they often throw themselves between two armies to bring about peace.
Druids were seen as essentially non-Roman: a prescript of Augustus forbade Roman citizens to practise druidical rites. In Strabo we find the Druids still acting as arbiters in public and private matters, but they no longer deal with cases of murder. Under Tiberius the Druids were suppressed by a decree of the Senate, but this had to be renewed by Claudius in 54 CE.
In Pliny their activity is limited to the practice of medicine and sorcery. According to him, the Druids held the mistletoe in the highest veneration. Groves of oak were their chosen retreat. When thus found, the mistletoe was cut with a golden knife by a priest clad in a white robe, two white bulls being sacrificed on the spot.
Tacitus, in describing the attack made on the island of Mona (Anglesey or Ynys Mon in Welsh) by the Romans under Suetonius Paulinus, represents the legionaries as being awestruck on landing by the appearance of a band of Druids, who, with hands uplifted towards heaven, poured forth terrible imprecations on the heads of the invaders. The courage of the Romans, however, soon overcame such fears; the Britons were put to flight; and the sacred groves of Mona were cut down.After the 1st century CE, the continental Druids disappeared entirely, and were only referred to on very rare occasions. Ausonius, for instance, apostrophizes the rhetorician Attius Patera as sprung from a race of Druids.
Early Druids in Britain
The story of Vortigern as reported by Nennius is one of the very few glimpses of Druidic survival in Britain after the Roman conquest. After being excommunicated by Germanus, the British leader invites twelve Druids to assist him. In Irish literature, however, the Druids are frequently mentioned, and their functions in the island seem to correspond fairly well to those of Gaul. The functions of Druids we here find distributed amongst Druids, bards and poets, but even in very early times the poet has usurped many of the duties of the Druid (at least to judge from poetry) and finally supplants him with the spread of Christianity.
The most important Irish documents are contained in manuscripts of the 12th century, but the texts themselves go back in large measure to about 700.
In the heroic cycles the Druids do not appear to have formed any corporation, nor do they seem to have been exempt from military service. Cathbu (Cathbad), the Druid connected with Conchobar, king of Ulster, in the older cycle is accompanied by a number of youths (100 according to the oldest version) who are desirous of learning his art.
The Druids are represented as being able to foretell the future: before setting out on the great expedition against Ulster, Medb, queen of Connaught, goes to consult her Druid, and just before the famous heroine Derdriu (Deirdre) is born, Cathbu prophesies what sort of a woman she will be.
Druids also have magical skills: the hero Cuchulainn has returned from the land of the fairies after having been enticed thither by a fairywoman named Fand, whom he is now unable to forget. He is given a potion by some Druids, which banishes all memory of his recent adventures and which also rids his wife Emer of the pangs of jealousy. More remarkable still is the story of Etain.
This lady, now the wife of Eochaid Arem, high-king of Ireland, was in a former existence the beloved of the god Mider, who again seeks her love and carries her off. The king has recourse to his Druid Dalgn, who requires a whole year to discover the haunt of the couple. This he accomplished by means of four wands of yew inscribed with ogam characters.
The following description of the band of Cathbus Druids occurs in the epic tale, the Tain bo Cuailnge: The attendant raises his eyes towards heaven and observes the clouds and answers the band around him. They all raise their eyes towards heaven, observe the clouds, and hurl spells against the elements, so that they arouse strife amongst them and clouds of fire are driven towards the camp of the men of Ireland. We are further told that at the court of Conchobar no one had the right to speak before the Druids had spoken. In other texts the Druids are able to produce insanity.
Druidic Sites
• The Isle of Ynys Mon
•Wistman's Wood on Dartmoor
Druids in Christian Literature
In the lives of saints, martyrs and missionaries, the Druids are represented as magicians and diviners opposing the Christian missionaries, though we find two of them acting as tutors to the daughters of Loegaire mac Neill, the High King, at the coming of Saint Patrick. They are represented as endeavouring to prevent the progress of Patrick and Saint Columba by raising clouds and mist. Before the battle of Culdremne (561) a Druid made an airbe drtiad (fence of protection?) round one of the armies, but what is precisely meant by the phrase is obscure. The Irish Druids seem to have had a peculiar tonsure. The word drtu is always used to render the Latin magus, and in one passage St Columba speaks of Christ as his Druid.
druid (Irish: druí; Welsh: derwydd) was a member of the educated, professional class among the Celtic peoples of Gaul, Britain, Ireland, and possibly elsewhere during the Iron Age. The druid class included law-speakers, poets and doctors, among other learned professions, although the best known among the druids were the religious leaders.
Very little is known about the ancient druids. They left no written accounts of themselves, and the only evidence are a few descriptions left by Greek, Roman, and various scattered authors and artists, as well as stories created by later medieval Irish writers.[2] While archaeological evidence has been uncovered pertaining to the religious practices of the Iron Age people, "not one single artefact or image has been unearthed that can undoubtedly be connected with the ancient Druids."[3] Various recurring themes emerge in a number of the Greco-Roman accounts of the druids, including that they performed animal and even human sacrifice, believed in a form of reincarnation, and held a high position in Gaulish society. Next to nothing is known for certain about their cultic practice, except for the ritual of oak and mistletoe as described by Pliny the Elder.
The earliest known reference to the druids dates to 200 BCE, although the oldest actual description comes from the Roman military general Julius Caesar in his Commentarii de Bello Gallico (50s BCE). Later Greco-Roman writers also described the druids, including Cicero,[4] Tacitus[5] and Pliny the Elder.[6] Following the Roman invasion of Gaul, druidism was suppressed by the Roman government under the 1st century CE emperors Tiberius and Claudius, and it had disappeared from the written record by the 2nd century.
In about 750 CE the word druid appears in a poem by Blathmac, who wrote about Jesus, saying that he was "... better than a prophet, more knowledgeable than every druid, a king who was a bishop and a complete sage."[7] The druids then also appear in some of the medieval tales from Christianized Ireland like the "Táin Bó Cúailnge", where they are largely portrayed as sorcerers who opposed the coming of Christianity.[8] In the wake of the Celtic revival during the 18th and 19th centuries, fraternal and neopagan groups were founded based on ideas about the ancient druids, a movement known as Neo-Druidism. Many popular modern notions about druids have no connection to the druids of the Iron Age and are largely based on much later inventions or misconceptions
Practices and doctrines
According to historian Ronald Hutton, "we can know virtually nothing of certainty about the ancient Druids, so that—although they certainly existed—they function more or less as legendary figures."[20] However, the sources provided about them by ancient and medieval writers, coupled with archaeological evidence, can give us an idea of what they might have performed as a part of their religious duties.
Societal role and training
Imaginative illustration of 'An Arch Druid in His Judicial Habit', from "The Costume of the Original Inhabitants of the British Islands" by S.R. Meyrick and C.H. Smith (1815), the gold gorget collar copying Irish Bronze Age examples.[21] One of the few things that both the Greco-Roman and the vernacular Irish sources agree on about the druids is that they played an important part in pagan Celtic society. In his description, Julius Caesar claimed that they were one of the two most important social groups in the region (alongside the equites, or nobles) and were responsible for organizing worship and sacrifices, divination, and judicial procedure in Gaulish, British and Irish society.[22] He also claimed that they were exempt from military service and from the payment of taxes, and that they had the power to excommunicate people from religious festivals, making them social outcasts.[22] Two other classical writers, Diodorus Siculus and Strabo, also wrote about the role of druids in Gallic society, claiming that the druids were held in such respect that if they intervened between two armies they could stop the battle.[23]
Pomponius Mela[24] is the first author who says that the druids' instruction was secret, and was carried on in caves and forests.
Druidic lore consisted of a large number of verses learned by heart, and Caesar remarked that it could take up to twenty years to complete the course of study. There is no historic evidence during the period when Druidism was flourishing to suggest that Druids were other than male.[25] What was taught to Druid novices anywhere is conjecture: of the druids' oral literature, not one certifiably ancient verse is known to have survived, even in translation.
All instruction was communicated orally, but for ordinary purposes, Caesar reports,[26] the Gauls had a written language in which they used Greek characters. In this he probably draws on earlier writers; by the time of Caesar, Gaulish inscriptions had moved from the Greek script to the Latin script.
Sacrifice
An 18th century illustration of a wicker man, the form of execution that Caesar alleged the druids used for human sacrifice. From the "Duncan Caesar", Tonson, Draper, and Dodsley edition of the Commentaries of Caesar translated by William Duncan published in 1753. Further information: Celts and human sacrifice, Threefold death and Ritual of oak and mistletoe
Greek and Roman writers frequently made reference to the druids as practitioners of human sacrifice, a trait they themselves reviled, believing it to be barbaric.[27] Such reports of druidic human sacrifice are found in the works of Lucan, Julius Caesar, Suetonius and Cicero.[28] Caesar claimed that the sacrifice was primarily of criminals, but at times innocents would also be used, and that they would be burned alive in a large wooden effigy, now often known as a wicker man. A differing account came from the 10th-century Commenta Bernensia, which claimed that sacrifices to the deities Teutates, Esus and Taranis were by drowning, hanging, and burning, respectively (see threefold death).
Diodorus Siculus asserts that a sacrifice acceptable to the Celtic gods had to be attended by a druid, for they were the intermediaries between the people and the divinities. He remarked upon the importance of prophets in druidic ritual: "These men predict the future by observing the flight and calls of birds and by the sacrifice of holy animals: all orders of society are in their power... and in very important matters they prepare a human victim, plunging a dagger into his chest; by observing the way his limbs convulse as he falls and the gushing of his blood, they are able to read the future." There is archaeological evidence from western Europe that has been widely used to back up the idea that human sacrifice was performed by the Iron Age Celts. Mass graves found in a ritual context dating from this period have been unearthed in Gaul, at both Gournay-sur-Aronde and Ribemont-sur-Ancre in what was the region of the Belgae chiefdom. The excavator of these sites, Jean-Louis Brunaux, interpreted them as areas of human sacrifice in devotion to a war god,[29][30] although this view was criticized by another archaeologist, Martin Brown, who believed that the corpses might be those of honoured warriors buried in the sanctuary rather than sacrifices.[31] Some historians have questioned whether the Greco-Roman writers were accurate in their claims. J. Rives remarked that it was "ambiguous" whether the druids ever performed such sacrifices, for the Romans and Greeks were known to project what they saw as barbarian traits onto foreign peoples including not only druids but Jews and Christians as well, thereby confirming their own "cultural superiority" in their own minds.[32] Taking a similar opinion, Ronald Hutton summarized the evidence by stating that "the Greek and Roman sources for Druidry are not, as we have received them, of sufficiently good quality to make a clear and final decision on whether human sacrifice was indeed a part of their belief system."[33] Nora Chadwick, an expert in medieval Welsh and Irish literature, who believed the Druids to be great philosophers, has also supported the idea that they had not been involved in human sacrifice, and that such accusations were imperialist Roman propaganda.[34] National Geographic recently revealed evidence that "[suggests] that Druids possibly committed cannibalism and ritual human sacrifice." But Mark Horton, an archaeologist at the University of Bristol associated with these recent findings, states that if cannibalism was practised it was probably extremely rare; it may be evidence of increasing hunger and desperation as Roman invaders closed in, or even the result of battle atrocities.[35] Guy G. Stroumsa, as well as Thomas Hartwell Horne, states that these practices were eventually halted with the introduction and spread of Christianity in Europe, as well as in the Mediterranean region.[36][37]
Philosophy
Alexander Cornelius Polyhistor referred to the Druids as philosophers and called their doctrine of the immortality of the soul and reincarnation or metempsychosis "Pythagorean": "The Pythagorean doctrine prevails among the Gauls' teaching that the souls of men are immortal, and that after a fixed number of years they will enter into another body." Caesar remarks: "The principal point of their doctrine is that the soul does not die and that after death it passes from one body into another" (see metempsychosis). Caesar wrote:
With regard to their actual course of studies, the main object of all education is, in their opinion, to imbue their scholars with a firm belief in the indestructibility of the human soul, which, according to their belief, merely passes at death from one tenement to another; for by such doctrine alone, they say, which robs death of all its terrors, can the highest form of human courage be developed. Subsidiary to the teachings of this main principle, they hold various lectures and discussions on astronomy, on the extent and geographical distribution of the globe, on the different branches of natural philosophy, and on many problems connected with religion.
— Julius Caesar, De Bello Gallico, VI, 13
Diodorus Siculus, writing in 36 BCE, described how the druids followed "the Pythagorean doctrine", that human souls "are immortal and after a prescribed number of years they commence a new life in a new body."[38] In 1928, folklorist Donald A. Mackenzie speculated that Buddhist missionaries had been sent by the Indian king Ashoka.[39] Others have invoked common Indo-European parallels.[40] Caesar noted the druidic doctrine of the original ancestor of the tribe, whom he referred to as Dispater, or Father Hades.
Sources on druidism
Greek and Roman records
Druids Inciting the Britons to Oppose the Landing of the Romans – from Cassell's History of England, Vol. I – anonymous author and artists The earliest surviving literary evidence of the druids emerges from the classical world of Greece and Rome. The archaeologist Stuart Piggott compared the attitude of the Classical authors towards the druids as being similar to the relationship that had existed in the 15th and 18th centuries between Europeans and the societies that they were just encountering in other parts of the world, such as the Americas and the South Sea Islands. In doing so, he highlighted that both the attitude of the Early Modern Europeans and the Classical authors was that of "primitivism", viewing these newly encountered societies as primitive because of their lesser technological development and perceived backwardness in socio-political development.[41]
The historian Nora Chadwick, in a categorization subsequently adopted by Piggott, divided the Classical accounts of the druids into two groups, distinguished by their approach to the subject as well as their chronological contexts. She refers to the first of these groups as the "Posidonian" tradition after one of its primary exponents, Posidonious, and notes that it takes a largely critical attitude towards the Iron Age societies of Western Europe that emphasizes their "barbaric" qualities. The second of these two groups is termed the "Alexandrian" group, being centred on the scholastic traditions of Alexandria in Egypt; she notes that it took a more sympathetic and idealized attitude towards these foreign peoples.[42] Piggott drew parallels between this categorisation and the ideas of "hard primitivism" and "soft primitivism" identified by historians of ideas A.O. Lovejoy and Franz Boas.[43]
One school of thought within historical scholarship has suggested that all of these accounts are inherently unreliable, and might be entirely fictional. They have suggested that the idea of the druid might have been a fiction created by Classical writers to reinforce the idea of the barbaric "other" who existed beyond the civilized Greco-Roman world, thereby legitimising the expansion of the Roman Empire into these areas.[44]
The earliest record of the druids comes from two Greek texts of c. 300 BCE: one was a history of philosophy written by Sotion of Alexandria, and the other a study of magic that was widely albeit incorrectly[citation needed] attributed to Aristotle. These mention the existence of Druidas, or wise men belonging to the Keltois (Celts) and Galatias (the Galatians or the Gauls).[45] Both texts are now lost, but were quoted in the 2nd century CE work Vitae by Diogenes Laertius.[46]
Some say that the study of philosophy originated with the barbarians. In that among the Persians there existed the Magi, and among the Babylonians or Assyrians the Chaldaei, among the Indians the Gymnosophistae, and among the Celts and Gauls men who were called Druids and Semnothei, as Aristotle relates in his book on Magic, and Sotion in the twenty-third book of his Succession of Philosophers.
Subsequent Greek and Roman texts from the third century BCE refer to "barbarian philosophers",[48] possibly in reference to the Gaulish druids.
Julius Caesar
Julius Caesar, the Roman general and later dictator, who wrote the "fullest" and "earliest original text" to describe the druids.[45] The first known text that describes the druids is Julius Caesar's Commentarii de Bello Gallico, book VI, written in the 50s or 40s BCE. A military general who was intent on conquering Gaul and Britain, Caesar described the druids as being concerned with "divine worship, the due performance of sacrifices, private or public, and the interpretation of ritual questions." He claimed that they played an important part in Gaulish society, being one of the two respected classes along with the equites (in Rome the name for members of a privileged class above the common people, but also "horsemen") and that they performed the function of judges. He claimed that they recognized the authority of a single leader, who would rule until his death, when a successor would be chosen by vote or through conflict. He also remarked that they met annually at a sacred place in the region occupied by the Carnute tribe in Gaul, while they viewed Britain as the centre of druidic study; and that they were not found amongst the German tribes to the east of the Rhine. According to Caesar, many young men were trained to be druids, during which time they had to learn all the associated lore by heart. He also claimed their main teaching was "the souls do not perish, but after death pass from one to another". They were also concerned with "the stars and their movements, the size of the cosmos and the earth, the world of nature, and the powers of deities", indicating they were involved with not only such common aspects of religion as theology and cosmology, but also astronomy. Caesar also held that they were "administrators" during rituals of human sacrifice, for which criminals were usually used, and that the method was through burning in a wicker man.[22]
Although he had first-hand experience of Gaulish people, and therefore likely with druids, Caesar's account has been widely criticized by modern historians as inaccurate. One issue raised by such historians as Fustel de Coulanges[49] and Ronald Hutton was that while Caesar described the druids as a significant power within Gaulish society, he did not mention them even once in his accounts of his Gaulish conquests. Nor did Aulus Hirtius, who continued Caesar's account of the Gallic Wars following Caesar's death. Hutton believed that Caesar had manipulated the idea of the druids so they would appear both civilized (being learned and pious) and barbaric (performing human sacrifice) to Roman readers, thereby representing both "a society worth including in the Roman Empire" and one that required civilizing with Roman rule and values, thus justifying his wars of conquest.[50] Sean Dunham suggested that Caesar had simply taken the Roman religious functions of senators and applied them to the druids.[51] Daphne Nash believed it "not unlikely" that he "greatly exaggerates" both the centralized system of druidic leadership and its connection to Britain.[52]
Other historians have accepted that Caesar's account might be more accurate. Norman J. DeWitt surmised that Caesar's description of the role of druids in Gaulish society may report an idealized tradition, based on the society of the 2nd century BCE, before the pan-Gallic confederation led by the Arverni was smashed in 121 BCE, followed by the invasions of Teutones and Cimbri, rather than on the demoralized and disunited Gaul of his own time.[53] John Creighton has speculated that in Britain, the druidic social influence was already in decline by the mid-1st century BCE, in conflict with emergent new power structures embodied in paramount chieftains.[54] Other scholars see the Roman conquest itself as the main reason for the decline of druidism.[55] Archaeologist Miranda Aldhouse-Green (2010) asserted that Caesar offered both “our richest textual source” regarding the druids, and “one of the most reliable.” She defended the accuracy of his accounts by highlighting that while he may have embellished some of his accounts to justify Roman imperial conquest, it was “inherently unlikely” that he constructed a fictional class system for Gaul and Britain, particularly considering that he was accompanied by a number of other Roman senators who would have also been sending reports on the conquest to Rome, and who would have challenged his inclusion of serious falsifications.[44]
Cicero, Diodorus Siculus, Strabo and Tacitus
Crown of the "Deal Warrior", possibly worn by druids, 200–150 BCE, British Museum[56] It would not only be Caesar, but other Greco-Roman writers who would subsequently comment on the druids and their practices, although none of them would go into as much detail as he. Caesar's contemporary, Marcus Tullius Cicero, noted that he had met a Gallic druid, Divitiacus, who was a member of the Aedui tribe. Divitiacus supposedly knew much about the natural world and performed divination through augury.[4] Whether Diviaticus was genuinely a druid can however be disputed, for Caesar also knew this figure, and also wrote about him, calling him by the more Gaulish-sounding (and thereby presumably the more authentic) Diviciacus, but never referred to him as a druid and indeed presented him as a political and military leader.[57]
Another classical writer to take up describing the druids not too long after was Diodorus Siculus, who published this description in his Bibliotheca historicae in 36 BCE. Alongside the druids, or as he called them, drouidas, whom he viewed as philosophers and theologians, he also remarked how there were poets and singers in Celtic society whom he called bardous, or bards.[38] Such an idea was expanded on by Strabo, writing in the 20s CE, who declared that amongst the Gauls, there were three types of honoured figures: the poets and singers known as bardoi, the diviners and specialists in the natural world known as o'vateis, and those who studied "moral philosophy", the druidai.[58] Nonetheless, the accuracy of these writers has been brought into question, with Ronald Hutton stating that "All that can be concluded is that we have absolutely no secure knowledge of the sources used by any of these authors for their comments on Druids, and therefore of their date, their geographical framework or their accuracy."[59]
The Roman writer Tacitus, himself a senator and a historian, described how when the Roman army, led by Suetonius Paulinus, attacked the island of Mona (Anglesey, Ynys Môn in Welsh), the legionaries were awestruck on landing by the appearance of a band of druids, who, with hands uplifted to the sky, poured forth terrible imprecations on the heads of the invaders. He states that these "terrified our soldiers who had never seen such a thing before..." The courage of the Romans, however, soon overcame such fears, according to the Roman historian; the Britons were put to flight, and the sacred groves of Mona were cut down.[60] Tacitus is also the only primary source that gives accounts of druids in Britain, but maintains a hostile point of view, seeing them as ignorant savages.[61] Ronald Hutton meanwhile points out that there "is no evidence that Tacitus ever used eye-witness reports" and casts doubt upon the reliability of Tacitus's account of events.[62]
Irish and Welsh records
During the Middle Ages, after Ireland and Wales were Christianized, druids appeared in a number of written sources, mainly tales and stories such as the Táin Bó Cúailnge, but also in the hagiographies of various saints. These were all written by Christian monks, who, according to Ronald Hutton, "may not merely have been hostile to the earlier paganism but actually ignorant of it" and so would not have been particularly reliable, but at the same time may provide clues as to the practices of druids in Ireland, and to a lesser extent, Wales.[63]
Irish literature and law codes
The Irish passages referring to druids in such vernacular sources were "more numerous than those on the classical texts" of the Greeks and Romans, and paint a somewhat different picture of them. The druids in Irish literature—for whom words such as drui, draoi, drua and drai are used—are sorcerers with supernatural powers, who are respected in society, particularly for their ability to perform divination. They can cast spells and turn people into animals or stones, or curse peoples’ crops to be blighted. At the same time, the term druid is sometimes used to refer to any figure who uses magic, for instance in the Fenian Cycle, both giants and warriors are referred to as druids when they cast a spell, even though they are not usually referred to as such; as Ronald Hutton noted, in medieval Irish literature, "the category of Druid [is] very porous."[64]
When druids are portrayed in early Irish sagas and saints' lives set in the pre-Christian past of the island, they are usually accorded high social status. The evidence of the law-texts, which were first written down in the 7th and 8th centuries, suggests that with the coming of Christianity the role of the druid in Irish society was rapidly reduced to that of a sorcerer who could be consulted to cast spells or practise healing magic and that his standing declined accordingly.[65] According to the early legal tract Bretha Crólige, the sick-maintenance due to a druid, satirist and brigand (díberg) is no more than that due to a bóaire (an ordinary freeman). Another law-text, Uraicecht Becc (‘Small primer’), gives the druid a place among the dóer-nemed or professional classes which depend for their status on a patron, along with wrights, blacksmiths and entertainers, as opposed to the fili, who alone enjoyed free nemed-status.[66]
White people hater please. Ireland was originally Ariland also spelled Eireann which means "Land of the Aryans" you dumbass. Sorry the Druids have nothing to do with you or your people you stupid Black supremacist moron. Run along now don't you have some White children to torture Jantavanta???
Posts: 3257 | From: Madisonville, KY USA | Registered: Nov 2011
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quote:Originally posted by CelticWarrioress: Jantavanta,
White people hater please. Ireland was originally Ariland also spelled Eireann which means "Land of the Aryans" you dumbass. Sorry the Druids have nothing to do with you or your people you stupid Black supremacist moron. Run along now don't you have some White children to torture Jantavanta???
Albino lies and Bullsh1t!
Quotes from the Histories of Herodotus, circa 440 B.C.
The Medes:
Book 7 - POLYMNIA
[7.62] The Medes had exactly the same equipment as the Persians; and indeed the dress common to both is not so much Persian as Median. They had for commander Tigranes, of the race of the Achaemenids. These Medes were called anciently by all people Aryans; but when Media, the Colchian, came to them from Athens, they changed their name. Such is the account which they themselves give.
White child hating hypocrite. All you do is spout Black supremacist lies & bull **** along with maliciously & purposely trying to harm White children.
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