A druid was a member of the high-ranking priestly class in ancient Celtic cultures. Druids were religious leaders as well as legal authorities, adjudicators, lorekeepers, medical professionals and political advisors. Druids left no written accounts. While they were reported to have been literate, they are believed to have been prevented by doctrine from recording their knowledge in written form. Their beliefs and practices are attested in some detail by their contemporaries from other cultures, such as the Romans and the Greeks.
The earliest known references to the druids date to the 4th century BCE. They were described by other Roman writers such as Cicero, Tacitus, and Pliny the Elder. Following the Roman invasion of Gaul, the druid orders were suppressed by the Roman government under the 1st-century CE emperors Tiberius and Claudius, and 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." The druids appear in some of the medieval tales from Christianized Ireland like "Táin Bó Cúailnge", where they are largely portrayed as sorcerers who opposed the coming of Christianity. 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.
Societal role and training
The Greco-Roman and the vernacular Irish sources agree that the druids played an important part in pagan Celtic society. In his description, Julius Caesar wrote 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 Gallic, British, and Irish societies.
Two other classical writers, Diodorus Siculus and Strabo, wrote about the role of druids in Gallic society, stating that the druids were held in such respect that if they intervened between two armies they could stop the battle.
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. 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, the Gauls had a written language in which they used Greek letters. In this he probably draws on earlier writers; by the time of Caesar, Gaulish inscriptions had moved from Greek script to Latin script.
Philosophy
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 the stars and their movement, on the extent and geographical distribution of the earth, on the different branches of natural philosophy, and on many problems connected with religion.
- Julius Caesar
Druids in mythology
Druids play a prominent role in Irish folklore, generally serving lords and kings as high ranking priest-counselors with the gift of prophecy and other assorted mystical abilities – the best example of these possibly being Cathbad. The chief druid in the court of King Conchobar mac Nessa of Ulster, Cathbad features in several tales, most of which detail his ability to foretell the future. In the tale of Deirdre of the Sorrows – the foremost tragic heroine of the Ulster Cycle – the druid prophesied before the court of Conchobar that Deirdre would grow up to be very beautiful, and that kings and lords would go to war over her, much blood would be shed because of her, and Ulster's three greatest warriors would be forced into exile for her sake. This prophecy, ignored by the king, came true.
The greatest of these mythological druids was Amergin Glúingel, a bard and judge for the Milesians featured in the Mythological Cycle. The Milesians were seeking to overrun the Tuatha Dé Danann and win the land of Ireland but, as they approached, the druids of the Tuatha Dé Danann raised a magical storm to bar their ships from making landfall. Thus Amergin called upon the spirit of Ireland itself, chanting a powerful incantation that has come to be known as The Song of Amergin and, eventually (after successfully making landfall), aiding and dividing the land between his royal brothers in the conquest of Ireland, earning the title Chief Ollam of Ireland.
Female druids
Irish mythology has a number of female druids, often sharing similar prominent cultural and religious roles with their male counterparts. The Irish have several words for female druids, such as bandruí ("woman-druid"), found in tales such as Táin Bó Cúailnge; Bodhmall, featured in the Fenian Cycle, and one of Fionn mac Cumhaill's childhood caretakers; and Tlachtga, daughter of the druid Mug Ruith who, according to Irish tradition, is associated with the Hill of Ward, site of prominent festivals held in Tlachtga's honour during the Middle Ages.
According to classical authors, the Gallizenae (or Gallisenae) were virgin priestesses of the Île de Sein off Pointe du Raz, Finistère, western Brittany. Their existence was first mentioned by the Greek geographer Artemidorus Ephesius and later by the Greek historian Strabo, who wrote that their island was forbidden to men, but the women came to the mainland to meet their husbands. Which deities they honored is unknown. According to Pomponius Mela, the Gallizenae acted as both councilors and practitioners of the healing arts.
History of reception
In the Gallic Wars of 58–51 BC, the Roman army, led by Julius Caesar, conquered the many tribal chiefdoms of Gaul, and annexed it as a part of the Roman Republic. According to accounts produced in the following centuries, the new rulers of Roman Gaul subsequently introduced measures to wipe out the druids from that country. According to Pliny the Elder, writing in the 70s CE, it was the emperor Tiberius (ruled 14–37 CE), who introduced laws banning not only druid practices, and other native soothsayers and healers.
The best evidence of a druidic tradition in the British Isles is the independent cognate of the Celtic *druwid- in Insular Celtic: The Old Irish druídecht survives in the meaning of 'magic', and the Welsh dryw in the meaning of 'seer'.
While the druids as a priestly caste were extinct with the Christianization of Wales, complete by the 7th century at the latest, the offices of bard and of "seer" (Welsh: dryw) persisted in medieval Wales into the 13th century.
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3rd of June, eh? Do you dislike acknowledging Julius Caesar? And does this mean you don't recognize August either?
you posted in the last one like a few minutes ago so i just added you, i can remove you if you want
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America is so cooked....just saw a Twitter thread of blue check fascists call breastfeeding "sexual abuse of a child." This is what puritanism gets you I guess.
Biggs update: Biggs is chuffing the fattest dart I've ever seen and insists on being called a "Hempster" instead of a hamster now
Officially unemployed 😕
Beat Ascension 20 Slay the Spire for the first time 😃
Don't forget to enjoy sitting in the sunlight every now and then
And you should use this time to get REALLY swole
Sun is hot, curtained room is nice and cool
Def want to take better care of myself though
Yea the sun is hot, just like embrace the sweat life, let its radiance fill you and just feel yourself roast. Don't forget to flip so you cook evenly. Then every now and then smoke a bowl + hose yourself off or jump in a pool. This is the unemployment dream, I'm telling you
It's so funny that Obama destroyed the idea that change is possible, and thus hope in the process, when that was his entire campaign slogan. Honestly, if I were religious, I would buy the claim that he is the anti-christ.
I want to get drunk but I have nobody to get drunk with anymore and doing it by myself would be sad :sicko-wistful:
physical limitations are so frustrating. bring on the cybernetic implants or super soldier serum or whatever.
We gotta do communism first so they aren't purely a luxury of the elite but otherwise yes totally agree
If elon was cool he would've cut off his arm and gotten the most high tech robot arm ever
If you set off fireworks tomorrow I'll be so goddamn mad I'll break into your house and paint furry porn on your walls
Why is it socially acceptable to shit on people who say sorry often? People constantly give me shit for the way I talk and I'm sick of it, I just apologize often and I don't see why that should be worthy of so much criticism, it's just the kind of person I am
It's not healthy to be the secret lefty in fringe right-wing/"edgy" communities, is it? I have a long history of boldly and suddenly wokeposting in such places to watch how these people react to seeing a fellow chan-esque poster suddenly sounding like a Marxist. These people are often starved for friendship, and I am a friendly guy with a lot of experience existing in chud spaces. It gives me a weird comfort seeing how often these Gary the Cryptofascist types will relent and agree in order to stay on good terms with me. But then I see how they post otherwise and I am repulsed by their naked hatred. It can't be healthy.
I want a steam deck
But not financially responsible
Plus my college laptop is getting old
And I already spent a lot of money on my desktop this past winter
Truly, the demiurge has cursed me to live in a tortured, imperfect world
Today is Belarus' independence day! July 3rd is the day Minsk was liberated by the Soviet Union in WWII. Belarus is the only post Soviet country to not celebrate it's "independence" from the USSR.