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Druidry 101

Basic Study of Druidry

Table of Contents

  • Celtic Society & Druids
  • The Original Druids
  • Druids in Celtic Mythology
  • Druids as Teachers and Diviners
  • Druids as Healers
  • Druids as Counselors
  • Druids as Mediators
  • Druids as Magicians
  • Druids Today
  • Druid Cosmology
  • The Three Realms
  • Pillars of Druidry
  • The Celtic Nations
  • Celtic Society
  • History of the Celts
  • Sources of Druidic Information
  • Human Sacrifice
  • Druidic Misconceptions
  • Druidic Symbols
  • Druidic Ritual Tools
  • Druidic Gods and Goddesses
  • Holidays and Festivals
  • A little History of Ogham
  • Sacred Animals
  • Witchcraft & Wicca
  • Arthurian Druidsm
  • Celtic Christianity
  • Romantic Druidism
  • Song of Amergin
  • Awen - the Holy Spirit of Druidry
  • Interview with a Yew Tree
  • Other Resources
  • Recommended Reading

Introduction

This class will explore the world of the druid by examining what we know of the ancient druids and the culture of druidry today. It is important to note that the organizations of druids are generally not as organized in terms of creeds and beliefs as other pagan and neo-pagan traditions such as Wicca. The information presented here may not represent the beliefs of all individuals who title themselves as druids. Instead, we aim to learn of the generalities, not the specifics. There is no single source of information such as the Christian Bible nor are there central creeds expressed specifically such as Wicca’s Charge of the God and Goddess. Instead there are fragments of epic poems recorded by Christian monks who were trying to conquer the Druidic culture. The contempt these sources had for the druids make their accounts suspect by default. A few other scattered samples of observations about the Druidic culture as it stood in the Celtic nations of old.

Today’s druidry is much the same. There are not central doctrines. There are general themes but even these may vary from group to group and organization to organization. There are several modern druidic organizations. These can be best explained by labeling them as denominations of druidry. These denominations make reference to various sources of ancient druidry and often interpret the information gathered there very differently. This will be discussed later in the class.

For now, understand that there is little that is known of the ancient druids that is historically accurate. Anyone claiming to have a direct lineage to the original ancient druids that walked the earth shortly after the erection of Stonehenge is probably yanking your chain.

Also, it should be noted that the vast majority of this document is text directly borrowed from the books, websites and articles listed in the Sources section of this handout.

Celtic Society and Druids – Source 1

The Druids were the wise men and women of the Celtic peoples. So before we describe the Druids let us describe the Celts.
From about 1800 BCE on, a new cultural impulse flowed across northern Europe. It descended from Indo-European roots, and brought with it new technologies especially in metal-working. Its people spoke the family of languages known as ‘Celtic.’ By the first millennium BCE (the Iron Age), this culture dominated central and western Europe. The evidence suggests that this domination did not occur forcibly, but by a process of slow assimilation with the earlier peoples. It is likely that the older Native European Tradition in its shamanic form continued in an unbroken line into this, the Celtic period. /

A specifically "Celtic" style appeared in central Europe as early as 1200 BCE with the advent of the Hallstatt Culture. The development of this culture was influenced by the control of trade routes. This culture declined after 600 BCE, but there arose from it a new and vigorous impulse known as La Tène. These peoples, composed of many different tribes, had contacts with the raw material hungry Mediterranean world. Through this trade they became wealthy and populations expanded. By 400 BCE large groups were migrating east and southwards. Celtic Gauls sacked Rome in 390 BCE, while other tribes moved eastwards, occupied the Danube area and threatened Greece. In the third century BCE, Celtic culture was at its peak. Although still extremely diverse, the many tribes shared the exquisite artistic traditions of La Tène. They possessed a similar social structure, they were able to understand each other, and an immense wealth flowed between them in the form of ideas, stories, myths, laws, values, wine, weapons and trade goods.

By the fourth and third centuries BCE, urban centers and social stratification increased. Charismatic men, and sometimes women, gained power through control of trade and resources with the support of a warrior elite. Some of these centres verged on statehood, with cities, ”national“ boundaries and sanctuaries, nobility and kings, and several classes of subjects. The wise men and women comprised one of these classes. They gathered around the halls of the aristocracy to supply their needs. Their functions included entertainment and genealogy - music, songs, the telling of stories and poems, especially those that praised the exploits of the ruler and his warriors. They provided the old shamanic functions such as herbalism, healing, divination, sooth-saying, and dream-interpretation, but took them in a new direction to serve the needs of the more complex society. These people were the Druids.

By the end of the first century BCE, Celtic society was crumbling before the power of Rome. Resistance in Gaul was at an end, and Julius Caesar had already launched the first invasion of Britain. With the second, Claudian invasion of Britain, the Druids were singled out and massacred. The Romans deliberately undermined Druid leadership and power among the conquered Celtic peoples. But in the long occupation of Britain that followed, 43 - 410 CE, local Celtic practices merged with Roman to produce a synthesis that did maintain many ancient customs - they were both, after all, pagan.

Pressure from the east finally ended both the Roman Empire and Celtic society. Nomadic tribes from the Caucasian steppes invaded Europe in the fourth century CE, and lack of space forced the Germanic and Scandinavian peoples west. The Angles, Jutes and Saxons defeated the newly independent Celts of Britain, and drove them into Wales, Brittany and the never-defeated Celtic fastnesses of Ireland, Scotland and the Isles. It is unlikely that the Druids ever staged a comeback at this time. The tales of King Arthur and Merlin represent what might have been if the Celts had been successful in defeating the Northmen. Christianity followed hard upon the heels of the Germanic invaders, and challenged any remaining Druids. Druid Brehon law however prevailed in Ireland until the Cromwellian invasions. These forces irrevocably changed the face of Celtic culture forever.

In summary, ‘Celts’ was the name given to the European tribes north of the Mediterranean by the Greeks and Romans. This covered an extremely diverse group of peoples none of whom called themselves by this name. ‘Celtic’ was adopted by linguists to refer to the family of languages of Indo-European origin spoken across a broad area of Europe and introduced there from as early as 2000 BCE. ‘Celtic’ was later used by historians to describe the cultural impulse that began in central Europe (Hallstat) before 1000 BCE, and achieved its full flowering with the La Tène era after about 500 BCE. This culture (with the virtue of combining all the above definitions) developed towns, and a highly centralized, hierarchical and socially stratified society. Its features included classes of nobles, priests, warriors, craftsmen and farmers, characteristic of its Indo-European origins. Growth depended upon trade with the Mediterranean world, and for many centuries the Graeco-Roman world mirrored the Celtic and vice-versa. The Druid class grew in response to these social developments and, like the priests of Etruria and Rome, largely served the warrior class and nobles.

Since the conquest by Rome, Celtic or Gaelic-speaking culture only remained on the northern and western fringes of Europe, but has had an enormous effect on the Western world, especially in North America. This is the Celtic diaspora, a rich and varied culture that is giving rise to Druidry again today.

The Original Druids – Source 1

After about 500 BCE, in the northern and western part of the patchwork quilt of Celtic Europe, wise men and women emerged as the Druids. They came from out of the old, indigenous, shamanic worldview. The Druids organized knowledge, passed it on through oral tradition, and served the political, social and spiritual needs of the people. The primary purpose of this emerging class of scholars and bards was to nourish the soul of the tribe and people. They did this by venerating the ancestors and spirits of place, and by supplying words to an increasingly sophisticated society so it could describe and think about itself. The Druids told and remembered the stories, songs and myths. They knew the ancestries, the prophecies, the pledges, treaties, alliances, and the legal codes. /

Increasingly they had to organize, to systematize and pass on this growing body of knowledge. They became arbitrators, lawyers and judges. They were advisors to the kings, negotiating alliances, making prophecies, describing the law. They became teachers, and took into their schools children who showed skill in any of the branches of learning. And as the poets and bards, they praised and celebrated the achievements of their nobles, their champions and their tribe.

The organization of the Druids had a price. It meant that they no longer participated in the grass-roots level of society where traditional shamanism continued to thrive. There was a distinction, but not a split between Druidry and shamanism. At best they complemented and recognized the strengths and weaknesses of each other. A further distinction was that the Druids, serving the elite, became increasingly male-dominated, while women continued to serve the needs of the far-greater body of the common population.

The name, Druid, may have applied to any woman or man wise in the native tradition of their ancestors. The herbalist, the midwife, the seer, the storyteller, may all have been called druids, generically meaning "truthful," "firm" as a tree is firm, or "wise ones." The training of most Druids began on the grass-roots level, and many would have remained there, serving the land, the tribe and people. Only a few went on into the service of the king or clan chief, and there they established schools and selected the pupils who would be their successors.

By the time the Romans conquered Gaul and Britain, circa 0 B.C.E., a distinction had arisen between Druids who advised the nobility, and local practitioners, mostly women, who birthed babies and cast spells. The latter who provided cradle-to-grave magical care were to become known as witches and sorcerers. The Romans set about systematically exterminating all organized Druidic practice, while it is likely that the "hedge-row" witches with their ancient shamanistic roots survived.

Early Irish literature uses "witch" and "Druid" in a similar way. Both are men and women, with more Druids being men, especially in the royal courts. The stories list shape-changing, illusion-making and weather-craft as the particular skills of the witches. Both witches and Druids were oriented to nature and had reverence for the ancestors. This was all part of the flavour of pagan spirituality at the time. The negative connotation of "witch" derives from later Christian transcribers of the early Irish texts and subsequently, the Inquisition.

In summary, the Druids codified and developed the knowledge of the Celtic branch of the Native European Tradition. They organized traditional knowledge, taught it in schools, and served the needs of a complex, growing society. Druids were exterminated to the extent that no-one can claim to have received anything in a direct line from Celtic times to this time. Although the context in which Druidry operated is now entirely lost, the early literature of Ireland and Wales contains records of their work. Such material has to be treated cautiously as it contains many overlays, interpretations and omissions. On the other hand, some witches and folk tradition survived. Despite persecution they have handed down some of the ancient ways to the present day. Folk tradition, however, was not organized to the philosophical level of Druidry and fulfilled a different social need.

Druids in Celtic Mythology – Source 1

Early Celtic myths and legends are full of things called Druid spears, Druid cloaks, Druid wands, rods, spells, songs, harps and other instruments that seem to be in the preserve of almost everyone. Just about anyone could apply "Druid herbs," and some who are obviously not Druids have access to "Druid wands." At times the sources use "Druid" as a catch-all description for anything mysterious, especially if it comes from the fairy world. In ‘The Fate of the Children of Lir’, for example, both Aoife and Bodb Dearg of the fairy race use "Druid rods" to effect transformations. In ‘Dairmuid and Grania,’ Angus Óg of the Sidhe of Brú na Boinne uses a "Druid cloak" to conceal and help Grania fly away from several entrapments. This frequent use of the word "Druid" probably entered the texts during the Christian era. Apart from this usage, there is another class of Druid descriptions that refer to specific Druids, often named, who feature in the stories. These descriptions are of special interest as they are likely to have originated in the pre-Christian era

Druids as Teachers and Diviners – Source 1

Cathbad ‘the Wise’ foretells the fate of Cuchulainn and gives him his name in the ‘Boyhood Deeds of Cuchulainn.’ He combines this role with that of a teacher. It is likely Cathbad was divining from the stars.One day, Cathbad the Druid was in his house...teaching Druid lore to many studious men, and a pupil asked him what the day would be lucky for. ”The man who takes up arms today or mounts his first chariot today will have his name enduring for ever in Ireland with his mighty deeds,“ Cathbad said. ”But his life will be short.“

The ‘Fate of the Sons of Usnach’ makes the role of the Druid as teacher especially clear. The woman-Druid, Levorcham, is not only an herbalist, astronomer and natural scientist, diviner and dream interpreter, but also a poet.

Deirdre was raised in a remote place so that none should see her until she was ready to be the wife of the king of Ulster. Only her foster parents were allowed to be with her, and the old woman Levorcham, a satirist, to whom nothing could be refused. Deirdre grew up straight and clean like the rush on the moor, her movements were like the swan on the wave or the deer on the hill. She was the woman of the greatest beauty and the gentlest and kindest nature in all the provinces of Ireland. Levorcham taught her every skill and knowledge that she had herself. There was not an herb on the ground or a star in the heaven or a bird in the wood that Deirdre did not know the name of, and besides these skills Levorcham taught her the Druid crafts of poetry, dreaming and seeing.

Druids as Healers – Source 1

There are many references in the texts that describe Druids as herbalists and healers. The following extract is typical. The great epic known as the Táin Bó Cúailnge, 'The Cattle Raid of Cooley,' has as its centerpiece the combat between Cuchulainn and Ferdiad. After a day of fighting the heroes break off for the night:
Cuchulainn and Ferdiad threw their spears into the arms of their charioteers, and came up to each other and put their arms around the other and exchanged three kisses.
/

Their horses passed that night in the same enclosure, and the charioteers shared the same fire and they made up beds of rushes for the wounded men.Druids came and put healing herbs in Cuchulainn’s wounds, but they could do little but chant spells and lay magic amulets on them to staunch the spurts of blood for the deepness of the wounds.

Druids as Counselors – Source 1

The Druids had immense authority in the great houses, and their word was law. Sencha ‘the Great,’ could "pacify the men of the world with his three fair words." This account of Sencha at work is from ‘Bricriu’s Feast.’