It has long been thought that the word
‘Druid’ probably came from the Greek
drops, which means ‘oak’, therefore
suggesting that the Druids would be the priests
of the god or gods identified with the oak tree.
However, it may also be derived from the word
vid, meaning ‘to know’, which would lead one
to believe that the Druids were considered to be
the wise ones of the community.
The History of the Druids
While Druids are mentioned frequently in
ancient scripts, little is truly known of their way
of life because their traditions were principally
oral and yet secret. In their society they were
accepted as the teachers of moral philosophy and science; public and private disputes were
referred to them for arbitration. Their authority
was as much social as religious and they enjoyed many privileges, including in Gaul –
though not in Ireland – exemption from
military service and the payment of taxes.
Many received great honors.
There were three principal classes of Druids:
bards, prophets, and priests, although religious
teachers, judges, and civil administrators would
often also be Druids. They were adept at
understanding the movement of the planets,
the mysterious powers of plants and animals
, and the art of natural magic. It is for this last
reason that they could be considered the wise ones – that is, knowing nature
herself. They regarded the oak tree and the
mistletoe, especially when the latter grew on oak trees, with great awe, and usually held
their rituals in oak forests. These rituals seem
also to have been associated with stone circles
and other natural groves. The Druids were
often assisted by female prophets or sorcerers
who did not always enjoy the same powers and privileges.
From evidence unearthed in modern times, it
is thought that Celtic Druids may have been the linear descendants of the megalithic builders of
the late Neolithic and Bronze Age periods in Europe. The Druids were also educators, particularly of the nobility, and it is almost
certain that Merlin in the story of King Arthur, rather than being just a magician, was also a
Druid. Their instruction was very wide-ranging
and far-reaching. One component was the
learning by heart of a large quantity of verse,
which presumably meant that their memories
were honed at the same time as they learned the traditions of their calling and their community. When the Druidic tradition died
out in approximately the 1st to 3rd centuries
CE, largely as a result of ferocious Roman
oppression, their store of bardic sacred songs, prayers, rules of divination, and magic was lost.
Much of the information we have today comes
from translations made at a much later date,
often as late as the 13th century.
Julius Caesar noted that the Gauls held a
tradition that Druids were of British origin. He
had made as extensive a study as he could of the latters’ doctrine and concluded that the principal point was that the soul did not die
and that after death it passed from one body into another. Some Greek writers are said to have believed that the Druids had borrowed
this idea from the philosopher Pythagoras or one of his disciples.
Certainly, the Druids had a philosophy, but it
is more than likely that the belief in the
continuation of life arose as much from observation of the cyclical pattern of nature as
from anything else. They do not appear to have
feared death, regarding it simply as a transition
stage in the immortality of the soul. Indeed,
they sometimes seemed to have welcomed
death – particularly if it was a courageous one
– to the puzzlement of those who struggled to