43 replies to this topic

[the L]

Also Druids did fight with curses and magic in battles but they only use melee weapon if you fight aginst other Druid. For example Caesar wrote that to become Arch druid you must won previous one in battle.


Nero in  60 AD sent general Gaius Suetonius Paulinus to island Anglesey with cca 20 000 soldiers. Thats were last big stong hold of Druids. Holy of holies. Their Jerusalem, their Varanasi, their Medina.
Paulinus attacked the island and then destroying the shrine and the sacred groves.
There they met man and woman fighting as well as Druids who were cursing and cast magic according to Tacitus.


Romans were supersticous. That was their psychological weapon. However Roman slaughtered them because they were military machine.
But they retreat because Boudica revolt who might me Druid herself. We dont know that. Maybe those two events are connected.
Romans took the island in 78 AD by Julius Agricola. Oral Bardic traditon continue in Irish and Welsh tradition. It was replaced by Christhianity.

[the L]

If moderators allow me I can upload cca 10 pictures about Celts in general so that you see visualy who were they. If not I will upload just this one.

[Clobhair-cean]

BBC had an excellent 1 hour radio programme about the Druids recently. It's pretty enlightening.

http://www.bbc.co.uk...rammes/b01mqq94

Edited by Clobhair-cean, 13 October 2012 - 10:24 PM.

[the L]

Clobhair-cean, on 13 October 2012 - 10:24 PM, said:

BBC had an excellent 1 hour radio programme about the Druids recently. It's pretty enlightening.

http://www.bbc.co.uk...rammes/b01mqq94

http://www.unexplain...howtopic=214221

I listen Melvyn from day one almost.


Also this


http://www.makeuseof...bscribe-listen/

[Abramelin]

I am not going to copy and paste, but here are some posts about druids in the Netherlands (Oera Linda Book thread):

http://www.unexplain...90#entry4196176

http://www.unexplain...75#entry4195893

[DieChecker]

Mordha, on 13 October 2012 - 01:06 PM, said:

This part I do know: Caeser noted that kings in Gaul could not act without the advice and consent of the Druids. So the Druids did have a sort of power behind the throne thing going for them. Destroy the Druids and replace the resulting power vacumn with the
accepted Roman state cults and the conquest is easier. This did work in Gaul and southern Britain.

I believe it was totally political. The druids backed the established rulers and insighted rebellion in the common people, therefore they had to be wiped out. Same happened with early Christianity. They would not recognize the authority of the Roman rulers and were often killed out of hand.

I do believe the Druids kept there religion through oral traditions so that it made them above the common people. It is why the Catholic church initially forbid the common people from having Bibles or even reading latin.

[LucidElement]

the L, on 13 October 2012 - 08:22 PM, said:

Also Druids did fight with curses and magic in battles but they only use melee weapon if you fight aginst other Druid. For example Caesar wrote that to become Arch druid you must won previous one in battle.


Nero in  60 AD sent general Gaius Suetonius Paulinus to island Anglesey with cca 20 000 soldiers. Thats were last big stong hold of Druids. Holy of holies. Their Jerusalem, their Varanasi, their Medina.
Paulinus attacked the island and then destroying the shrine and the sacred groves.
There they met man and woman fighting as well as Druids who were cursing and cast magic according to Tacitus.


Romans were supersticous. That was their psychological weapon. However Roman slaughtered them because they were military machine.
But they retreat because Boudica revolt who might me Druid herself. We dont know that. Maybe those two events are connected.
Romans took the island in 78 AD by Julius Agricola. Oral Bardic traditon continue in Irish and Welsh tradition. It was replaced by Christhianity.

How is it that they fought with magic?? Can you be more specific and what were the outcomes?? Thanks.

[LucidElement]

It still just interesting that we know so much about ancient civilizations, tribes, cultures etc. But, not the druids? Did they not play a vital roll in civilization during that time period? Why are they so hard to dig up information on??

[Clobhair-cean]

LucidElement, on 14 October 2012 - 07:55 AM, said:

It still just interesting that we know so much about ancient civilizations, tribes, cultures etc. But, not the druids? Did they not play a vital roll in civilization during that time period? Why are they so hard to dig up information on??

Basically because they represented a strictly oral culture and they didn't write anything down on principle.

LucidElement, on 14 October 2012 - 07:54 AM, said:

How is it that they fought with magic?? Can you be more specific and what were the outcomes?? Thanks.

They used curses and spells in the form of loud incantations. Of course, they did not work as curses or magic, but they were used as psychological weapons against the Romans with some success. Romans in general were very superstitious, and seeing a bunch of  people who were thought to have great powers doing magic-looking things in a battle must have caused them much distress.

[Tutankhaten-pasheri]

LucidElement, on 14 October 2012 - 07:55 AM, said:

It still just interesting that we know so much about ancient civilizations, tribes, cultures etc. But, not the druids? Did they not play a vital roll in civilization during that time period? Why are they so hard to dig up information on??

As Clobhair-cean has said, mostly because they left no written records. Though to go further, I would say, and probably stating the obvious, that the early Christians, when they gained power in Britain, and this would also be valid for all countries, vigorously supressed and contorted the old religions to such an extent that we really know hardly anything concrete about any of the old religions outside of Roman and Greek myth. For instance, if it were not for Snorri Sturlusen, we would know almost nothing about Norse paganism. What is really known of what people believed in Britain between Romans leaving and return of Christianty?, not much. Same as in Russia were the nature of the old gods was so totally twisted and supressed by Christians, that almost nothing is known that can be verified as fact. All that remains are names and what they were the god of. All else is conjecture from surving folk traditions, and such things are very unreliable as evidence. So Druids are not alone in that their true nature is almost unknown. Though perhaps the mystery is sometimes better than cold harsh facts. We know the reality was probably very mundane, but we rather like the modern fantasy about Druids.

[Mordha]

Abramelin, on 13 October 2012 - 07:17 PM, said:

The Bello Gallico describes the situation of a couple of decennia BCE, the Irish sources are from centuries later. Things may have changed during those centuries.

And Mordha, did those Irish druids physically take part in combat or in a war, or were they only present as advisers to the chieftains?

That is a good question with no easy answer. Many of the Irish druids mentioned in the texts have names suggesting warrior status, Cathbad = Battle-Slayer, and in most warrior cultures they did not hand out names like that for funsies.
We have to remember the texts were written by Christian monks with an eye to relegating the druids to demonic magician status, and at time doing a full Simon Magus on them. Only room for one power structure at a time.

[Armchair Educated]

Atentutankh-pasheri, on 13 October 2012 - 12:57 PM, said:

One of the biggest questions I have about them, is why the Romans hated them so strongly as to wipe them out almost entirely. Romans are known for assimilating  and tolerating other religions, providing the conquered people accepted Jupiter as supreme. Yet with the druids there seems something different about them that the Romans hated, or even feared? Perhaps druidism was more powerful in the minds of it's believers. Perhaps the Romans had some self awareness of short comings in their own essentially mundane state religion, and saw in druidism something potentially more powerful. Certainly the modern image is far more exciting, and enticing than boring old Jupiter.

The religious caste of the druids were also the ruling caste i thought

[LucidElement]

Clobhair-cean, on 14 October 2012 - 08:06 AM, said:

Basically because they represented a strictly oral culture and they didn't write anything down on principle.




They used curses and spells in the form of loud incantations. Of course, they did not work as curses or magic, but they were used as psychological weapons against the Romans with some success. Romans in general were very superstitious, and seeing a bunch of  people who were thought to have great powers doing magic-looking things in a battle must have caused them much distress.

Is their an article you could find for me? I would enjoy reading the success at times through psychological words to dismantle the romans at times.

[LucidElement]

I never knew druids were spread around the world world. I thought they were primary if not only Irish?

[Clobhair-cean]

LucidElement, on 16 October 2012 - 02:35 AM, said:

Is their an article you could find for me? I would enjoy reading the success at times through psychological words to dismantle the romans at times.

I don't know many articles, but this spell thing is mentioned in the radio programme I posted above. It also includes a list of books that should be worth checking out (I copy-paste them out for your convenience):

Miranda Aldhouse-Green, ‘Caesar's Druids: Archaeology of an Ancient Priesthood’ (Yale University Press, 2010)
Justin Champion, ‘Republican Learning: John Toland and the Crisis of Christian Culture’ (Manchester, 2009)
Barry Cunliffe, ‘Druids: A Very Short Introduction’ (Oxford University Press, 2010)
Miranda J. Green, ‘Exploring the World of the Druids’ (Thames and Hudson, 1997)
Michael Hunter, ‘John Aubrey and the Realm of Learning’ (Duckworth, 1975)
Ronald Hutton, ‘Blood and Mistletoe: The History of the Druids in Britain’ (Yale University Press, 2009)
Stuart Piggott, ‘Ancient Britons and the Antiquarian Imagination’ (Thames & Hudson, 1989)
Sam Smiles, ‘The Image of Antiquity: Ancient Britain and the Romantic Imagination’ (Yale, 1994)

LucidElement, on 16 October 2012 - 02:38 AM, said:

I never knew druids were spread around the world world. I thought they were primary if not only Irish?

Druids were spread around Europe, not the world. They seemed to be part of Celtic culture, which once covered most of the mainland, from Portugal to Ukraine and Turkey. We have evidence for them from Ireland, Britain and Gaul (France), but they might have been around in different places, though with the fragmented nature of Celtic culture, we might never know.

Actually, they seemed to have been stronger in Britain than in Ireland, but that might just be a distortion due to the fact that the Romans conquered Britain, but not Ireland and thus they left hardly any records of the latter.