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108-491: A menhir ( / ˈ m ɛ n h ɪər / ; from Brittonic languages : maen or men , "stone" and hir or hîr , "long"), standing stone , orthostat , or lith is a large upright stone , emplaced in the ground by humans, typically dating from the European middle Bronze Age . They can be found individually as monoliths , or as part of a group of similar stones. Menhirs' size can vary considerably, but they often taper toward

216-599: A "plausible vector for the spread of early Celtic languages into Britain". There was much less inward migration during the Iron Age, so it is likely that Celtic reached Britain before then. Barry Cunliffe suggests that a Goidelic branch of Celtic may already have been spoken in Britain, but that this middle Bronze Age migration would have introduced the Brittonic branch. Brittonic languages were probably spoken before

324-473: A Celtic word that might mean 'painted ones' or 'tattooed folk', referring to body decoration. Knowledge of the Brittonic languages comes from a variety of sources. The early language's information is obtained from coins, inscriptions, and comments by classical writers as well as place names and personal names recorded by them. For later languages, there is information from medieval writers and modern native speakers, together with place names. The names recorded in

432-673: A band of druids, who, with hands uplifted to the sky, poured forth terrible imprecations on the heads of the invaders. He says 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. Tacitus is also the only primary source that gives accounts of druids in Britain, but portrays them negatively, as ignorant savages. In

540-544: 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 calls the first of these groups 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

648-595: A common ancestral language termed Brittonic , British , Common Brittonic , Old Brittonic or Proto-Brittonic , which is thought to have developed from Proto-Celtic or early Insular Celtic by the 6th century BC. A major archaeogenetics study uncovered a migration into southern Britain in the middle to late Bronze Age , during the 500-year period 1,300–800 BC. The newcomers were genetically most similar to ancient individuals from Gaul . During 1,000–875 BC, their genetic markers swiftly spread through southern Britain, but not northern Britain. The authors describe this as

756-428: A discussion, see Celtic languages .) Other major characteristics include: Initial s- : Lenition: Voiceless spirants: Nasal assimilation: The family tree of the Brittonic languages is as follows: Brittonic languages in use today are Welsh , Cornish and Breton . Welsh and Breton have been spoken continuously since they formed. For all practical purposes Cornish died out during the 18th or 19th century, but

864-406: 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

972-553: 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,

1080-543: A prescribed number of years they commence a new life in a new body". In 1928, the folklorist Donald A. Mackenzie speculated that Buddhist missionaries had been sent by the Indian king Ashoka . Caesar noted the druidic doctrine that the original ancestor of the tribe was the god that he referred to as " Dispater ", which means "Father Dis". Diogenes Laertius , in the 3rd century CE, wrote that "Druids make their pronouncements by means of riddles and dark sayings, teaching that

1188-480: A professor of archaeology at Cardiff University, has noted that Suetonius's army would have passed very near the site while travelling to deal with Boudicca , and postulates that the sacrifice may have been connected. A 1996 discovery of a skeleton that was buried with advanced medical and possibly divinatory equipment has, however, been nicknamed the " Druid of Colchester ". An excavated burial in Deal, Kent discovered

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1296-553: A progressive aspect form has evolved which is formally similar to those found in Celtic languages, and somewhat less similar to the Modern English form, e.g. 'I am working' is Ich bin am Arbeiten , literally: 'I am on the working'. The same structure is also found in modern Dutch ( Ik ben aan het werk ), alongside other structures (e.g. Ik zit te werken , lit. 'I sit to working'). These parallel developments suggest that

1404-738: A revival in Cornish has led to an increase in speakers of that language. Cumbric and Pictish are extinct, having been replaced by Goidelic and Anglic speech. The Isle of Man and Orkney may also have originally spoken a Brittonic language, but this was later supplanted by Goidelic on the Isle of Man and Norse on Orkney. There is also a community of Brittonic language speakers in Y Wladfa (the Welsh settlement in Patagonia ). The names "Brittonic" and "Brythonic" are scholarly conventions referring to

1512-571: A revival movement has more recently created small numbers of new speakers. Also notable are the extinct language Cumbric , and possibly the extinct Pictish . One view, advanced in the 1950s and based on apparently unintelligible ogham inscriptions, was that the Picts may have also used a non- Indo-European language. This view, while attracting broad popular appeal, has virtually no following in contemporary linguistic scholarship. The modern Brittonic languages are generally considered to all derive from

1620-897: A study of magic widely attributed to Aristotle . Both texts are now lost, but are quoted in the 2nd century CE work Vitae by Diogenes Laërtius . 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

1728-432: Is a far greater overlap in terms of Celtic vocabulary than with English, it is not always possible to disentangle P- and Q-Celtic words. However, some common words such as monadh = Welsh mynydd , Cumbric monidh are particularly evident. The Brittonic influence on Scots Gaelic is often indicated by considering Irish language usage, which is not likely to have been influenced so much by Brittonic. In particular,

1836-509: Is also unknown. It is known, however, that they buried their dead and had the skills to grow crops, farm and make pottery, stone tools and jewelry. Identifying the purpose or use of menhirs remains speculative. Until recently, standing stones were associated with the Beaker people , who inhabited Europe during the European late Neolithic and early Bronze Age —later third millennium BC, c.  2800 –1800 BC. However, recent research into

1944-757: Is associated with the Hill of Ward , site of prominent festivals held in Tlachtga's honour during the Middle Ages . Biróg , another bandruí of the Tuatha Dé Danann , plays a key role in an Irish folktale where the Fomorian warrior Balor attempts to thwart a prophecy foretelling that he would be killed by his own grandson by imprisoning his only daughter Eithne in the tower of Tory Island , away from any contact with men. Bé Chuille (daughter of

2052-488: Is no more than that which is 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 upon a patron for their status, along with wrights, blacksmiths, and entertainers, as opposed to the fili , who alone enjoyed free nemed -status. While druids featured prominently in many medieval Irish sources, they were far rarer in their Welsh counterparts. Unlike

2160-561: Is probable that at the start of the Post-Roman period, Common Brittonic was differentiated into at least two major dialect groups – Southwestern and Western. (Additional dialects have also been posited, but have left little or no evidence, such as an Eastern Brittonic spoken in what is now the East of England .) Between the end of the Roman occupation and the mid-6th century, the two dialects began to diverge into recognizably separate varieties,

2268-530: Is termed the "Alexandrian" group, being centred on the scholastic traditions of Alexandria , Egypt ; she notes that it took a more sympathetic and idealized attitude toward these foreign peoples. 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 . One school of thought has suggested that all of these accounts are inherently unreliable, and might be entirely fictional. They have suggested that

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2376-643: Is the only ancient author drawing the association between oaks and druids and the intensifying modifier sense of the first element fits better with other similar compounds attested in Old Irish ( suí 'sage, wise man' < *su-wid-s 'good knower', duí 'idiot, fool' < *du-wid-s 'bad knower', ainb 'ignorant' < *an-wid-s 'not-knower'). The two elements go back to the Proto-Indo-European roots *deru- and *weid- "to see". Both Old Irish druí and Middle Welsh dryw could refer to

2484-409: Is the origin of Derwent, Darent, and Darwen (attested in the Roman period as Deru̯entiō ). The final root to be examined is went/uent . In Roman Britain, there were three tribal capitals named U̯entā (modern Winchester, Caerwent, and Caistor St Edmunds), whose meaning was 'place, town'. Some, including J. R. R. Tolkien , have argued that Celtic has acted as a substrate to English for both

2592-457: Is traceable to Brittonic influence. Others, however, find this unlikely since many of these forms are only attested in the later Middle English period; these scholars claim a native English development rather than Celtic influence. Ian G. Roberts postulates Northern Germanic influence, despite such constructions not existing in Norse. Literary Welsh has the simple present Caraf = 'I love' and

2700-425: Is used, with peul meaning "stake" or "post" and van which is a soft mutation of the word maen which means "stone". In Germany and Scandinavia the word Bauta is used (e.g., de:Bautastein and no:bautastein ) and this occasionally makes its way into English with the term "bauta stone". Almost nothing is known of the social organization or religious beliefs of the people who erected the menhirs. Their language

2808-556: The Historia Augusta , Alexander Severus received a prophecy about his death from a Gallic druidess ( druiada ). The work also has Aurelian questioning druidesses about the fate of his descendants, to which they answered in favor of Claudius II . Flavius Vopiscus is also quoted as recalling a prophecy received by Diocletian from a druidess of the Tungri . The earliest surviving literary evidence of druids emerges from

2916-727: The Celtic languages of Britain and to the ancestral language they originated from, designated Common Brittonic , in contrast to the Goidelic languages originating in Ireland. Both were created in the 19th century to avoid the ambiguity of earlier terms such as "British" and "Cymric". "Brythonic" was coined in 1879 by the Celticist John Rhys from the Welsh word Brython . "Brittonic", derived from " Briton " and also earlier spelled "Britonic" and "Britonnic", emerged later in

3024-596: The Coligny calendar , with druidic culture. Nonetheless, some archaeologists have attempted to link certain discoveries with written accounts of the druids. The archaeologist Anne Ross linked what she believed to be evidence of human sacrifice in Celtic pagan society (such as the Lindow Man bog body) to the Greco-Roman accounts of human sacrifice being officiated-over by the druids. Miranda Aldhouse-Green –

3132-639: The Iron Age and Roman period . In the 5th and 6th centuries emigrating Britons also took Brittonic speech to the continent, most significantly in Brittany and Britonia . During the next few centuries, in much of Britain the language was replaced by Old English and Scottish Gaelic , with the remaining Common Brittonic language splitting into regional dialects, eventually evolving into Welsh , Cornish , Breton , Cumbric , and probably Pictish . Welsh and Breton continue to be spoken as native languages, while

3240-643: The Medieval Latin lingua Britannica and sermo Britannicus and the Welsh Brythoneg . Some writers use "British" for the language and its descendants, although, due to the risk of confusion, others avoid it or use it only in a restricted sense. Jackson, and later John T. Koch , use "British" only for the early phase of the Common Brittonic language. Before Jackson's work, "Brittonic" and "Brythonic" were often used for all

3348-738: The P-Celtic languages , including not just the varieties in Britain but those Continental Celtic languages that similarly experienced the evolution of the Proto-Celtic language element /kʷ/ to /p/ . However, subsequent writers have tended to follow Jackson's scheme, rendering this use obsolete. The name "Britain" itself comes from Latin : Britannia~Brittania , via Old French Bretaigne and Middle English Breteyne , possibly influenced by Old English Bryten[lond] , probably also from Latin Brittania , ultimately an adaptation of

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3456-591: The Roman Empire " and one that required civilizing with Roman rule and values, thus justifying his wars of conquest. Sean Dunham suggested that Caesar had simply taken the Roman religious functions of senators and applied them to the druids. Daphne Nash believed it "not unlikely" that he "greatly exaggerates" both the centralized system of druidic leadership and its connection to Britain. Other historians have accepted that Caesar's account might be more accurate. Norman J. DeWitt surmised that Caesar's description of

3564-498: The wren , possibly connected with an association of that bird with augury in Irish and Welsh tradition (see also Wren Day ). Sources by ancient and medieval writers provide an idea of the religious duties and social roles involved in being a druid. 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

3672-415: The " Deal Warrior "– a man who was buried at around 200–150 BCE with a sword and shield, and wearing an almost unique head-band, which is too thin to be part of a leather helmet. The crown is bronze with a broad band around the head, and a thin strip that crosses the top of the head horizontally. Since traces of hair were left on the metal, it must have been worn without any padding beneath it. The form of

3780-712: The 19th century. "Brittonic" became more prominent through the 20th century, and was used in Kenneth H. Jackson 's highly influential 1953 work on the topic, Language and History in Early Britain . Jackson noted by that time that "Brythonic" had become a dated term: "of late there has been an increasing tendency to use Brittonic instead." Today, "Brittonic" often replaces "Brythonic" in the literature. Rudolf Thurneysen used "Britannic" in his influential A Grammar of Old Irish , although this never became popular among subsequent scholars. Comparable historical terms include

3888-467: The 4th century BC. The oldest detailed description comes from Julius Caesar 's Commentarii de Bello Gallico (50s 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

3996-496: The 5th century through the settlement of Irish-speaking Gaels and Germanic peoples . Henry of Huntingdon wrote c.  1129 that Pictish was "no longer spoken". The displacement of the languages of Brittonic descent was probably complete in all of Britain except Cornwall , Wales , and the English counties bordering these areas such as Devon , by the 11th century. Western Herefordshire continued to speak Welsh until

4104-563: The 7th century onward and are possibly due to inherent tendencies. Thus the concept of a Common Brittonic language ends by AD 600. Substantial numbers of Britons certainly remained in the expanding area controlled by Anglo-Saxons , but over the fifth and sixth centuries they mostly adopted the Old English language and culture. The Brittonic languages spoken in what are now Scotland , the Isle of Man , and England began to be displaced in

4212-871: The Brittonic languages were displaced is that of toponyms (place names) and hydronyms (names of rivers and other bodies of water). There are many Brittonic place names in lowland Scotland and in the parts of England where it is agreed that substantial Brittonic speakers remained (Brittonic names, apart from those of the former Romano-British towns, are scarce over most of England). Names derived (sometimes indirectly) from Brittonic include London , Penicuik , Perth , Aberdeen , York , Dorchester , Dover , and Colchester . Brittonic elements found in England include bre- and bal- for 'hill', while some such as co[o]mb[e] (from cwm ) for 'small deep valley' and tor for 'hill, rocky headland' are examples of Brittonic words that were borrowed into English. Others reflect

4320-496: The English progressive is not necessarily due to Celtic influence; moreover, the native English development of the structure can be traced over 1000 years and more of English literature. Some researchers (Filppula, et al., 2001) argue that other elements of English syntax reflect Brittonic influences. For instance, in English tag questions , the form of the tag depends on the verb form in the main statement ( aren't I? , isn't he? , won't we? , etc.). The German nicht wahr? and

4428-641: The French n'est-ce pas? , by contrast, are fixed forms which can be used with almost any main statement. It has been claimed that the English system has been borrowed from Brittonic, since Welsh tag questions vary in almost exactly the same way. Far more notable, but less well known, are Brittonic influences on Scottish Gaelic , though Scottish and Irish Gaelic, with their wider range of preposition-based periphrastic constructions, suggest that such constructions descend from their common Celtic heritage. Scottish Gaelic contains several P-Celtic loanwords, but, as there

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4536-572: 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 made similar observations: 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

4644-513: 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 said that their main teaching was "the souls do not perish, but after death pass from one to another". They were concerned with "the stars and their movements, the size of the cosmos and the earth, the world of nature, and

4752-459: The Greco-Roman writers were accurate in their claims. J. Rives remarked that it was "ambiguous" whether 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. Nora Chadwick , an expert in medieval Welsh and Irish literature who believed

4860-649: 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: Sena, in the Britannic Sea, opposite the coast of the Osismi, is famous for its oracle of a Gaulish god, whose priestesses, living in

4968-482: The Irish Language defines a druí (which has numerous variant forms, including draoi ) as a magician, wizard, or diviner. In the literature, the druids cast spells and turn people into animals or stones, or curse peoples' crops to be blighted. When druids are portrayed in early Irish sagas and in saints' lives that are set in pre-Christian Ireland, they are usually given high social status. The evidence of

5076-461: The Irish texts, the Welsh term commonly seen as referring to the druids, dryw , was used to refer purely to prophets and not to sorcerers or pagan priests. Historian Ronald Hutton noted that there were two explanations for the use of the term in Wales: the first was that it was a survival from the pre-Christian era, when dryw had been ancient priests; the second was that the Welsh had borrowed

5184-587: The Latin word druidēs (plural), which was considered by ancient Roman writers to come from the native Gaulish word for these figures. Other Roman texts employ the form druidae , while the same term was used by Greek ethnographers as δρυΐδης ( druidēs ). Although no extant Romano-Celtic inscription is known to contain the form, the word is cognate with the later insular Celtic words: Old Irish druí 'druid, sorcerer'; Old Cornish druw ; and Middle Welsh dryw ' seer ; wren '. Based on all available forms,

5292-524: The Middle Ages, after Ireland and Wales were Christianized , druids appear in a number of written sources, mainly tales and stories such as Táin Bó Cúailnge , and in the hagiographies of various saints. These were all written by Christian monks. In Irish-language literature, druids ( draoithe , plural of draoi ) are sorcerers with supernatural powers, who are respected in society, particularly for their ability to do divination . Dictionary of

5400-492: The Roman invasion throughout most of Great Britain , though the Isle of Man later had a Goidelic language, Manx . During the period of the Roman occupation of what is now England and Wales (AD 43 to c.  410 ), Common Brittonic borrowed a large stock of Latin words, both for concepts unfamiliar in the pre-urban society of Celtic Britain such as urbanization and new tactics of warfare, as well as for rather more mundane words which displaced native terms (most notably,

5508-761: The Roman period are given in Rivet and Smith. The Brittonic branch is also referred to as P-Celtic because linguistic reconstruction of the Brittonic reflex of the Proto-Indo-European phoneme * kʷ is p as opposed to Goidelic k . Such nomenclature usually implies acceptance of the P-Celtic and Q-Celtic hypothesis rather than the Insular Celtic hypothesis because the term includes certain Continental Celtic languages as well. (For

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5616-523: The Western into Cumbric and Welsh, and the Southwestern into Cornish and its closely related sister language Breton, which was carried to continental Armorica . Jackson showed that a few of the dialect distinctions between West and Southwest Brittonic go back a long way. New divergencies began around AD 500 but other changes that were shared occurred in the 6th century. Other common changes occurred in

5724-499: 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. Other classical writers also commented on

5832-680: The age of megaliths in Brittany strongly suggests a far older origin, perhaps back to six to seven thousand years ago. During the European Middle Ages, standing stones were believed to have been built by the giants who lived before the biblical flood . Many of the megaliths were destroyed or defaced by early Christians; it is estimated that some 50,000 megaliths once stood in Northern Europe, where almost 10,000 now remain. Menhirs have also been found in many other parts of

5940-1010: The centuries, they have variously been thought to have been used by druids for human sacrifice, used as territorial markers, or elements of a complex ideological system, used as mnemonic systems for oral cultures, or functioning as early calendars. Until the nineteenth century, antiquarians did not have substantial knowledge of prehistory, and their only reference points were provided by classical literature. The developments of radiocarbon dating and dendrochronology have significantly advanced scientific knowledge in this area. Menhirs are widely distributed across Europe, Africa, and Asia, but are most numerous in Western Europe; particularly in Ireland, Great Britain, and Brittany , where there are about 50,000 examples, and northwestern France, where there are some 1,200 further examples. Standing stones are usually difficult to date. They were constructed during many different periods across prehistory as part of

6048-774: The classical world of Greece and Rome. Archaeologist Stuart Piggott compared the attitude of the Classical authors toward 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. He highlighted the attitude of " primitivism " in both Early Modern Europeans and Classical authors, owing to their perception that these newly encountered societies had less technological development and were backward in socio-political development. Historian Nora Chadwick , in

6156-687: 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. Caesar believed that this practice of oral transmission of knowledge and opposition to recording their ideas had dual motivations: wanting to keep druidic knowledge from becoming common, and improving

6264-474: The druids and their practices. Caesar's contemporary, Cicero , noted that he had met a Gallic druid, Divitiacus , of the Aedui tribe. Divitiacus supposedly knew much about the natural world and performed divination through augury . Whether Diviaticus was genuinely a druid can however be disputed, for Caesar also knew this figure, and wrote about him, calling him by the more Gaulish-sounding (and thereby presumably

6372-544: The druids as being concerned with "divine worship, the due performance of sacrifices, private or public, and the interpretation of ritual questions". He said 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. Caesar wrote that

6480-461: The druids 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 remarked that to settle disputes between tribes, they met annually at a sacred place at the borders of the Carnute territory, which is said to be the center of Gaul. They viewed Britain as the centre of druidic study; and that they were not found among

6588-407: 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. Alexander Cornelius Polyhistor referred to the druids as philosophers, and called their doctrine of the immortality of the soul and metempsychosis (reincarnation), " Pythagorean ": The Pythagorean doctrine prevails among

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6696-729: The druids' faculties of memory. Caesar writes that of the Druids "a large number of the young men resort for the purpose of instruction". Due to the privileges afforded to the druids he tells us that "many embrace this profession of their own accord", whereas many others are sent to become druids by their families. Greek and Roman writers frequently made reference to the druids as practitioners of human sacrifice . Caesar says those who had been found guilty of theft or other criminal offences were considered preferable for use as sacrificial victims, but when criminals were in short supply, innocents would be acceptable. A form of sacrifice recorded by Caesar

6804-511: The elements der-/dar-/dur- and -went e.g. Derwent, Darwen, Deer, Adur, Dour, Darent, and Went. These names exhibit multiple different Celtic roots. One is * dubri- 'water' (Breton dour , Cumbric dowr , Welsh dŵr ), also found in the place-name Dover (attested in the Roman period as Dubrīs ); this is the source of rivers named Dour. Another is deru̯o- 'oak' or 'true' (Bret. derv , Cumb. derow , W. derw ), coupled with two agent suffixes, -ent and -iū ; this

6912-542: 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 which banned not only druidic practices, but also other native soothsayers and healers– a move which Pliny applauded, believing that it would end human sacrifice in Gaul. A somewhat different account of Roman legal attacks upon

7020-548: 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

7128-535: The gods must be worshipped, and no evil done, and manly behavior maintained". 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

7236-528: The headdress resembles depictions of Romano-British priests from several centuries later, leading to speculation among archaeologists that the man might have been a religious official– a druid. In the Gallic Wars of 58–51 BCE, 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

7344-532: 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. Diodorus Siculus , writing in 36 BCE, described how the druids followed "the Pythagorean doctrine", that human souls "are immortal, and after

7452-501: The holiness of perpetual virginity, are said to be nine in number. They call them Gallizenae, and they believe them to be endowed with extraordinary gifts to rouse the sea and the wind by their incantations, to turn themselves into whatsoever animal form they may choose, to cure diseases which among others are incurable, to know what is to come and to foretell it. They are, however, devoted to the service of voyagers only who have set out on no other errand than to consult them. According to

7560-548: The hotel. It is believed that practitioners of megalithic religions travelled via the sea, as the mass majority of menhirs are located on coasts, islands, and peninsulas. The French comic book series Asterix features the character Obelix , who is known for carrying menhirs, as a sculptor and deliveryman. Brittonic languages The Brittonic languages (also Brythonic or British Celtic ; Welsh : ieithoedd Brythonaidd/Prydeinig ; Cornish : yethow brythonek/predennek ; and Breton : yezhoù predenek ) form one of

7668-477: The hypothetical proto-Celtic word may be reconstructed as * dru-wid-s (pl. * druwides ), whose original meaning is traditionally taken to be " oak -knower", based upon the association of druids' beliefs with oak trees, which was made by Pliny the Elder , who also suggested that the word is borrowed from the Greek word δρῦς ( drỹs ) 'oak tree' but nowadays it is more often understood as originally meaning 'one with firm knowledge' (ie. 'a great sage'), as Pliny

7776-460: 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 legitimizing the expansion of the Roman Empire into these areas. The earliest record of the druids comes from two Greek texts of c. 300 BCE: a history of philosophy written by Sotion of Alexandria, and

7884-426: The introduction of Christianity by missionaries. 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 notions about druids, based on misconceptions of 18th-century scholars, have been largely superseded by more recent study. The English word druid derives from

7992-652: 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

8100-632: The larger megalithic cultures in Europe and near areas. Some menhirs stand next to buildings that have an early or current religious significance. One example is the South Zeal Menhir in Devon, which formed the basis for a 12th-century monastery built by lay monks. The monastery later became the Oxenham Arms hotel, at South Zeal, and the standing stone remains in place in the snug bar at

8208-507: The late nineteenth century, and isolated pockets of Shropshire speak Welsh today. The regular consonantal sound changes from Proto-Celtic to Welsh, Cornish, and Breton are summarised in the following table. Where the graphemes have a different value from the corresponding IPA symbols, the IPA equivalent is indicated between slashes. V represents a vowel; C represents a consonant. The principal legacy left behind in those territories from which

8316-424: The law-texts, which were first written-down in the 600s and 700s CE, 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 do healing magic, and that his standing declined accordingly. According to the early legal tract Bretha Crólige , the sick-maintenance due to a druid, satirist, and brigand ( díberg )

8424-561: The lexicon and syntax. It is generally accepted that Brittonic effects on English are lexically few, aside from toponyms, consisting of a small number of domestic and geographical words, which "may" include bin , brock , carr , comb , crag and tor . Another legacy may be the sheep-counting system yan tan tethera in the north, in the traditionally Celtic areas of England such as Cumbria . Several words of Cornish origin are still in use in English as mining-related terms, including costean , gunnies , and vug . Those who argue against

8532-539: The more authentic) Diviciacus, but never referred to him as a druid and indeed presented him as a political and military leader. Another classical writer to take up describing the druids not too long afterward was Diodorus Siculus , who published this description in his Bibliotheca historicae in 36 BCE. Alongside the druids, or as he called them, drouidas , who he believed to be philosophers and theologians, he remarked how there were poets and singers in Celtic society, who he called bardous , or bards . Such an idea

8640-399: The name of the river Trent simply comes from the Welsh word for a 'trespasser' (figuratively suggesting 'overflowing river'). Scholars supporting a Brittonic substrate in English argue that the use of periphrastic constructions (using auxiliary verbs such as do and be in the continuous/progressive) of the English verb , which is more widespread than in the other Germanic languages ,

8748-503: The native word for the island, * Pritanī . An early written reference to the British Isles may derive from the works of the Greek explorer Pytheas of Massalia ; later Greek writers such as Diodorus of Sicily and Strabo who quote Pytheas' use of variants such as πρεττανική ( Prettanikē ), "The Britannic [land, island]", and νησοι βρεττανιαι ( nēsoi brettaniai ), "Britannic islands", with Pretani being

8856-572: The power and might of the immortal gods", indicating they were involved with not only such common aspects of religion as theology and cosmology , but also astronomy . Caesar held that they were "administrators" during rituals of human sacrifice , for which criminals were usually used, and that the method was by burning in a wicker man . Though he had first-hand experience of Gaulish people, and therefore likely druids, Caesar's account has been widely criticized by modern historians as inaccurate. One issue raised by such historians as Fustel de Coulanges

8964-632: The presence of Britons such as Dumbarton – from the Scottish Gaelic Dùn Breatainn meaning 'Fort of the Britons', and Walton meaning (in Anglo-Saxon) a tun 'settlement' where the Wealh 'Britons' still lived. The number of Celtic river names in England generally increases from east to west, a map showing these being given by Jackson. These include Avon, Chew, Frome, Axe, Brue and Exe, but also river names containing

9072-500: The present stative (al. continuous/progressive) Yr wyf yn caru = 'I am loving', where the Brittonic syntax is partly mirrored in English. (However, English I am loving comes from older I am a-loving , from still older ich am on luvende 'I am in the process of loving'). In the Germanic sister languages of English, there is only one form, for example Ich liebe in German, though in colloquial usage in some German dialects,

9180-554: The previous pictures. It is not known if this re-use was deliberate or if the passage grave builders just saw menhirs as a convenient source of stone. Where menhirs appear in groups, often in a circular, oval, henge , or horseshoe formation, they are sometimes called megalithic monuments. These are sites of ancient religious ceremonies, sometimes containing burial chambers. The exact function of menhirs has provoked more debate than practically any other issue in European prehistory . Over

9288-507: 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, although this conclusion was criticized by another archaeologist- Martin Brown, who believed that the corpses might be those of honoured warriors who were buried in the sanctuary, rather than sacrifices. Some historians have questioned whether

9396-533: 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. Diodorus writes of the Druids that they were "philosophers" and "men learned in religious affairs" who are honored. Strabo mentions that their domain was both natural philosophy and moral philosophy , while Ammianus Marcellinus lists them as investigators of "obscure and profound subjects". Pomponius Mela

9504-463: The role of druids in Gaulish society may report an idealized tradition, based on the society of the 2nd century BC, before the pan-Gallic confederation led by the Arverni was smashed in 121 BC, followed by the invasions of Teutones and Cimbri , rather than on the demoralized and disunited Gaul of his own time. John Creighton has speculated that in Britain, the druidic social influence

9612-455: 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 . Other such mythological druids were Tadg mac Nuadat of the Fenian Cycle , and Mug Ruith , a powerful blind druid of Munster . Irish mythology has

9720-456: The term from the Irish, as had the English (who used the terms dry and drycraeft to refer to magicians and magic respectively, most probably influenced by the Irish terms). As the historian Jane Webster stated, "individual druids ... are unlikely to be identified archaeologically". A. P. Fitzpatrick, in examining what he believed to be astral symbolism on late Iron Age swords, has expressed difficulties in relating any material culture, even

9828-498: The theory of a more significant Brittonic influence than is widely accepted point out that many toponyms have no semantic continuation from the Brittonic language. A notable example is Avon which comes from the Celtic term for river abona or the Welsh term for river, afon , but was used by the English as a personal name. Likewise the River Ouse, Yorkshire , contains the Celtic word usa which merely means 'water' and

9936-623: The top. Menhirs are found across Europe, Africa, and Asia, with a concentration in Western Europe , notably in Ireland , Great Britain , and Brittany . Theories concerning their purpose remain speculative, with hypotheses ranging from druidic rituals to territorial markers or elements of an ideological system. Some menhirs feature engravings , including anthropomorphic figures and symbols, and are often associated with ancient religious ceremonies and burial chambers . The word menhir

10044-444: The twenty-third book of his Succession of Philosophers . Subsequent Greek and Roman texts from the 3rd century BCE refer to " barbarian philosophers", possibly in reference to the Gaulish druids. The earliest extant text that describes druids in detail is Julius Caesar 's Commentarii de Bello Gallico , book VI, written in the 50s or 40s BCE. A general who was intent on conquering Gaul and Britain, Caesar described

10152-607: The two branches of the Insular Celtic languages; the other is Goidelic . It comprises the extant languages Breton , Cornish , and Welsh . The name Brythonic was derived by Welsh Celticist John Rhys from the Welsh word Brython , meaning Ancient Britons as opposed to an Anglo-Saxon or Gael . The Brittonic languages derive from the Common Brittonic language, spoken throughout Great Britain during

10260-479: 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. He wrote that they were exempt from military service and from paying taxes , and had the power to excommunicate people from religious festivals, making them social outcasts. Two other classical writers, Diodorus Siculus and Strabo , wrote about

10368-401: The way his limbs convulse as he falls and the gushing of his blood, they are able to read the future. Archaeological evidence from western Europe has been widely used to support the theory that Iron Age Celts practiced human sacrifice. Mass graves that were found in a ritual context, which date from this period, have been unearthed in Gaul, at both Gournay-sur-Aronde and Ribemont-sur-Ancre in

10476-632: The woodland goddess Flidais , and sometimes described as a sorceress rather than a bandruí) features in a tale from the Metrical Dindshenchas , where she joins three other of the Tuatha Dé to defeat the evil Greek witch Carman . Other bandrúi include Relbeo– a Nemedian druid who appears in The Book of Invasions , where she is described as the daughter of the king of Greece, and the mother of Fergus Lethderg and Alma One-Tooth. Dornoll

10584-480: The word srath ( anglicised as "strath") is a native Goidelic word, but its usage appears to have been modified by the Welsh cognate ystrad whose meaning is slightly different. The effect on Irish has been the loan from British of many Latin-derived words. This has been associated with the Christianisation of Ireland from Britain. Druids The earliest known references to the druids date to

10692-464: The word for 'fish' in all the Brittonic languages derives from the Latin piscis rather than the native * ēskos – which may survive, however, in the Welsh name of the River Usk , Wysg ). Approximately 800 of these Latin loan-words have survived in the three modern Brittonic languages. Pictish may have resisted Latin influence to a greater extent than the other Brittonic languages. It

10800-537: The world. Many menhirs are engraved with megalithic art , some with anthropomorphic features. Other common carvings are identified as images of stone axes , ploughs, shepherds' crooks, and yokes; and are named after these motifs. However, these identifications are not secure except for those of the stone axe images, and the names used to describe them are largely a matter of convenience. Some menhirs were broken up and incorporated into later passage graves , where they had new megalithic art carved with little regard for

10908-588: The written record by the 2nd century. In about 750 AD, 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 often appear in both the tales from Irish mythology first written down by monks and nuns of the Celtic Church like the " Táin Bó Cúailnge " (12th century), but also in later Christian legends where they are largely portrayed as sorcerers who opposed

11016-463: Was a bandrúi in Scotland, who normally trained heroes in warfare, particularly Laegaire and Conall ; she was the daughter of Domnall Mildemail. 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

11124-458: Was adopted from French by 19th-century archaeologists. The introduction of the word into general archaeological usage has been attributed to the 18th-century French military officer Théophile Corret de la Tour d'Auvergne . It is a combination of two words of the Breton language: maen and hir . In modern Welsh , they are described as maen hir , or "long stone". In modern Breton, the word peulvan

11232-420: Was already in decline by the mid-1st century BCE, in conflict with emergent new power structures embodied in paramount chieftains. Other scholars see the Roman conquest itself as the main reason for the decline of the druid orders. 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

11340-403: Was expanded upon by Strabo , writing in the 20s CE, who declared that amongst the Gauls, there were three types of honoured figures: The Roman writer Tacitus , who was himself a senator and historian, described how when the Roman army, led by Suetonius Paulinus , attacked the island of Mona ( Anglesey ; Welsh : Ynys Môn ), the legionaries were awestruck on landing, by the appearance of

11448-567: 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 after 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

11556-422: Was the burning alive of victims in a large wooden effigy , now often known as a wicker man . A differing account came from the 10th-century Commenta Bernensia , which stated 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

11664-518: Was the first author to say that the druids' instruction was secret and took place in caves and forests. Cicero said that he knew a Gaulish druid who "claimed to have that knowledge of nature which the Greeks call physiologia, and he used to make predictions, sometimes by means of augury and sometimes by means of conjecture". Druidic lore consisted of a large number of memorized verses, and Caesar remarked that it could take up to twenty years to complete

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