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The ancient Celts were devoted to maintaining their spiritual balance and sacred connectivity with the Natural World by treating all things hallowed with the respect and reverence they deserved. They had deeply rooted spiritual traditions that included: Bards, Druids, Fairy Mounds, Healing Rivers, Holy Wells, Newgrange, Mound Building, Otherworld, Ovates, Sacred Groves, Stonehenge, and Tree Spirits. For the Celts, the Earth and the Realm of Nature were alive with sacredness and with the elementals of fire, earth, air, and water who were imbued with innate divinity and purposeful beingness. Three was a Celtic holy number which had many different meanings beside the most traditional of the representations, that of the three realms of land, sea, and sky. Besides their deep respect and abiding reverence for the Natural World, another hallmark of the Celts was their thematic tradition of mythic storytelling about heroic quests, sacred kingships, and underworld journeys. During their rituals, the Celts often revered their ancestors who lived in a paradise that lied somewhere beyond the encircling sea. The Celts and the Druids also revered many Goddesses and Gods. The living waters of rivers, springs, and wells were venerated because they were believed to have both magical and curative powers. Fairy Mounds, the Wee Folk, Mineral Spirits, Hollow Hills, Leprechauns, Animal Spirits, Holy Wells, Sacred Lakes, Tree Spirits, the Sidhe. . . the Celtic world was alive with the vibrancy and the glittering glories of hosts of Fairies; of the elemental beings of fire, earth, air, and water; of the holy divinity of the land, the sea, and the sky.
Like the intricate,
intertwining, interlacing, eternally connected knotwork of their art, the
spiritual continuity of the Celtic traditions shined through their cultural
mythos. For instance, the Celtic Goddess Brighid (who was associated with the
cow) was featured in many heroic myths about sacred kingship and underworld
quests. The fire festival of Imbolc honored Brighid as it ushered in the Spring.
Even though the Celts were highly skilled artists, builders, craftsmen, farmers, merchants, and smiths who shared common customs and spiritual traditions, they were content to remain a pastoral and agricultural peoples, living in harmony with the land and the seasonal cycles. Exquisitely crafted bracelets, brooches, cauldrons, cups, household objects, jewelry, religious statues, torcs, and weapons decorated with superbly stylized patterns flourished throughout the Celtic culture. The Celts were the keepers of special metaphysical knowledge which they safeguarded over the years by encoding it in their art, mythology, songs, and stories, and, by encrypting it in their DNA and cellular structures until the cycles once again turned to a time for awakening and revival. The storyteller, the Seannachaidh, was a popular fixture around the fire especially during the wintertime. Since daylight hours were scarce that time of year and families spent a lot of time around the light and the warmth of the hearth, which became a gathering place where the Seannachaidh burning with the fires of inspiration would tell the stories of the people. The most honored and revered of the storytellers were those who told the longest and most intricate tales.
Some of the most superbly
crafted and enchantingly enduring of the Celtic tales (like those about Taliesin
and Fionn mac Cumhail) were richly textured with symbolism about alternate
realities, animal totems, divination, drumming, ecstatic dance, journeying,
healing, oracles, shamanic trance, shapeshifting, soul loss retrieval, spirit
guides, transformation, and vision quests...
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Celts
Celtic Ancient Culture 
