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Druidry Druid Druidic Treelore
Background Beliefs Traditions Overview
Celtic warriors honored the fearless fierceness and powerful might of the wild Boar by decorating their armour and weapons with its visage. By using the Druidic magic of associative linkage, they hoped to courageously survive the terrors of warfare and the furies of battle with the help of ferocious focus and decisive action.
One of the most complex of Animal Totems, denoting death and rebirth, depictions of the Ravens speaking to humans have been found on the walls of ancient caves. The most common characteristic of Ravens, as Power Animals over the ages, has been as prophetic, truth speaking, Otherworld messengers. Often portrayed in this guise on coins and statuary, they acted as benefactors bringing beneficial and fruitful gifts, like insightful discrimination and truthful prophecy.
Druids often acted as Shamans and Shamanism was practiced by the ancient Celts. Some of the most superbly crafted and enchantingly enduring of the Druidic Celtic tales were similar to those about Taliesin and Fionn mac Cumhail.
The storytelling was 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.
Working within the context
of the Celtic Cosmology, the Druids used their power to access the Otherworld
and their knowledge of what they had personally seen to help and benefit others.
Druidic Treelore of "Lady of the Woods" Greenwood Glade
Image Courtesy Nicolas Tollervey taken May 28, 2005
There was also a Celtic Druid Zodiac based on Druidic Treelore. The thirteen signs of the Druidic Zodiac unlike the twelve signs of the Graeco-Roman Zodiac were based on trees rather than constellations.
The thirteen trees of the Druidic Zodiac are Birch, Rowan, Ash, Alder, Willow, Hawthorn, Oak, Holly, Hazel, Vine, Ivy, Reed, and Elder.
For example, the timeframe from December 24 - January 20, which in the Graeco-Roman Zodiac corresponded most nearly to the constellation of Capricorn, was called Beth, The Celtic Zodiac Sign of The Birch Tree.
Often called the "Lady of the Woods", the Birch
was stronger and sturdier than the Oak Tree despite its slender beauty. While the
wood of the tree produced many useful products like broom handles, the bark of the
Birch was once used for writing. As a Druidic herbal remedy every part of the
tree had valuable uses throughout the Celtic Calendar year....
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Read Druidry Treelore Articles
Druids as Celtic Shamans,
Glossary Terminology,
Hallowed Symbols and Holy Ground,
Megaliths and Sacred Mounds,
Ogham Storytelling and Oral Traditions,
Reverence for Natural World Animals and Birds,
Spiritual Beliefs of Druids,
Sacred Wheel of Seasons,
Sun Talismans and Holy Wells,
Threefold Path of Bards Ovates Druids,
Treelore and Sacred Groves
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Shamanism Shaman,
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Druidry Druid Druidic Treelore Copyright
© 2002-2008 Maureen Grace Burns, Blessings Cornucopia. All Rights Reserved. Permission GNU FDL given to use Image Druidic Treelore of "Lady of the Woods" Greenwood Glade taken May 28, 2005 given by Nicolas Tollervey from [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Sherwoodglade.jpg]. Accessed January 11, 2007.
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