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Druidry Druid Druidic Treelore
Glossary Terminology
Sun Wheel Talismans
Sun Wheels were worn as
protective amulets and healing talismans. They symbolized the sensual solace of
bountifully fruitful fecundity and the heartening warmth of productively crucial
comfort shedding their illuminating light into the cold disappointing darkness
of shadowed chaos and the sorrow provoking cruelty of ominous passages.
The brilliance of the Sun
dispelled illusory confusions and banished bindings by shining solar radiance
into the murky corners of the soul. The sunshine of cheery mindfulness
transformed stagnant areas of persistent pain and skulking sorrow into renewed
hope and reinvigorated trust.
Small clay Goddess
votives, decorated with Sun Wheels, were offered prayerfully at curative
springs, holy shrines, and sacred lakes. The figurines were also buried with the
dead to help them navigate the mysterious journey to the Otherworld.
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Tree Alphabet and Celtic Calendar
The Druids, who travelled
widely among the Celtic tribes, were the keepers of the Celtic Calendar which
corresponded to the months with the Celtic Tree Alphabet and the vowels of the
Ogham. Although they had the Ogham written language, the Celts rarely used it,
preferring instead to pass on their beliefs, knowledge, and wisdom through the
time honored method of their oral traditions.
So for each of the months
there was a corresponding tree from which an overall Tree Calendar emerged. The
Celtic Year then was divided into thirteen months with an extra day or two
adjustment at the end of the year. Even though there were thirteen months in the lunar Celtic Calendar, only eight seasonal festivals were
celebrated.
The two solstices and two equinoxes marked the passage of the four seasons, while, the four fire festivals
inbetween the passages commemorated the changes that ensued. Modern reconstructionist versions of the Celtic Year divided it into two portals.
They were the dark half which began with Samhain and the light half which began with Beltane. Inbetween these doorways were
the quarter celebrations of Imbolc and Lammas while the four Albans or the festivals at the equinoxes and the solstices rounded out the year...
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 Explore 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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 Druidry Druid Druidic Treelore Copyright
© 2002-2008 Maureen Grace Burns, Blessings Cornucopia. All Rights Reserved.
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