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    The Celtic Supernatural
    The Celtic Supernatural
    The Celtic Supernatural
    Ebook45 pages30 minutes

    The Celtic Supernatural

    By Michael Sheane

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    About this ebook

    The Celts believed that the supernatural pervaded their lives and surroundings. Magic and the observance of rituals dominated their lives, and consequently their magician caste - the Druids - held a position in society above even kings. The Druids' role was critical, providing a link between the Celtic people and the supernatural world.

    Yet the Druids kept no written record. Their rituals and observances were passed on orally. Roman and early church historians considered them too barbarous or heathenish to merit detailed examination.

    We turn therefore to the archaeological record, where, from an abundance of Celtic sites, from Ireland to La Tène, our knowledge of their belief system continues to grow.

    ***

    Michael Steven Sheane is now in his seventies, and was educated mainly at Orange's Academy, Belfast, and attended Trinity College, Dublin. Orange's Academy was a small private school of mixed Catholics and Protestants in the centre of the city. A lot of his time was spent living in Ballygally on the Antrim Coast, Northern Ireland.

    In the past he has contributed widely to press, radio and television in Ulster. He spent six years at BRMB Radio, Birmingham where he was Ireland political correspondent.

    Michael is presently researching books and articles on selected areas of Scotland that in the past have been connected with the North of Ireland.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherA H Stockwell
    Release dateDec 19, 2022
    ISBN9780722352410
    The Celtic Supernatural

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      Book preview

      The Celtic Supernatural - Michael Sheane

      Pagans

      The origins of the Celts have been put at many dates – everything from 1000 to 350 bc. They inhabited Switzerland or Central Europe before expanding into Gaul, or France, where they were conquered by Julius Caesar, according to his Gallic Wars, which records conquests in the broader sphere of the Roman Empire. Julius Caesar and the future emperors of Rome were, of course, also pagans, but not so obsessed with paganism as the Celts, who were steeped in magic and the observance of ritual – more so than anyone else in the old world. The Celts were not observers of a religion with a pantheon like the Roman one. As with most other country-dwellers of the time, the Celts believed that magical agencies pervaded many aspects of their lives and surroundings. They were concerned to use magic for beneficent ends, and they recited myths which were committed to memory. Many believe their myths, cults and sacred terminology sprang from an Indo-European origin, which the Celts shared with the Aryan ancestors of the Hindus and with the Italic forerunners of the Romans.

      There is a considerable volume of material written about the Celts, thanks to the Roman historians, despite much church expurgation in the ancient literature of Ireland. Many mythical tracts point to deities, the main pagan festivals, the activities of the Druids and other related matters.

      The Roman historians and generals wrote in Latin, and seldom in Greek, the works being dedicated to a local god. The monuments, normally altars of a purely Roman type, provide an iconography where none existed, or hardly so, in these ancient times. Julius Caesar’s Gallic Wars and other classical works provide a soldier’s view of the Celts that threatened the Roman Empire in the closing years bc.

      On the Druids, and on various beliefs reported of the Celts, Greek and Roman sources have more useful information. Information can also be gleaned from the philosophers of the Celts and in the study of Celtic place names, and sites connected with the Celts. There is archaeological evidence of burial sites and votive offerings at sacred sites like the oak groves of the Druids and their temples along with the colleges where Druids trained. Some Gaulish and British coins have been found at such sites from immediately before Julius Caesar’s conquest of Gaul.

      It is useful to look at the life of the ordinary Celt to form a judgement of the role they played in ancient times. They lived for the rural festivals, four of which were held at turning points in the year;

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