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Druids

Although since Christian times Druids have been identified as wizards and soothsayers, in pre-Christian Celtic society they formed an intellectual class comprising philosophers, judges, educators, historians, doctors, seers, astronomers and astrologers. The earliest surviving classical references to Druids date to the 2nd century B.C.
The word "Druidae" is of Celtic origin. The Roman writer Pliney the Elder (Gaius Plinius Secundus) believed it to be a derivative of the Greek word "drus", meaning "an oak." "Dru-wid" combines the word roots "oak" and "knowledge". "Wid" means "to know" or "to see". The oak was an important sacred tree to the Druids. In the Celtic social system, Druid was a title given to learned men and women possessing ""oak knowledge" or "oak wisdom".
The Druids emerged from the ancient Celtic Tribes, at a time when the people had to live close to nature to survive. In the deep woods the Druids would gather. Bringing together their mysticism and philosophy, their insight and learning. Their spirit emerged from the tides of the sea, the light of the sun, the wind in the Oak and the cry of the deer. They created an institution that inspired, frightened and uplifted their people.
Druid filled the roles of judge, doctor, diviner, mage, mystic, and clerical scholar. They were the religious leaders of their culture. To become a Druid, students assembled in large groups for instruction and training, for a period of up to twenty years. The myths describe Druids who were capable of many magical powers such as divination and prophesy, control of the weather, healing levitation and shape changing themselves into the forms of animals. Their education was so rigorous that at the end of it they were virtually walking encyclopedias. A good word to describe them would be "priests" but the Druids didn't minister to any congregations as priests do. They had a clientele, like a lawyer, a consultant, or a mystic would have. Caesar and his historians never...