The Druids and Their Temples

1875

BY ALEXANDER WAINWRIGHT.

Near the town of Carnac, in Brittany, France, there is an extensive plain several miles wide, with a flat and barren surface. It is the last place in the world a tourist would care about visiting, if he were simply traveling in search of beautiful objects. In Winter the coldest winds blow over it with wild force, and in Summer it is unprotected by trees or shrubbery from the scorching shafts of the sun. But it is not wholly uninteresting, and I propose that we shall make a short visit to it.

We will suppose, then, that you and I are stopping at one of the quiet taverns in Carnac, and have wandered toward the plain for a walk. Just outside the town a bit of a hill rises high enough to show us the surrounding country.

There are few houses or trees on the plain; but it is divided into several avenues by long rows of unhewn upright stones, which, as far as the eye can see, are ranged in almost perfect order, like an army prepared for battle. There are over a thousand of them, and they stretch across the country from east to west for nearly seven miles. The largest are twenty-two feet high, and the smallest ten feet. A few have fallen, and others have been carted away; but originally they were placed apart at regular distances.

When you come nearer to them you will see many signs of age upon them. They are seamed, mossy, and battered. How old do you guess they are? Nobody is quite sure, not even the wisest of the historians, but we may safely say that they have held their present positions for over eighteen hundred years. For eighteen hundred years they have clung to the meager ground and withstood the combined assaults of time and storm, while generation after generation of the living has passed away.

How did they come there? The simple, credulous people of old, to whom all fairy stories were the truest histories, believed that giants brought them and planted them; but we know better than that.

They were erected by ordinary men, and you may imagine how much labor the work cost at a time when there were no carts or wheel-barrows, much less railroads or massive cranes. Years, perhaps centuries, were occupied, and to the builders the undertaking must have seemed as stupendous as the erection of the East River bridge seems to us.

Similar stones are found at other places in Brittany; but the most famous collection is on a plain near the town of Salisbury, in England. This is called Stonehenge, and consists of one hundred and forty stones, the smallest of which weigh ten tons and the largest seventy tons. The remains of men and animals have been also found in the vicinity, and these have given the antiquaries a clue as to the objects for which the stones were raised.

Nothing positive is known about them, but it is supposed that they mark the temples of the Druids, a religious order which possessed great power in France and England during the century before and the century after the coming of Christ. They obtained a complete mastery over the ignorant and superstitious people then occupying those countries, by the practice of mysterious arts, which often were extremely cruel. They professed to know the hidden nature of things, and the forms and movements of the sun and stars; but in reality they were not as wise as the children in our primary schools, and the simplest tricks of a good modern conjurer would surpass their most wonderful ones. They were astrologers and herb-doctors as well as priests and historians, and they attributed a sacred character to many plants.

The mistletoe was considered a cure for all diseases, and was gathered with great ceremonies. When it was discovered twined about the oak, which was also sacred, the Druids assembled near the tree and prepared a banquet and sacrifice. A priest in white raiment cut the twig off with a golden sickle, and two other priests, also dressed in white, caught it in a white apron as it fell. Two milk-white oxen were afterward sacrificed, and the ceremonies concluded with much rejoicing.

The marshwort was plucked by a priest with his left hand, his head being turned aside, as there was a superstition that the plant would lose its virtues if it were obtained otherwise; and the hedge-hyssop was gathered after offerings of bread and wine.

These plants were supposed to be remedies, not only for physical diseases, but also for mental diseases, and it was thought that they afforded protection against all evil spirits.

Little beads of amber were looked upon as safeguards against all dangers, but the most potent of all charms was a serpent's egg. It was said that when a serpent was knotted together, eggs came out of its mouth, and were supported in the air by its hissings. The priests hid themselves in the woods watching for this marvel, and, when it was observed, one of them would boldly rush forward, catch an egg in a napkin, mount a horse and gallop toward the nearest river, after reaching which he was safe from the pursuit of the serpent. This was their story about it. Even in this day, some impostors advertise in the newspapers that they can foretell future events, and the Druids claimed a like power. They examined the entrails of animals, and watched the flight of birds, from which they professed to tell things that would happen years afterward.

Human sacrifices formed one of the most terrible features of their religion. The victims usually were criminals or prisoners of war; but when there were none of these, innocent and unoffending persons were sacrificed.

The favorite resort of the Druids was an island opposite the mouth of the river Loire, in France, where, once every year, between sunrise and sunset, they pulled down and rebuilt the roof of their temples; and any priest who allowed the smallest part of the sacred materials to fall carelessly, was torn to pieces by his fellows.

The only traces of the order left to us are the rude stone buildings at Stonehenge and Carnac. Retreating before the Romans, the Druids went to the Isle of Anglesey, in Wales; and when they saw their conquerors following, they made preparations for a battle. Among their preparations — not exactly for the battle, but for what they expected to follow it — were immense altars, on which they intended to sacrifice the unfortunate Romans who should be left after the battle. They were quite sure that they would need these altars, for their oracles gave them every reason to believe in a glorious triumph of their arms. But the Romans were again victorious, and the Druids themselves were the ones sacrificed.

—St. Nicholas, June 1875, pp. 469-471.