Читать книгу 366 Celt: A Year and A Day of Celtic Wisdom and Lore - Carl McColman - Страница 26

A legendary meeting of druids is said to have taken place at a London tavern in 1717, attended by delegates of druidic and bardic orders from throughout the Celtic world. Scholars today doubt that such a meeting ever really occurred, but it lives on as a myth in the traditions of several modern druid groups—and what a singularly appropriate myth, seeing the rebirth of druidry not in a stone circle or sacred grove, but at a pub! Some sixty-four years later, a secret society called the Ancient Order of Druids was founded, and this marks the reliable history of druidism reborn (and yes, this order’s organizational meeting took place in a pub). For almost two hundred years, druidism was a blend of fraternal organization and national identity (especially in Wales, where bardic competitions became popular beginning in the nineteenth century). Many of the stereotypes that dog druidism today arose from the fraternal druid orders, which consisted of English gentlemen, wearing white robes and performing ceremonies in London parks as well as more traditionally sacred sites like Glastonbury or Stonehenge. For these druids, the Celtic wisdom-keepers of old were revered not so much for their religious beliefs or intellectual function as for their symbolic value as the cultural forefathers of the land.