Long before Rome conquered all of Europe, the people known as Celts (known by the Greeks as Keltoi) lived and practiced complex polytheistic religious traditions, including Druidism, from Britain and Ireland to Spain, France, southern Germany, and all the way to central Turkey.
But they had no written language. Until modern archaeology began to reveal the depths of their culture, all that was known about them came from folklore, oral history, and Roman writers, particularly the quite prejudiced work of Julius Caesar (The Gallic War), Polybius, and Strabo.
Caesar first spoke about Druids-intellectuals, judges, diviners, and mediators with the gods. But Celtic religion was widespread, and it varied from land to land. Lugh (the "shining light"), Teutates ("god of the tribe"), Andastra, Belenus, Artio ("the bear"), Camulos, Cernunnos ("the horned one," lord of the animals), and Vasio all had their followings.
As is the case with many indigenous religions, gods had their own locations. A god of the grove sacred to one tribe might be recognized by another tribe but not worshiped, because he or she didn't live nearby. Instead, this other tribe would tend to worship the god of the lake near where they lived.
Celtic religious practice points out an important theological truth. When gods or spirits arise within the context of a particular place, the people connect with their environment and treat it accordingly. Indigenous people who worship in this manner, whether they are European Celts, Japanese Shinto, or American Indians, know that their environment is their cathedral. They live in their church, the home of their god. This kind of connection cements the bond between the land and the people. To cut down the sacred grove of the Druids, to kill the buffalo of the Dakota people, or to strip-mine a Cherokee mountaintop is religious blasphemy. Indigenous religion cannot be transported to another place. Missionaries cannot carry that religion with them to indoctrinate a new culture.
People of Jewish, Christian, or Islamic traditions often failed to understand this point of view. And when they did understand it, they usually exploited it. A people cut off from the "ground of their being," their god, are a defeated people. Julius Caesar understood. When he burned the Druid sacred groves and toppled the standing stones, he tore the soul out of the Celtic people, and with it their will to resist. Celtic religion went underground, practiced by old women who remembered herb lore and snatches of forgotten prayers and rituals. It was found in men's secret societies and existed in overgrown roadside shrines in the hollow hills of dim legend and folklore.
Only now, through the patient work of archaeologists, are we beginning to discover how much was lost. And who is to say whether the terrible record of environmental catastrophe in Western civilization is not a result of practicing religion in a way that separated humans from, rather than connected them to, the land they call home?
(See also Caesar, Julius)
Sources: James, Simon. The World of the Celts. New York: Thames and Hudson, 1993. Jones, Prudence, and Nigel Pennick. A History of Pagan Europe. New York: Routledge, 1995.
