Guardian of Nature: Druids

The dawn is approaching, and the twilight is fleeing in a hurry. Two men in gray robes stood on a hill at the edge of the forest, looking out at the eastern sky.

"You see that Venus is crumbling in the sky, but the sun in the east has not yet erupted, but the heat of the star has brightened the sky. If you can become a bird, you should fly high into the sky, all the way to the east, and you can see that the dawn of the stars has penetrated into the clouds. Although the distant sky was still covered in gray nightgowns, the broken clouds closest to the zenith were gradually dyed ochre-colored. As we continued to fly, the clouds we crossed became more and more colorful, and gradually the air around us seemed to be bright like fire. A large cloud drifted over the canopy, and the view was obscured by a gray darkness. At this time, your heart can't help but feel a sense of depression, as if you are walking through a tunnel with no end in sight. Watch out for a dazzling light that will sneak up on your eyes through the gap in the clouds, and before you can get used to it, the brilliant light has enveloped us. This is the stellar light at the beginning of birth, a soft light with a hint of red, a lukewarm light. In the center of the light, it is there that the sun breathes flames. We're still climbing, and from time to time clouds keep the sun out. The sky is getting brighter and the sky is getting brighter. As the wind roared, we spread our wings harder and harder, and at last the time came, leaving all the clouds at our feet, and the sky all shrouded in his splendor - the sun !!"

The old elder stared at the rising sun and said to the young disciple, "Feel this feeling, when you become one with this wind energy, your soul will be able to fly!" At this time, ten thousand rays of light have been shot from the air to the ground with an irresistible liliang, this Apollo's arrow contains unparalleled light and heat, and the young man seems to be able to feel the teacher's soul also burning due to the echo between magic and nature. In the distance, the howl of wild wolves could be heard, the lonely cry of wolves that had been wandering in the darkness for a long time, the sound of a wilderness that engulfed and nurtured life. The old magician roared at the sky. Answering this most primitive call with the wildest roar: gradually his eyes became blood-red, his lips stretched forward to show his fangs one by one, his ears became sharp and long, and his face was obscured by countless manes. The old magician shook off his cloak with his right hand (which had turned into a canine forearm with sharp claws): he was already a werewolf. Decades of vicissitudes have covered his body with scars, and his will has become as strong as a rock. The werewolf said to the shocked young man, "What is it? What you see is the wonder of man and nature, and this is the secret of our druids." Would you like to be a druid?"

1. Good and evil: Druids with different opinions

At the beginning of winter in the Northern Hemisphere, farmers have long since left their land fallow and forest animals begin to hibernate. Farmhouses and caves keep the cold wind at bay and shelter the lives of people or beasts that hide within. On the day of the winter solstice, the nights become longer than at any other time of the year. The daylight becomes shorter. It is on this day that a group of mysterious priests from unknown places appear in Stonehenge, who observe the celestial phenomena in Stonehenge to predict the future. According to English legend, this group of mystical priests were followers of the ancient primitive religion of the Druids, who generally lived in seclusion in a corner of Shijie and lived their unknown lives in silence.

Europeans generally consider the Druids to be champions of nature and neutrality, hermits who make the entire wasteland their home, and use their special liliang to protect nature and bring balance to the whole shijie. This is on full display in Diablo II, where the Druids are depicted as a group of mages living in the boreal forest. Instead of using elemental magic in the traditional sense, they use their own way to merge with nature to gain unique magical abilities that give them the magical ability to control fire, earth, and wind. The magical powers of the Druids allow them to summon a multitude of plants and beasts to help them in battle, such as crows, eagles, wolves, vines, and even ghosts roaming the wilderness. They themselves can also transform into savage animals such as mad wolves or giant bears, thus gaining a wild liliang to fight their enemies. Druids' skills fall into three main categories: elemental magic. Transformation skills, summoning abilities.

In the Dragonlance Chronicles, the Druids are a group of people who use herbs to save people in the forest. In Icewind Dale, Alundo, the druid of Kudaha, is clearly a stout intellectual, and he has no trace of the barbarians of the wasteland. The Druids who appear in games made according to AD&D rules are generally completely neutral about everything. Completely neutral characters tend to be the least conformists, for example, when the good side is strong, he will run to the evil side, and when the evil side has the upper hand, he will run back to the good side. Anyway, his goal is to maintain the balance between the various opposing camps. The most pitiful thing is that in the "Might and Magic" series, the Druids have turned into a cult: the Sheep Singing Cult. Although there will definitely be a lot of commissions if you serve the Yang Ming Sect in the game, if you want to take the bright road and take the risk, you have to follow the rules of the rivers and lakes - have little contact with the people of the Yang Ming Sect. Although the Sheep Ming temple has an extremely low price of reply, it has gained notoriety due to some undesirable side effects. In addition, the whereabouts of the Yangming Sect have always been strange, and people have been crowned as a "cult". There used to be some people who had a bad reputation because they donated money at the Yangming Temple. Therefore, unless it is absolutely necessary, try not to have anything to do with the people of the Yang Ming Sect.

2. The Sacrifice of the Living: A Primitive Religion Like a Mystery

Canadian writer Margaret Atwood won the Booker Award, Britain's highest literary award, for her biography The Blind Assassin, an honor that established Margaret as a prominent figure in the Shijie literary world. After attending the award ceremony at London's Guildhall, she was invited to a gala dinner, during which she joked about the Booker Awards: "...... It's like a Druidic ritual where the judges bring six innocent lambs to a banquet, five are slaughtered, and the rest is given to her for a grand prize. "The use of living people or animals to worship the gods is what Westerners think of as a cruel druidic ritual.

Last year's famous adventure game, The Mysterious Druid Church, is based on German folklore and tells the story of a horrific murder that takes place in a mysterious house. Players take on the role of a Metropolitan Police detective known as Black Goose as he investigates a series of horrific murders. Soon the mastermind behind the scenes: a mysterious dark druid church emerges. Their purpose turned out to be a bloody murderous sacrifice to summon demons. (Cui Weiju novel)

Much of the East's knowledge of Satan can be attributed to the British Iranian writer Rushdie, who was hunted down for his work The Satanic Verses, which angered the former Iranian religious leader, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. In the West, especially in countries where Catholicism is believed. Satan is synonymous with the devil. At the mention of Satan, children are too frightened to speak. However, in recent years, such a terrible fallen angel has been worshipped by young people in many European and American countries, and has gradually evolved into a cult organization called "Satanism." As a result, one shocking human tragedy after another was staged. The religion kills animals and humans in ritual ceremonies to worship its idol, the demon king Satan (by the way: remember the sheep-headed troll in the "Big Pineapple" series? He was the popular Satan incarnation in the European Middle Ages). In the United States, there are some Satanist cultists who openly claim that their religion is derived from the ancient primitive religion "Druidism".

Actually, after the unification of Europe by Christian shili. In order to strengthen the control of thoughts, there was a process of "demonization" of the primitive religious unity throughout Europe. When Christianity first came to Europe, it was brutally suppressed by the Roman Empire, and it was popular entertainment to feed Christians to lions in the Colosseum because they were "infidels". Thirty years in Hedong and forty years in Hexi, the religious apocalyptic institutes established after the rise of Christianity continued to mutilate lives: those who did not convert to themselves were beheaded, drowned, hanged, and even burned in the fire. The reason was exactly the same as that used by the Roman emperors: the criminals were "heretics", and even Joan of Arc was burned as a witch. This kind of murder in the history of the development of Western civilization, that is, the history of the development of Christianity, does not seem to be much more noble than that of modern cultists.

3. The Long Journey: The Druids of Ireland

The original name of the druid is "Druid", and the word can be understood in two parts: the first half is related to the Greek word "drus", which means oak tree, and the second half is similar to the Indo-European ending "-wid". The end of the word means to understand. And the Druids regard acorns as holy fruits, so the ancient meaning of the name Druids is people who are familiar with oak trees. According to the ancient chronicles of Ireland, the Druids were the first colonists of the country, and they all belonged to the Japheth tribe, the most important of which was the Irish. The Druids traveled from Sithia (an area of southeastern ancient Europe centered on the northern shores of the Black Sea) into Greece, Egypt, and Spain. Finally, in 1530 BC, it reached Ireland from Spain. In all these sea migrations, the druids had a very important nucleus - the High Priest Caicos. It is said that at the very beginning of the Druids' journey, he had already made it to Erinn (the old name of Ireland) as their final destination.

When the Druids arrived in Ireland, the head of the Irish was Amakin. Amekin was a very famous Druid: he was both a great priest and a poet and judge in the Druid expeditions. The ancient Irish epic Leabhar Gabhala (a.k.a. History of Invasion) considers Amakin to be the first druid among the Irish Gaelic people. With the first Druid settlers landing in Ireland, the Druids conquered the land with lightning and spread their teachings to every inch of Ireland.

Druidic rituals and teachings are very mystical and are taught orally only according to convention. Therefore, despite the unremitting research and exploration of historians, very little is still known. Most of the information about them is from ancient Greek and Roman sources. In addition, archaeologists can only stumble upon small clues such as drawings and signs from the remains of forests, shrines, and temples. The earliest records of the Druidic Church in the history books are found in the writings of Julius Caesar and the greatest Roman historian Tacitus. During Caesar's expedition to Gaul, he reported to the Senate: "The Druidic priest had important positions and powers such as arbitration and celebrancy in the locality, and the priest was proficient in physics and chemistry, and they lived in the woods, cut down sacred acorns with golden sickles, and even sacrificed human beings!" In fact, in most cases, the Druids were recognized as the guardians of ancient intelligence. He has a high moral cultivation and has a deep knowledge of natural science and theology.

According to the records of the ancient Romans, the Druid priests were proficient in divination, in the process of prophecy. Druidic priests often used birds and beasts, such as crows and eagles, to divinate good fortune and evil. Prophecies were sometimes made by observing the throats and entrails of animals (living people used for sacrifice). On the occasion of the festival, the druid priests perform rituals to hypnotize people. Then swap souls and predict the future with dreams. Druids also believe in the eternity of the soul. After the death of a loved one, they will burn all the belongings of the deceased and even jump into the fire to hold the body of their loved one. In order to ascend to bliss with their loved ones. They would write letters to the deceased and even raise the amount of the payment so that the other person could pay it back after death. Druidism stipulates that both men and women can be Druids, and they also enjoy a high status in society, they are synonymous with law enforcers, bards, and explorers. Historians have equated druidic priests with Indian Brahmins, Persian monks, Egyptian shamans, and witch doctors.

4. Roman Attack: The Fall of the Druids

Is the legendary horror sacrifice really true? In fact, there have been killing sacrifices in the primitive religions that exist in various parts of Shijie. Early Judaism, for example, was known for this, and the Bible even devotes a section to the practice of murder and sacrifice. The Druids' understanding of life is similar to that of the Mayan civilization in South America: the belief that the sacrifice of the dead could lead to the special favor of the gods and the purification of the souls of the dead and the living. Also according to Roman records, during the Druidic rituals, the priests harvested acorns on the sixth day of the full moon, during which the acorns could not fall to the ground. and put it in pure white cloth. Then two white bulls were sacrificed, and then a feast was held. They also sometimes sacrificed animals, which were usually prisoners, but if they didn't have any, they were chosen from among the civilian population. The victims were burned alive in wooden cages. or pierced with a wooden post, or stabbed to death with a sharp weapon, or shot with an arrow. There is also the execution of the most sacred of all, the "triple death" (a ritual that only those who have chosen to become druid princes accept, and the deceased usually accept it voluntarily). The animal is first knocked unconscious with an axe, then quickly strangled with a rope with three knots made of animal muscle, and at the same time the throat is cut, and the zuihou is placed face down in four feet of water, indicating that the zuihou is drowned, and the zuihou food that the animal eats before death is a baked barley cake sprinkled with acorns. In any case, the act of murder and sacrifice can only represent barbarism and cruelty, especially since the Romans who ruled the West at that time had already entered the imperial stage of relatively civilized and civilized democratic rule of slave owners, so the self-proclaimed noble Romans were extremely disgusted by this cruel human sacrifice. The Romans themselves recorded that after the barbarian Druids repeatedly refused the Romans' orders to stop such sacrifices, the enraged Roman emperor sent legions to destroy the druids in one fell swoop. Although there have been Western scholars who have tried to justify the Druids, this kind of barbaric human sacrifice should not exist in human civilization for a long time.

The truth of history is that Druidic priests were very high Celtic priests, mages, or prophets. The Celts were a barbarian people scattered in Gaul, Britain, Ireland, Europe, Asia Minor, and the Balkans from the 5th century BC to the 1st century AD. Around the 1st century AD, the Roman Empire went on a major crusade against the Celts. Tacitus recorded that during the battle, the Druids jumped in the Celtic army dressed in black, roaring the names of the gods and cursing the Roman Empire viciously. After the victory of Rome, they not only slaughtered all the Celtic soldiers, but also bloodicured the Druids and abandoned the corpses of the priests in the sacred forests of the Druids. This battle brought the Druidism to a demise for centuries to come, and until the 16th and 7th centuries AD, the Druids remained only a dead cult or a good guardian of nature. (Cui Weiju novel)

5. The Academic Revival: The Lonely Contemporary Druids

In the ancient and vast desert plains of England, there are many strange megalithic buildings, which have stood in the wind and rain for thousands of years, watching the vicissitudes of the world. This is the puzzling ruins of ancient Stonehenge mentioned at the beginning of the article. These majestic and mysterious Stonehenges attract tourists from all over Shijie and many puzzled archaeologists, historians, architects and astronomers.

Stonehenge was first built in the late Neolithic period, around 2800 BC, when the rudiments of Stonehenge were built: round ditches, earthen mounds, huge heel stones, and the "Aubrey Pit Group". From about 2000 BC it entered the second stage of Stonehenge construction, and the entire Stonehenge was basically formed. The main buildings of this phase are a group of blue-sand rock pillars and long passages. The third phase of Stonehenge was the most important, around 1500 BC, when the sand and stone circles and arches were completed, and this is the full picture of the majestic Stonehenge ruins that we see today. It should be pointed out that the entire construction of Stonehenge required 1.5 million labor, and there was no trace of the use of wheel-loaded vehicles and livestock throughout the construction process.

From a modern perspective, the scale and engineering difficulty of Stonehenge is simply incredible for early humans. It was built 700 years before the oldest pyramid in Egypt, but it is still debated who built this majestic Stonehenge. Some believe that the tombs were built by the Celts, the ancient Romans, the temple built by the ancient Romans for the god Silas, and the Danes, but there is no conclusive evidence for these ethereal imaginations.

Countless scholars have searched for the builders of Stonehenge for many years. Scholars lament that Stonehenge is as mysterious as the Egyptian pyramids, and some have suggested that the building stones of Stonehenge were transported from more than 160 kilometers away, and that mining, transporting, and placing such huge stones required superb transportation and construction. They believed that Stonehenge and the pyramids were the work of the same mysterious builder. Scholars have even used the most advanced instruments and equipment to investigate the mysteries of Stonehenge, and strangely enough, they have discovered that the huge rocks can emit ultrasonic waves! How could the ancients know about ultrasound waves in the era of slash-and-burn farming? The scholars' investigation and research have fallen into a mystery again. In desperation, someone gave the glory of Stonehenge's architecture to extraterrestrial beings, that is, aliens. Is the Giant Array really built by aliens? There is no evidence to deny it, and there is no evidence to affirm it.

In the 17th century, the British archaeologist John Auberly first pointed out that the Druids in the Roman period may have included some older beliefs, and that they may have built the famous "Stonehenge" to worship the sun god! In 1717, William Stuckley and John Tolan, who proclaimed themselves the Druid High Priests, restored the Druids, and Henry Holly restored its ancient dogma and made it a Freemason-like charity. Interestingly, the Druid Church in the United States was founded for a completely different purpose: in 1963 the North American Reformed Druid Church was founded only as an organization founded by a group of college students in Minnesota to oppose the forced participation of students in religious services. Later, the organization developed into the Druid Church, which advocates freedom of religion and belief, and has grown to this day.

Now you know how miraculous the description at the beginning of this article is, whether the druids have the magic of turning into werewolves or bears. The reason why I write this is just to cushion the bloody smell of countless years of oppression and killing that must be involved in the text. In terms of the history of the Druids, it is clear that they had the time to build Stonehenge, but did they really have the magic to accomplish this monumental work? (To be continued.) )