Who Were the First British Wizards?
WIZARDS EXISTED IN BRITAIN LONG before Hogwarts
was founded. Early wizards were known as Druids (as in Druidess
Cliodna, who is depicted on a Famous Witches
and Wizards trading card). The name comes from the Celtic for
“knowing the oak tree.” They were the scholarly class in Britain
and Gaul (what is now France).
Druids acted as local priests, teachers, and
judges. They also gathered annually in what is now the French city
of Chartres to debate broader questions and settle
controversies.
The Roman ruler Julius Caesar, who conquered
Gaul and Britain and recorded what he learned of those lands, said
the Druids “discuss and teach to the youth many things respecting
the stars and their motion, respecting the extent of the world and
of our earth, respecting the nature of things, respecting the power
and majesty of the immortal gods.”
For centuries scholars thought the Druids built
Stonehenge, the circular monument on Salisbury Plain, England. But
some now believe it is much older than Druid culture.
See also: Death Eaters
Wizards
Druid training could last as long as twenty
years. As Caesar suggests, it included instruction in poetry,
astronomy, and philosophy, as well as religion.
The Druids worshipped several nature gods—they
believed in a religious force that pervaded all living things. They
also believed in immortality and reincarnation. Their rituals
included animal and perhaps even human sacrifice. Caesar claimed
they used twigs and branches to build huge frame sculptures in the
shape of a man, then filled the inside of the sculptures with
living people and set the sculptures ablaze. However, some scholars
dispute this assertion, saying Caesar was unfairly biased against
the Druids because they vigorously resisted his rule.