A History of Ancient Britain (51 page)

Everyone today thinks they know what druids look like – odd characters in robes, usually to be spotted mooning about ancient sites like Stonehenge during mid-summer. The truth of their
existence in antiquity, however, is harder to find.

Archaeologist Miranda Green, of Cardiff University, is an expert on druids, among other things. She said the historical references that do survive make clear they were in some ways more
important than tribal leaders, or even kings. ‘They were right at the top of society,’ she said. ‘We know that the kings listened to their advice. They were like Old Testament
prophets. ‘One of the things that made them important was that they overarched society – so that you might have kings of tribes but the druids would connect with each other through huge
areas of Europe, so they acted like a sort of Celtic glue.’

According to Green the druids were so respected and feared they had the power to start and to finish wars. ‘They even intervened in times of warfare. They could walk out into the middle of
a battlefield – and stop the fighting. To go against a druid would be almost as bad as being dead, because you would be exiled. Nobody would speak to you and you were then beyond society
– because of the word of a druid.’

The druids apparently wrote nothing down. Caesar himself recorded that their secret knowledge – their lore – was learned by rote and held only in the memory. All of the contemporary
references to druids are therefore the work of a few Greek and Roman writers, so that our image of them is a distortion seen through the lens of biased observers. They seemingly conducted their
religious services in the open air and their sacred places
were often close to water and oak trees, especially those bearing mistletoe. Animals and humans were sacrificed
during their ceremonies and Caesar wrote about the use of the Wicker Man, a giant wooden effigy within which people were burnt alive.

Much is made of their ability to see or rather to divine the future and there is even a class of archaeological artefact, mostly found in Britain and Ireland, that has been cited as evidence for
the practice. Since the nineteenth century a total of 15 enigmatic little bronze spoons have been recovered from a variety of contexts. Usually they occur in pairs and the majority came to light in
the days before anyone bothered much about recording the precise circumstances of their discovery. Two sets have more recently been excavated from within graves and one from a bog close by a
natural spring of water. Most of the others are believed to have come from small hoards deliberately buried or placed in boggy or watery places. Only one pair have been found on Continental Europe,
in the grave of a woman excavated on a site in the Marne region of France; and even those are thought to have been British or Irish in origin.

They are the queerest little objects. Called ‘spoons’ because they feature a shallow bowl, they are actually of a form that is quite unique and distinctive. To me they suggest the
shape taken on by a leaf cupped in the hand to hold water. One end is gently pointed, the other straight-edged so that it forms a simple handle. In all but the French examples one bowl of the pair
has an incised cross that divides it into four equal quadrants, while the other is plain but for a tiny hole off to one side (in the case of the French spoons, one bowl is completely plain while
the other has both a cross, and a hole drilled or punched where the lines intersect). Sometimes the ‘handles’ are decorated with typically Celtic artwork but in truth they are too few
and far between to allow many generalisations to be made.

Most archaeologists are agreed the spoons look as though they were used for ritual purposes. Best guesses suggest they were held together, either with bowls facing one another like castanets or
with one inside the other, bowl within bowl. Liquid or powder could then be dripped or blown through the hole and, depending on its dispersal among the quadrants on the lower bowl, assumptions made
about the future, or the will of the gods.

Green described the likely scene, with the druid being consulted by the chief or petty king about what was likely to happen next. The whole affair was obviously open to exploitation by the man
in the long robe. ‘Having heard the question, the druid would have the choice of what to say in
response,’ she said. ‘So I think what you’ve got here
is a way of manipulating the future and manipulating power.’

In a manner wholly befitting characters for whom mystery and intrigue were stock in trade, the druids have all but managed to disappear. Little else but 15 spoons scattered between Britain,
Ireland and France sounds like a pretty clean getaway. The only other evidence is in the form of the graves that provided the contexts for three of the little caches of cutlery.

The French grave was that of a woman; and if she was a member of that priestly class of advisors and seers then her existence at least suggests not all druids were men. The graves of two men,
one in Burnmouth in the Borders and another at Mill Hill, in Deal, Kent contained the other pairs. That they too were accompanied into the next world by such unusual objects suggests they were
unusual people, members of an unusual sect.

A second burial from Mill Hill contained the skeleton of a man whose grave goods might have suggested that in life he was a warrior. He was in his early to mid thirties when he died, sometime
around 200
BC
, and had been laid on his back, partly covered by a large shield. The wood of the shield had long since decayed and its existence was revealed only by telltale
surviving bronze fittings. Alongside him was an iron sword inside a scabbard decorated with more fittings of cast bronze. There was a brooch as well, also made of bronze and decorated with
coral.

On his skull was a piece of headgear that, given the sword and shield, might have been taken for a helmet. Closer examination of the find, however, revealed it was a dainty thing, a loop of
bronze to fit around the skull and a band curving over the crown from ear to ear. Great skill had been required to make the pieces, rivet them together – and then to apply a fine tracery of
Celtic curls and lines to the outer face. A few of the dead man’s hairs were found snagged in the band, making it clear there had been no leather or other padding between the metal and the
head. In short, it was no helmet, rather some sort of headdress.

Then there was the skeleton itself. It was small for an adult male – the bones of the pelvis and skull left no room for doubt about the sex – but at least one of the excavators
remarked upon the ‘feminine’ nature of the slender bones. The burial has gone into some of the archaeological literature as that of the ‘Deal Warrior’ but it seems unlikely
he would ever have swung that sword of his in anger. So who was he?

Iron Age specialist Ian Stead looked at the headdress and found it most closely resembled ceremonial gear worn by religious leaders in Roman
Britain fully 200 years
later. His burial had been within a cemetery but set some distance away from all of the other graves. Was he set apart from the mass of men in death, just as he had been separate from them in
life?

There seems enough about the circumstances of his burial to suggest that, rather than any kind of warrior, he was a man whose status was born of something other than physical strength or martial
prowess. Perhaps he fought his battles on behalf of the spiritual well-being of his people, and when he died they laid their druid in the ground armed and garbed to keep fighting on their
behalf.

Archaeologists found another enigmatic grave in a cemetery at Stanway, outside Colchester. Excavated during the 1990s, the collection of burials appeared to be of people regarded as special by
those who laid them in the ground. They died in the few years either side of the Roman invasion of
AD
43 and yet nothing about their graves or the personal items buried with
them suggested they actually were Roman. Rather they were native Britons who had knowledge of Rome and who valued some of the luxury items available from there. Among the grave goods were a pottery
inkwell – implying knowledge of writing at least, if not the ability actually to write; an amber-coloured glass bowl and an elegant blue-glass jar that may once have held make-up of some
sort. Both vessels likely came all the way from Rome.

One man’s grave in particular captured the imaginations of the archaeologists. Alongside his mortal remains were a dinner set, with vessels of both red and black pottery, and two wooden
boxes. None of the organic material survived, but the hinges and other fittings revealed their shadows. One box contained bronze drinking vessels, the other a mysterious gaming board with glass
beads for gaming pieces. Placed on top of the board were rods of bronze and iron, some interpreted as divining rods – tools for looking into the future – and others more identifiable as
those of a surgeon – forceps, scalpel and the like. Some have looked at the finds and called him a doctor; others prefer to think of him as a druid.

Whoever they were and whatever became of most of their bodies when they died, the British druids were real and a cause of much anxiety for those tasked with invading their land. The Romans had
practised sacrifice in their time – of people as well as animals – but had consigned it to the past long before they contemplated the conquest of Britannia. They were determined from
the outset to destroy the druids, whom they regarded as powerful and hardline Celtic insurgents and who would not prove easy prey.

Even as the first century
AD
drew to a close the Romans were still in the
messy, frightening business of bringing them to bay. Tacitus, who gifted
that legendary speech to Calgacus, the first named Scot, also recorded a climactic encounter between Roman soldiers and druids on the island of Anglesey in Wales:

All of that lay far off in the future – during the lifetimes of the great-, great-, great-grandchildren of those Roman soldiers who contemplated Britannia in the middle of the first
century
BC
. Sensed from the coastline of Gaul, it seemed a strange place. It was a strangeness thousands of years in the making, much of it the product of separation from
the European mainland by just 21 miles of cold, grey water.

Julius Caesar’s invasions of Britain in 55 and 54
BC
are so familiar they feel like touchstones. Told and retold down the centuries, the words and dates have become
their own memorials. For all that, some portion of it bears retelling here.

The oft-repeated account has it that early on the morning of 23 August 55
BC
the first of 98 transport ships, carrying two legions of professional foot soldiers and a
cavalry force, appeared on the horizon off the coast of Kent. Caesar led the campaign himself and initially made for Dover. Word of what the general had in mind had gone before him, however, spread
by merchants with contacts on both sides of the Channel, and the Romans were expected. Apparently the sight of thousands of British warriors lining the tops of the White Cliffs made any attempt at
landing there unappealing to say the least, and the fleet headed a few miles round the coast instead, looking for an open beach suitable for disembarking the men.

Wherever they went, the defenders followed, armed with shields and long swords. There was to be no unopposed landing and it seems likely that Roman and British blood
finally mingled for the first time that late summer in the shallows off Walmer Beach. By any standards it was a scrappy first encounter. Eventually the Romans got enough men ashore to establish a
beachhead; but since their cavalry could not get off their ships to drive home any advantage, a stalemate developed. Caesar would later crow about how the Britons had been cowed by his arrival on
their shores – that they quickly capitulated and offered him hostages as proof of their good will – but he was undoubtedly being economical with the truth. Many of his ships were
damaged by waves pounding onto the beach, as late summer turned to autumn, and soon there was a real threat of finding his troops stranded without means of returning to Gaul. More indecisive
fighting followed – the British attacking, the Romans defending their position – until finally Caesar withdrew, back onto the remains of his ships.

Before the year’s end they were back on the other side of the Channel again. What might have been regarded as failure was successfully spun the other way by the general and Emperor-to-be.
As it turned out the mere fact that he had actually gone to Britain – and landed an army on the beach there – was enough to persuade the Senate back in Rome his efforts were deserving
of a ceremony of thanksgiving.

Having licked his wounds, Caesar spent the winter of 55
BC
and the spring of the following year preparing to return and finish what he had started. By 7 July 54
BC
, by his own account at least, he was back in Kentish waters with a fleet of 800 ships and a fighting force comprising five legions of soldiers and 2,000 mounted men
– an army perhaps 50,000 strong.

This time the landing was unopposed. Those resistant to Ceasar awaited him elsewhere, inland. But for the British there was a problem: some of them hated each other far more than they hated
Rome. The classic account becomes then a tale of hubris – of a land and its peoples undone and undermined by petty rivalries. At a time when the independent tribes of Britain needed to set
aside their squabbles in favour of tackling the greater foe, they allowed themselves to be blinded to the bigger picture by selfishness and by hopes of personal gain.