Celtic Mythology and Religion

druidism.
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apple, with a cartilaginous rind, studded with
cavities like the arms of a polypus." A Roman
knight was making use of it in court to gain an unfair
verdict,
and for this was put to death by Claudius
the Emperor. And, lastly, in speaking of magic
and its " vanities," he says that " Britain celebrates
them to-day with such ceremonies that it might
seem possible that she taught magic to the Persians,"
and " Gaul was overrun with magic arts even up
to our own time, until Tiberius Caesar did away
with the Druids and this class of prophets and
medicine-men." This passage has puzzled many
commentators, for if the Druids were done away
with, how does Pliny elsewhere mention them as
still existent in Gaul ? And to add to the difficulty,
Suetonius, a generation later, says that " Claudius
abolished entirely the religion of the Druids, a religion
of dreadful barbarity, and forbidden only the
Roman citizens iinder Augustus." Pliny and
Suetonius do not agree as to which Emperor abolished
Druidism, nor can we well believe that it
was altogether
abolished even then : it would appear that
only the human sacrifices and certain modes of
divination were put a stop to. Strabo, indeed,
says as much ;
and we can see from Tacitus that
the prophecies of the Druids incurred political wrath
as late as Vespasian's time—after the abolition of
Druidism, according to Pliny. Human sacrifices
and, probably, meddling in politics were sure to bring
the wrath of Rome on the system. Tacitus gives