Celtic Paganism for Beginners (Filmed in the Scottish Highlands)

hello and welcome back to the wisdom of odin today i want to talk about celtic paganism now this may seem odd to my viewers who have been listening to the channel for a while or for people who just heard me say the wisdom of odin uh i am a norse pagan someone who worships the old norse deities but also i have a great respect for the celtic gods celtic heritage and just really celtic mythology this is something that's always kind of been there as i am very clearly of scottish or irish ancestry and definitely my mother's side and so i've always been interested but the norse gods are really the ones that called to me now this did not stop my interest in celtic paganism and celtic myth so i actually kind of researched them alongside of each other and i always found celtic mythology and celtic paganism to me much harder to research and even coming up to this video i find it very hard to find the right way to talk about it so this video is going to be quite long to give you a good view of what celtic paganism is and it is very complicated this one video cannot encapsulate all that it is i mean even looking at the term celtic the celtic people and what that means is not so simple uh you know yes you can say the people here in uh basically scotland are you know celtic people but that's an oversimplification because you also have the welsh people the pictish people uh the irish people and then you have the gaelic people as well as the germanic people who are celtic uh celtic is a very broad term and so saint celtic paganism is a very broad thing so yes there's a lot to talk about here but the thing i'm most excited for is the road trip that i'm taking you on which is why i had to make this video i am currently traveling up to scotland and so along the way i will be showing you these beautiful backdrops and talking about this subject so buckle up and get ready and bring out your notepads because there's a lot of information coming and a lot of very beautiful sights to share with you along the way [Music] now the first thing we need to talk about when it comes to researching celtic paganism is your primary source materials or at least the closest thing we have to primary source materials they're not primary because they're not actually written by celtic people they're written by the romans and the christians and so again it can just be really difficult to research into celtic paganism and another reason which i've already covered in this video and i really just wanted to show you how widespread the term celtic paganism is you may notice something different about this environment maybe my hair is a little bit longer because this segment has been filmed three weeks later in germany where i'm actually staying here in europe i'm actually in southeast germany right now in bavaria and this area has celtic history over in these hills is a celtic ring fort over there is a celtic druid stone hundreds of miles away from where i was filming in northern england and getting up into scotland and this area is considered celtic it has celtic history so i really just wanted to make sure you understood how bad of a term celtic paganism is it's just the one that is the most searchable the one that people look for the most and so it just really is hard to research this when you have such a widespread history through thousands of years dozens of different cultures and languages the people that were celtic here were very different in a lot of areas than the people who were celtic in scotland in ireland in wales uh in the golic region uh so yeah it's just it's really hard sometimes uh but now let's talk about those written source materials now in this large area we have very few source materials of very select regions so over here in the france region we have one source material coming from julius caesar in the golic wards where he talks about invading the celtic people that lived here now this work is good in some areas as we will talk about later because it talks about the druids very heavily and a lot of our information about the druids comes from this work but this work is mostly a slander piece against the celtic people and so it can be really hard to determine if what is written is true because julius caesar really focuses on the negative aspects on the human sacrifice the animal sacrifice the blood the savagery because he wasn't writing a positive image about the celtic people he was writing about a people that rome was invading it's also important to note that julius caesar most likely never met these people uh he more than likely just heard reports from other people much like how tacitus wrote about germania they both learned from the soldiers and the roman emissaries that were up there so these are secondhand accounts of secondhand sources uh so but it is a really good source when it comes to the druids uh but just note that it is kind of iffy on how 100 correct the information is now the next written source material we have come from the christians of course and we're going to head north up to wales and the mabinogian so the mabinogian is the best source of welsh mythology in lore and the welsh deities now i haven't dug too much into this myself immediately just because i don't know that much about welsh gods i plan on the future but i wanted to make sure of course i was mentioning it when i was talking about celtic paganism so if you're wanting to learn more about welsh paganism specifically the mabinogian is where you're going to want to go now moving over to ireland this is probably the source material that i know the most about and have read more in depth and the one most people probably want to know more about because this contains a lot of the deities that people worship now like the morrigan and the dagda so over here in ireland you have these cycles of irish myth and lore you have the ulster cycle the fianna cycle the king cycle and the mythological cycle and so all these cycles came from christians writing it down and so of course you have the same problems we come into with the prose and poetic edda from norse paganism is you have christian influences within these works now having said that i actually found them very enjoyable there's a lot of really humorous moments and every now and then you come across a section you're like wait what did you just say that and so i really enjoyed reading uh the cycles that come from irish mythology and so really recommend them now it can actually be really hard to find these uh in any kind of store and when you actually search the ulster cycle or the fianna cycle nothing actually pops up usually uh you might get a few different books but nothing that actually says the ulster cycle and so the best one i found came from england classic books which was their collection of irish myths and sagas and it seemed to have the most written source material that wasn't uh edited too much by the people that translated it so i really enjoyed this i also found it on kindle so i highly recommend the penguin classics uh translation and edits to the uh the four cycles of irish myth and lore i will of course link all the books i discuss in this video down below so you can check them out yourself but yeah other than that those are your three source materials the three main collections of source materials for celtic paganism so again here i am in germany so far away from where i originally was filming uh so far away from where these books were written uh and so you have very limited written source material about a wide collection of people uh so just keep that in mind that's why celtic paganism is really hard to get into or at least one of the main reasons it's hard to get into is because the the lack of amount of source material when it comes to the amazing size of the term celtic pagan so with this detour out of the way let us head back to scotland and continue this conversation on celtic paganism [Music] after our long road trip from the north of england we have finally arrived in scotland past glasgow and into the highland region so this is the first lock you see after glasgow and this is loch lomond uh it is here i want to talk about secondary source materials for you uh for celtic paganism uh so secondary source materials as far as books that have been written about celtic paganism or celtic history uh that will help you along the way or at least who have helped me along the way the first one i want to mention i actually only have on kindle which is the celts by alice roberts and i actually did see this in a bookstore here as well and there's quite a few copies but i have it on kindle here uh this book is really good if you want a good history book uh a go-to one and this one i've heard others praise as well this one is seriously amazing the alice roberts one is the first one that actually made any sense to me uh when digging through uh these books i actually have several back in the states that i have read through including the mammoth book of celtic legends and it just wasn't something that it really clicked with me and this really is the first book uh that really made me go wow this is really interesting so seriously cannot recommend this enough uh the celts by alice roberts uh it is a good historical look at the celts overall and it does have an entire section on the myths and the religion uh so again yes highly recommend it now these next two are actually two that we found here uh while traveling across england uh this was actually what we found in lindisfarne uh so this i've actually seen back in the states so this is just celtic myths and tales the author is by i don't actually see an author on here i haven't actually read through this but i have seen it in the states uh so this is just one i know you can pick up and it just has a uh a retelling of different celtic legends uh so if you actually want something that is going to be a little bit more palatable think norse mythology by neil gaiman this one we brought up for fun uh it's a horrible histories book on the celts and the headline on here is get ahead with a new sword turn your enemies into a druid fluid and cut throughout celts so it's just a little fun you know little fun things have fun with your religion now this next section in this next book i have to talk about something that i've really struggled with because i i want to make sure that it is fair but also honest this book celtic myth and magic by aiden mccoy is a beautiful book i found it in lexington where i'm from in kentucky uh and it's really thick and has a lot of information on it and it does cover some of the things that we've already mentioned uh like the ulster cycle but then it also has some things that have been added in in the last 50 or 60 so years now good things about this book one it's beautiful absolutely gorgeous and it does have a very very very long list of gods uh some of which i'll be mentioning in the next section of this video talking about the deities so if you need a reference for the large amount of deities in celtic paganism this is a good go-to book the problem is a lot of this book has been stuff that has been added to celtic paganism since the introduction of wicca i am not a wiccan and i have not done a lot of research into wicca but i do know that wicca in general is very heavily based off of celtic mythology in celtic lore but i also know that wicca has been heavily added to in modern new new age practices that is not necessarily a bad thing and i'm not saying wiccans are wrong i'm not saying practicing wicker is wrong and i'm not saying wiccans can't practice forms of celtic paganism and vice versa what i'm saying is it has made it very difficult to figure out what is traditional like real world historical celtic paganism and what is modern new age wicca practices that are disguising themselves or parading themselves as celtic practices so a lot of things and i can't give you examples for all of it uh but there is just a lot that has been added uh that just really have no actual like pinpoints in history that i can discover because there isn't a lot that can actually be pinpointed to a historical moment now anyone that's actually watched my norse pagan videos knows that this isn't a huge deal to me but also i like to structure my videos by showing the historical sources first so that you know what is historical and then i'll move more into modern new age practices as well as my own and so it's just really hard when a lot of celtic books about celtic paganism don't give you that dissertion between historical and modern and so this is one of those books where a lot of these things are modern practices that have been added in the the age of wicca maybe the best way to put it is celtic paganism influenced wicca and then wicca became its own thing and then the lines between what is wicca and what is celtic paganism really became blurred and we don't know where one begins and the other ends and so it just it can be really difficult to research just celtic paganism but with that there are some really amazing books out there the celts by alice roberts in particular is an absolutely amazing historical work and historical research and even moments of the celtic myth and magic book are good and so just really get multiple source materials it's the best thing that you can do cross-reference do your own research don't just watch this video really this is going to be another religion with homework and it's going to take years to figure things out and it's going to take you figuring things out if you're watching this video uh you know we need you celtic paganism needs you to figure out more about it to do rituals to perform it to practice it and to research it so that we can determine the differences between uh modern wicked practices and historical celtic practices as well which again there's celtic and then there's the petition that we're about to go see picture stuff and then there is the welsh stuff it's complicated but i i think in the end there is something here to hold on to and that's something we're going to be talking about here as we transition over to our next destination which is what is the castle which is done ad castle which i know nothing about but kevin's going to tell me on the road there and i'm going to do research and then we're going to talk about gods and stuff so see you then so i want to take a pause from all the information here because if you're someone getting into celtic paganism i want to recommend how i got into norse paganism and that is yes you have to do research yes you do have to you know honor your source materials and there is work to be done but at the end of the day pagan religions are about communing with nature and that is no different than with the celtic paganism to norse paganism um you know people in the ancient days saw gods in the world that they were in and i have no doubt as i'm standing here in scotland that people saw the gods here they saw their gods here something i mean it's so vast and so large how could they not believe in something vast and large and powerful and so that's what they experienced they sat around a fire they told stories they witnessed places like this felt the energy felt the wind saw the water and then they saw their gods and so if you're wanting to get into celtic paganism yes do your research but ultimately you're going to find your gods outside you're going to find your gods in nature in beautiful places and it doesn't have to be in scotland it doesn't have to be in a mountain if you're in the united states or somewhere that isn't here you can still find them but you find them outside i truly believe that pagan gods are found out in the natural world and this is where you feel the most connected and when the modern world gets so complicated and full of so much i think that's why so many people are seeking old ways that's why i found norse paganism i think it's why people want to find celtic paganism is to know what gods exist here exist in this lock exist on that mountain exist in these skies that's what people are trying to figure out because they know it's not just one big creator god they know it's multiple because these mountains are so old and full of stories that is why people believe in the old gods or at least that's why i think they do and my people are returning to them so i hope you find your answers i hope you find your gods and i hope you find scotland as well because oh it's pretty here um so anyways we're gonna get back to the video now and get back to the information segment but this is my channel this is the wisdom of odin this is what i built the channel on is sharing the facts with you sharing what i know about norse paganism what others have found out sharing experiences sharing rituals showing practices honoring the gods this is the channel there's so much content here so if you like the content here i will be talking more about celtic paganism in the future i do plan on coming back here to live for a couple of months next year if my plans work out uh and so i will be sharing more content from scotland more content about celtic paganism so if you want to see more content like that make sure you like and subscribe and all that good stuff and be ready for more adventures across this beautiful world talking about pagan subjects so with that let us get back to this video talking about celtic paganism it's so pretty do [Music] so kevin and i are currently standing on the top of fort dunham this was the object of our journey here and very interesting history before i talk about the gods i know i've been teasing you for so long but history is important especially if you want to get into paganism uh so up here is a 1500 year history as well as some mystery uh so up here on the fort uh fort donnard was supposedly or pretty pretty well known this place where kings of this time would actually come and swear their fealty to the land and declare themselves king so there's actually a very ceremonial place here and again to a child's mind to someone who doesn't really respect and love history or to someone who isn't pagan that might just see this as a stone but right here on this stone is a place where the king would place their foot and declare themselves king that is pretty amazing uh there is more history on the stone as well right here you can barely see it uh anymore but this is actually probably some of the only evidence of orgrim uh like the celtic gaelic riding right here uh some of the lines still exist and then over here you can barely see it still but there is actually the carving of a boar right here which if my history serves me correctly is usually a sign of kingship uh so it's barely in here um this drawing of a boar uh and then interestingly enough this is not on the sign back here and i haven't seen it oh is it the bowl the basin what does it say the basin's for to the left of the inauguration okay so it's barely mentioned on the sign over here but there's also a bowl this bowl over near all the poop the feces this bowl right here is obviously not natural this is a man-made bowl let me tell you something i know about man-made bowls these were used to collect things typically those things were blood of animals uh so this very much in my mind it is not listed on this side the sign simply means the inaugural bull the inaugural vessel but they don't specify what was done here i can almost guarantee you what was done here uh so 99 sure in my mind this was used for sacrifices uh when the king actually took his step only feet away uh i can also tell because all the animals have decided to defecate around here no meaning that they know what happened here a thousand years ago uh i joke but this is a very important spot i mean fort denied not a place i ever expected to be uh and really you wouldn't expect it being up here thinking that it would be something special i mean from the road it really just looks like a hill but up here is one of the most important places to ancient scotland and the ancient kingdoms that were here and as kevin has put it it also could be the ancient site of camelot uh so you know could be but still really cool hope you've enjoyed the view up here around here is apparently over 200 different historical ancient sites that have to do with ancient scotland and i really want to come back here and show you them uh but right now i can only focus on the over 200 sheep that are all bathing around me anyways uh i will head up here and we will talk about gods and celtic paganism uh but again i wanted to make this video different i didn't want to just sit in front of a screen in front of a computer screen and just list you the gods i don't think that actually shows the living reality of this religion to be able to show you a place of significance in scotland talking about the celtic gods i think that is something very important but now let us talk about the gods all right we have finally arrived at the gods section sorry to keep you waiting for so long but there's a lot of backstory that you have to know before we get in here uh because this is complicated i i there's just no getting around the fact that celtic paganism is just more complicated to get into than norse paganism at least in my experience and what it seems like the experience of others and i i was even worried to make this video because there just seems to be so much inconsistency uh with how things are shared and talked about uh and so again i just want to specify i'm not perfect at this i'm not saying i'm perfect you're not gonna be perfect no one is perfect and that is okay with that out of the way there are so many gods in the celtic pantheon because it's not just one pantheon it's the pantheon of the irish it's the pantheon of the welsh it's the pantheon of the picks it's the pantheon of the gauls it's the pantheon of the germans there's so much going on here i think the best way to show you is just to run through the list of irish deities because these are typically the ones people go to the uh first and foremost uh but i did have a list of welsh deities that i know nothing about uh so i will hopefully be talking about that at some point but i just do not feel comfortable mentioning the welsh deities just because i don't know how to pronounce them at all i don't know anything about them uh but they are out there there's there's so many and there's there's bound to be so many deities that we don't know uh celtic paganism is very location based uh and there's just so much so many different pantheons uh that one book i showed you the celtic myth and magic book listed over 400 different deities uh it's insane but here are the main ones that i hear a lot of people talking about and the ones you're probably interested in there is the dagda the morrigan macha neyman brieged [Music] new [Music] and ogma so i put a little bit of what we know about these deities under them again i'm not an expert in any of these um but i just wanted to give you a list so you can start doing your research as always i apologize for the wind up here but wrapping up the god section here another thing that makes god worship and veneration and research really difficult when it comes to celtic paganism is the fact that it's really hard to determine who is a god and who is not and who's a hero so it's just one of those things that you're really going to have to practice and i want people to go out there and practice which is why i'm making this video uh so in order to practice you're gonna need to know how so we need to talk about rituals and why we perform rituals which also means we need to talk about druids so let's head to another location and talk about ritual practice within celtic paganism [Music] so when talking about rituals and the practices of pagans of the celtic era all the different peoples there uh it can't be quite difficult because much like many pagan practices nothing was written down and so we have nothing to really say this is definitively the way people gave offerings let alone you know individuals and groups like we know some about the group offering some about the holidays and things like that uh but the most information we get from the celtic side is from the druids which are pretty predominantly known and were heavily written about by julius caesar in his works slightly mentioned once again by tacitus but for the most part we get a lot of our information from julius caesar there are many druidic orders that exist today that have tried to revive the teachings of the druids but there's a few problems with that that i want to discuss but also i think i have the perfect place to talk about the druids and that is a stone circle that is actually labeled as a druid stone a druid temple this entire area everything around here is called druid something the druid cottages the druid temple um because of this area right here and one of the most amazing things i have to show you here is the fact that this druid temple is covered in oak trees and the reason that's important is because it's one of the few aspects of druids that we know is that they saw oak trees as sacred as connections to the other world and so many of their rituals were held around oak trees and oak trees were a central part so that is something that we can pull out for uh celtic pagans that want to practice today is oak trees are definitely going to be a place that you want to go to to perform your rituals now stone circles would also be a really good place to do it and you may have to build your own if you have your own land but this stone circle here in particular is very impressive i've seen a few on this trip now and this one really has a presence to it and so you can make assumptions here you can make assumptions that over here by the big central pillar and the platform right there the offerings were made there but we don't know and offerings at this time would come in the form of animal or human sacrifice according to julius caesar now again as i mentioned at the beginning of this video this isn't necessarily proof or you know you know the truth about druidic paganism or druids in general is the fact of animal and human sacrifice this is something that from the viking age that we see a lot of people focusing on we have to remember that julius caesar was writing these things not to show them as beautiful people with a wonderful culture he was trying to get them seen as savages so a lot of the information would have been focused on the savagery and that they were different than the romans what i really want to focus on is the act of giving offerings because this is something that is pretty common among many pagan traditions including norse paganism and of course yes we can say animal sacrifice and human sacrifice but obviously we don't do those things in this modern age the only thing animals sacrifice if you do own like this farmer here he has his own animals obviously he has to butcher them to get their meat uh and so if you have animals that you actually own and you actually run a farm then animal sacrifice could still be an option but for the majority of people following this faith today following celtic paganism they're going to give votive offerings which essentially means offerings that do not kill something in the process now this still can be meat that you buy from a grocery store but you're not actively killing the animal you're not actively draining the blood uh and this is something that i have seen uh other places uh actually in germany i was at druid stones or supposed druid stones that had cuts in the rock to collect some form of liquid it's not a long jump to say that possibly this was blood for animal sacrifices sorry for the rain i mean i couldn't pass up the opportunity to film at a druidic temple a supposed druidic temple in the rain i mean what an amazing place to talk about this but looking out here and just seeing it you can really picture what could have happened we don't know the details looking at i mean this this is the memory of a of a group of people of the the spiritual leaders that once you know led these people led these faiths and the druids were far beyond just spiritual leaders they were also advisors uh politician lawmakers uh craftsmen there was so much to the druids that we do not know and they had so many aspects of society and one of the reasons we don't know that much about them outside of julius caesar's writings is because the druids as said by julius caesar did not write anything down that they actually were against writing things down they wanted past things orally and so of course this makes it very difficult to research a group of individuals that led a religious society when they didn't write anything down so really we're just left with the memories of what they used to do there is no signs about this place uh this druid temple here but if it's anything like the other stone circles i've seen here it's within the thousands of years old so it actually could not be celtic it could be pre-history pre-celtic people here in scotland so ultimately we do not know that much about ritual practice from this time but we do know about this mystery of the druids and like i said druidism is still something that is practiced today and again these groups bring on their new life and they have to fill in the blanks because that is what has to happen but our actual knowledge of what they did is very limited um we know oak trees we know mistletoe was important uh we know sacrifices and offerings were important we know they had various roles in society we know they were fairly high rankings in society and that they were very feared by the their opponents um this is something that was written by tacitus oh i need to switch arms i could bring my tripod so this was something that was written by tacitus is that the druids were very feared in war when the romans went against them here in the british isles uh they would be a part of the war ban they would chant spells uh they would you know murmur ancient spells and and scary things that would scare the romans and the romans didn't want to fight them i mean the celtic people were a very warlike people and the druids were a part of that druids were the druids were a part of creating that that terror and that magic and the romans really saw their magic as a thing that they had to actually worry about and the druids were at the center of that magic uh so again i wish i could give you more details specifically about the history of all this uh but i just simply can't and not as a practicing celtic pagan myself i don't want to overstep my bounds but i will share as a norse pagan i think the way we give offerings is very similar uh we have a moment we call to whatever we're calling to we go to a place like this where we go to a place in our own homes or within our own homes we thank a deity we thank an ancestor we thank a spirit uh and then we give an offering and maybe talk with them ask for something ask for guidance and that's a basic pagan practice i think that's something that transitions not only norse paganism celticism but many pagan practices including wicca and so yes historically it's going to be very very hard to practice celtic paganism as close to historically accurate as possible unless you're going to go to places like this and start sacrificing animals and people because that's what julius caesar told you to do uh but i don't think we should necessarily listen to julius caesar and you're going to have to build your own practices based on this foundation from thousands of years ago again human society has evolved and so therefore the spiritual practices will have to evolve as well but i wanted to give this to you if you want to research more into the druids like i said there's many things out there just but keep in mind that a lot of our actual knowledge about them comes from julius caesar and a few artifacts and of course studying and making theories about places like this um but yeah i think that's all i have to cover on rituals and offerings if you haven't caught on to this theme yet i'm really big on simplifying things down and then expanding from there so you're very simple offering call to the deity called whoever you're calling to give the offering have that conversation ask for your guidance and thank them and send them back to where they came from that is essentially a basic pagan ritual that i think you can build any practice off of including a celtic one [Music] so one thing i know a lot of people are going to ask when it comes to cell to paganism and the reason i say this because a lot of people asked it when i got into norse paganism in fact it was one of the first questions i got asked is if there was any moral code so christianity has sinning and not sinning and you know and atoning for your sins and then norse paganism a little bit has the honor code and then what is told to us in the havamal sadly from what i can tell in celtic paganism and celtic culture there really isn't something ancient that is written down nothing like to have them all saying like these are the ways to live by and again not at least in the pagan way of life and the way i the reason i say this is because i would say like highland culture would be a really good one to look at like highland culture is very you know entrenched it has an identity it has a tradition and those things more than likely came from a pagan source from an ancient source and so a lot of the things that are still held as important to highland people to the people that live here now and to even highland culture in the last thousand years are things that probably would have been held as important to people uh in the pagan era and this spot right here is a good example of that this is the mcdonald war memorial uh or the massacre here at glen coe so the mcdonald clan and its leader were in this clansmen were massacred here by the campbells uh in the 1600s and this was erected in the 1800s as a way to remember them and something we learned from the norse is the importance of remembrance of your ancestors and so doing things like this even though it is christian clearly noted from the cross the top is still a way culturally to maintain your identity and again honoring your ancestors is something that does come from pagan roots and something we do have evidence of within ancient celtic beliefs uh because i mean i literally last night was at a a burial mound uh you know nothing significant that i need to talk about besides the fact that it's 4 500 years old and so remembering your ancestors and doing things to honor them is something that comes from the ancient past that has carried on into modern tradition it also helps that the view here at glencoe is pretty amazing also there's kevin kevin you finally snuck in the video [Laughter] uh but yeah the view here is amazing and i did want to mention we drove by a youth hostel here uh that you can rent out a couple of them and so we're really pushing our uk fellowship leader terry to have a fellowship in northern traditions gathering here in scotland uh in glencoe because it's absolutely mind-bogglingly beautiful so if you want to join one of our gatherings that we have now in the uk uh make sure you check out our fellowship at northern traditions website and when we do say northern traditions we also mean norse paganism celtic paganism and slavic paganism we're really honoring the gods that have come from northern europe and so celtic gods have been brought into rituals uh before in the past just recently at the uk gathering we just had here like a week ago kevin brought up the god luke which is a celtic deity and so it's something we are interested in bringing our community while we are primarily focused on the norse deities um it is something that we are bringing in so if you're interested in joining us for our gatherings uh we will hopefully be having one here in glencoe as long as we can make terry come up this far north i mean but seriously look how beautiful that is [Music] one of the biggest questions we ask when getting into religion or questioning our nature in the universe is where do we go when we die and to a north speaking like myself we believe in things such as valhalla or helheim or just the different halls of the gods to christians heaven and hell you know nirvana for others but for the celtic pagans it is a little bit different so i found a perfect location to talk about the afterlife as well as the life celebrations that they held during the holy days and that is this barrow so an actual burial mound that has been hollowed out and has a hollow entrance as well this is one of the coolest pagan sites i have ever been to in my life might be the coolest thing i've ever seen in my life so some of the history about this borrow real quick so it does have a stone circle that goes all the way around it beautiful vistas around it as well inside uh so it's over four thousand years old inside was a woman but the body was not there it was just the imprint like the memory of someone uh the body had long decayed but also there was a ceremonial practice to it so i guess there were thousands of quartz shards found in here which suggest according to the sign over here that this was a very ceremonial religious burial now again we do not know what deities the people that put this here followed this is not necessarily a celtic barrow this is not necessarily a celtic pagan thing this is something from the pre-people from the people that were here before and so again that's one of the things that makes cult paganism so difficult um is actually like figuring these things out because we don't know what deities or what practices were followed here let me take you to the top of the barrel which is allowed it is does say yields it is loud uh before someone questions me on that uh but up here is really the really cool part so tell me you don't get some serious skyrim vibes from this i've never seen this i've seen several burial mounds across the world but i've never seen one with an open entrance on the roof like this absolutely incredible amazing magical again stone circle all the way around anyways let us talk about celtic paganism at least european celtic paganism what we understand hopefully you're getting the gist um towards the end of this video here um so burial practices typically mound typically given back to the earth that is where we're going to get a lot of the ideas of the afterlife but we also get some of those ideas from the druids that we mentioned in the writings of julius caesar it seems that the druids promoted and practiced an idea of reincarnation that giving up a life here meant a life was born elsewhere so typically that was also in the family line the ancestral line and from what i have been able to tell there is the idea of the other world so in most religions there typically is an upper world in the lower world and from what i can tell from most celtic paganism it seems that there is an idea of the other world but there isn't necessarily an idea of the lower world in the upper world like many religions and so for the most part when you die here you go to the other world and then a life is born here and so it goes back and forth like a transition of energy between our world and their world uh so definitely this idea of reincarnation particularly the family line seems to be something that is prevalent to celtic tradition and otherwise there is very little information on celtic deities of the dead celtic deities of the afterlife or what their afterlife would be otherwise and once again a lot of the information comes from these burial mounds and again this isn't necessarily a celtic burial mound this is a burial mound that just so happens to be in a celtic place so very difficult uh so when getting into celtic paganism and you're wondering where do i go when i die i think the answer really is this idea of reincarnation so live a good life here and then hopefully the rewards of this life carry to the next uh one thing that we have found across burial mounds celtic and alike is this idea of offerings giving offerings to the next life or something to take with you to the next life again something we see in the norse tradition as well as the celtic tradition the burial mound we saw last night had an offering bowl that had a liquid in it that was buried with the person and so this idea of having something to take with you to the next life seems to be something that carries over many cultures and traditions including in celtic tradition so i do actually want to take you inside of the barrow here which once again is allowed uh so i will take you down here it is very low um but i really just want to give you this experience so you can join me i haven't been in here yet so it is very low to the ground but once again we are allowed to go in here so let's do it [Music] of course i had to so just because we can come in here and it says that we're allowed by according to the rules doesn't mean that we don't go that extra pagan step uh and so since this is something we obviously already talked about this video is the idea of offerings i can't tell you i can't show you the source material that says you need to give an offering to the burial mound when you're there and visit but out of respect for the entity the presence the history here we can still give small amounts of offerings in fact behind these two rocks is clearly an offering left by somebody else uh there's two feathers in here that clearly were not put in here naturally because they were put behind these two rocks so it's obviously something people have come here and done is left offerings here and we do have candy like a sugary treat where's the sugary treats so this is something you can get here in scotland it basically is sugar cubes as i have tried them and it's just sugar cubes um so this might seem simple to you but this is something i'm really big on to my norse pagan audience is offerings don't have to be these massive things a lot of the times offerings were very simple from what we know of the ancient world it was salt it was water it was sugar um you know small things it didn't have to be this big animal sacrifice like we mentioned before and so in small moments like this having just sugar something that used to be a you know such a rare thing so something so hard to actually get can be left as an offering and you might call this upg whatever you want to say but again giving an offering here doesn't have to be so complicated really it can be standing here in the middle of a barrow or out in nature wherever you're from and being thankful and reflecting on who used to live here the history of these rocks the history of these stones uh the area around here the mountains the cows outside and just enjoying the peace so to the presence here to gratitude to thanks to whatever god looks over this land to whoever was buried here thank you i hope this small gift of sugar from your homeland as it stands now shows my love for the history and what came before [Music] here i am at the clava cairns which align with the summer and winter solstice but the most interesting aspect of this area is the fact that it has a burial mound that isn't actually a burial mound here is a ring mound or a ring circle that they mentioned or at least what they're calling it because it doesn't appear to be used for any burial practices unlike the two other mounds here one of which over here which was which was used as a burial mound and the one over here which was also used as a burial mound so this here in the center the only thing they can actually guess of what it is is a ritual space and within the center of it they have detected that they there was fires at some point but no bodies buried so yes it could have just been a giant campfire but more than likely this was used for some kind of ceremonial purposes now it could have been used as just a one-and-done kind of thing to celebrate the two burial mounds being built but it appears that it more likely was used multiple times through multiple celebrations now these do align with the winter and summer solstices that does not actually mean that the celtics pagans the celtic people venerated during the winter and summer solstice once again this came from the people before the celts more unlikely the picks or the people that came before the picks use these as celebrations for the mid-summer and the winter solstice celebrations from what we can tell from celtic paganism through the source material it appears that the celtic people more than likely celebrate their own versions of holidays at their own specific dates for instance they would have a beginning of the spring beginning of the harvest festival and then they would have an end of the harvest festival and then two festivals in between rather than celebrating the actual moments of the sun moving around the earth so the first one being imbulk which was the beginning of the harvest that took place roughly around springtime and then you have another festival beltane which was the like really the hard work beginning the the planting season really coming into full uh swing and then the fire festival during that celebration as well where livestock would actually move through two fires uh to symbolize you know uh you know growth and fertility and prosperity again very similar to other pagan celebrations of summer and then as you approach the end of summer you have the lunasa festival which was the beginning of the harvest season uh after that you have the celebration of samhain which happens around october 31st through november 1st uh and it is the celebration of the end of the harvest season and it's also when the veil is the thinnest beltane is also considered the opposite of that as well when the veil is the thinnest once again so possibly these were the more spiritual holidays but all four were actually agrarian and fire festivals combined now within welsh tradition the celebration of mabon or mabon also occurs but it doesn't seem to be celebrated by all celtic pagans and not necessarily by celtic pagans of the past many modern practitioners of pagan beliefs today in particular wicca do follow the wheel of the year which also includes the self uh the equinoxes and the solstices as well the fire festivals and often mabon as well so it's ultimately going to be up to you what you celebrate i actually really like what kevin does within the community who's here with me uh he celebrates the equinoxes and the solstices as a norse pagan tradition within our community and then he often celebrates the fire festivals on his own or if we have festivals around that time we actually had a beltane festival this year in our community in north carolina with lauren who's the other person here with us and so these celebrations are really up to you but it really appears that the historic celtic tradition was in bulk to begin with beltane lunasa and then sound to finish out the year but again it is ultimately up to you how you celebrate your holidays as a celtic pagan now the information bit is out of the way this place is seriously really cool i mean two burial mounds ring thing right here that was most likely used for celebrations lots of flat stones another little cairn in the center here that was used as a singular burial later on supposedly then these were built there was quartz offerings pottery offerings and other things i've not been to stonehenge but i think you should go to clavicharans instead uh there is still a decent amount of people who have totally heard me talk all about this but maybe they learned something so really cool location lots of really cool things to see and let me tell you this road trip has been crazy i hope you've been enjoying it and we are about to wrap up this video so really this is the end of the information but i do want to show you one last beautiful thing uh to close us out you know what real paganism is to me is being in an ancient castle in scotland looking over loch ness and having a double rainbow form right next to you [Music] this is what religion should be [Music] so ending this video in a church yard might be weird considering we started in a stone circle and traveled to several stone circles and grave mounds but of all the things we've seen on this journey and in this introduction into celtic paganism what is behind me right here is actually the oldest thing we have seen so behind me here is the oldest tree recorded in europe this is a 5 000 year old yew tree and it is where i want to end this video 5 000 years is really hard to comprehend i mean as they have on their stone slabs here that goes all the way back to the stone age of humanity some of the earliest dates we know uh but that's kind of the beauty of celtic paganism in general as well as we started this video with there are so many different cultures people groups languages uh history i mean thousands of years of human history are contained within the term celtic paganism uh i do believe there probably is a better term out there i think this is why you see some breakdowns of individual pagan groups within the under the banner of celtic paganism but this was the best way for me to share this content with you and i think this is what a lot of people end up looking up so they're as i've said many times throughout this video it is really hard to talk about this because we're talking about 5 000 years of human history right here in this tree uh the people that were around this tree honoring it and you know venerating it and maybe not even knowing how far it would go uh one of the things that actually was noted here on the sign is that at one point this tree was actually called the tree of eternity uh before christianity came here and built this church uh and so even before this church stood here this tree was known as something special to the people that existed here so through all the things through the stones through the burial mounds uh through the trees to the mountains through all of this beauty and throughout the conversation about the ulster cycle the mabinogian and you know julius caesar all these things you know it only means so much as i've also said in this video experiencing life being in balance with nature honoring your ancestors honoring the gods these are the ways that you're going to be able to connect to what it is to be a celtic pagan and traveling through these lands again still calling myself a norse pagan i can feel it i can feel the celtic energy i can feel that magic that people talk about it exists in these mountains it exists in these trees and exists in those stone circles uh and so that is where you're going to find the celtic gods the celtic way is in nature and beauty and maybe even in yourself as you discover more about this beautiful world we live in so i really hope this video helped you i really hope this information has given you the starting ground to begin your own practice on and i'm very excited to explore more about celtic paganism in the future so if you want to learn more about celtic paganism in the future or other pagan subjects please think about subscribing to this channel and if you want to see me come to more places like this this is why i have a patreon which is the only reason i'm able to do this come to these places and share it with you so if you want to become one of the hundreds of people that support this channel and ensure that i'm able to record this and share it with you please think about going down below other than that thank you so very much for joining me for this video across this journey across northern england and scotland and until the hall skull well now you get to be in the end of the video now my road trip partners there's lauren she was there part of the time before she got stuck and there's kevin he gave me a lot of information told me how to pronounce things so if i was wrong it's all his fault and goodbye [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] you

Channel: Jacob Toddson

Views: 96,386

Keywords: pagan, Norse Paganism, Vikings, heathen, heathenry, books, list, Odin, Thor, Freya, gods, old gods, religion, wicca, Wiccan, shaman, shamanism, yule, pagan holidays, yuletide, pagan christmas, holidays, yggrasil, heilung, ritual, Asatru for beginners, norse pagan ritual, Norse Pagan Religion, norse pagan, the wisdom of odin, celtic, celtic pagan, celtic paganism, irish, Irish paganism, Welsh Paganism, Celtic Mythology, Celtic Myth, Celtic legends, Celtic lore, Druids, Dagda, Morrigan, Scotland, Pictish

Id: zDxrwPc1bkw

Length: 51min 21sec (3081 seconds)

Published: Wed Aug 10 2022