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Bards have an identity problem!
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<blockquote data-quote="Haldrik" data-source="post: 8073078" data-attributes="member: 6694221"><p>When the Bard uses Intelligence, it seems more like History or Legal Studies. When the Wizard uses Intelligence, it seems more like Mathematics or Chemistry. But they share much in common, because both investigate magic power and magic traditions. So they are looking at the same thing, dreamlike symbols, despite different approaches to it.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>In British history, when Christianity arrived, Christians embraced the Bard yet demonized the Druid. There must have been a difference between the two. It seems to me, the Bard was fundamentally non-theistic, while the Druid was fundamentally polytheistic.</p><p></p><p>I suspect the Christians interpreted the prescient abilities of the Bard as able to come from the Christian Holy Spirit, and likewise the blessings and curses that relate to fate, as from Divine providence. Perhaps even the overt magical abilities such as shapechanging were moreorless "secular" sotospeak, depending on ones own mind and skill.</p><p></p><p>By contrast, the Druid appears to be a sacred priestly caste dedicated to Celtic gods, as Romans mention, and that they also functioned as community leaders as teachers. It seems, structurally, the Druids functioned much the same way that Irish Catholic priests traditionally function in Ireland, more as sacred community spiritual leaders, separate from secular government leaders. Their focus was on the personal wellbeing of the members of their congregation, and had much say about the lives of each member, and moral authority. The Druids appear to be members of a specific family, a clan or tribe who inherited their priestly status. Romans mentioned Druids were pacifists, in the sense sacred tradition forbade them from fighting with weapons. But the Druids were known for magical abilities, including cloud magic for divination. I suspect the potion-making traditions (across Celtic Europe) with weird natural ingredients of the "eye of newt" variety, are probably a Druid thing. Celtic lore mentions such potions. An other feature of Celtic magic generally is the union of opposites, where both opposites are true simultaneously. For examples, new year is both the end and the beginning of the cyclical year, an earthmound is both above ground and below ground at the same time, wearing a sod of grass as a hat is both above and below ground, Merlin was born as an elder and aged backward becoming more youthful, and so on. These unions are vehicles of magical feats. In any case, cognates of the word "druid" later became a generic word for "magic" generally, so it is difficult to distinguish which kinds of "magic" the historical Druids practiced. But at least, it seems the Druids did do magic, and their magic was inherently polytheistic in approach.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Haldrik, post: 8073078, member: 6694221"] When the Bard uses Intelligence, it seems more like History or Legal Studies. When the Wizard uses Intelligence, it seems more like Mathematics or Chemistry. But they share much in common, because both investigate magic power and magic traditions. So they are looking at the same thing, dreamlike symbols, despite different approaches to it. In British history, when Christianity arrived, Christians embraced the Bard yet demonized the Druid. There must have been a difference between the two. It seems to me, the Bard was fundamentally non-theistic, while the Druid was fundamentally polytheistic. I suspect the Christians interpreted the prescient abilities of the Bard as able to come from the Christian Holy Spirit, and likewise the blessings and curses that relate to fate, as from Divine providence. Perhaps even the overt magical abilities such as shapechanging were moreorless "secular" sotospeak, depending on ones own mind and skill. By contrast, the Druid appears to be a sacred priestly caste dedicated to Celtic gods, as Romans mention, and that they also functioned as community leaders as teachers. It seems, structurally, the Druids functioned much the same way that Irish Catholic priests traditionally function in Ireland, more as sacred community spiritual leaders, separate from secular government leaders. Their focus was on the personal wellbeing of the members of their congregation, and had much say about the lives of each member, and moral authority. The Druids appear to be members of a specific family, a clan or tribe who inherited their priestly status. Romans mentioned Druids were pacifists, in the sense sacred tradition forbade them from fighting with weapons. But the Druids were known for magical abilities, including cloud magic for divination. I suspect the potion-making traditions (across Celtic Europe) with weird natural ingredients of the "eye of newt" variety, are probably a Druid thing. Celtic lore mentions such potions. An other feature of Celtic magic generally is the union of opposites, where both opposites are true simultaneously. For examples, new year is both the end and the beginning of the cyclical year, an earthmound is both above ground and below ground at the same time, wearing a sod of grass as a hat is both above and below ground, Merlin was born as an elder and aged backward becoming more youthful, and so on. These unions are vehicles of magical feats. In any case, cognates of the word "druid" later became a generic word for "magic" generally, so it is difficult to distinguish which kinds of "magic" the historical Druids practiced. But at least, it seems the Druids did do magic, and their magic was inherently polytheistic in approach. [/QUOTE]
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