The Tree-Knowers: How the Word 'Druid' Reached Modern English
Tuesday 21 July 2026 at 22:40
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Edited by Richard Walker, Wednesday 5 August 2026 at 22:41
In his Natural History Pliny the Elder wrote of Druids venerating oak trees and and climbing them on the sixth day of the moon to harvest mistletoe with a golden sickle *.
"The druids; or the conversion of the Britons to Christianity". Engraving by S.F. Ravenet, 1752, after F. Hayman.¶
This is a vivid story and part of our stereotype of Druids, but perhaps it is just a myth. However we know the concept of the sacred grove plays a prominent part in the religions of many Indo-European cultures (see the WP article on the topic) and in Greece I once visited a holy well in the woods that felt a bit a distant echo of this tradition.
The connects with trees is also supported by the generally accepted etymology (already prefigured by Pliny). Druid seems to come ultimately from ancient PIE roots *doru-, 'tree'§ and *weyd-, 'see, know', so it would mean something like 'tree-knower'.
The word is found in Latin druides andGreekδρυΐδαι (dryidai), borrowed from Old Celtic. Old English had dry, 'magician', a direct borrowing, but Modern English druid came from Latin via French. Modern Gaelic and Welsh have cognates draoidh (dree) and derwydd (dehrooith), presumably directly from Old Celtic. A rough genealogy of these words in shown in this sketch.
* Fans of Asterix the Gaul will be familiar with these details.
¶ Welcome Foundation ICV No 36622 Licensed under Creative Commons.
§ The first root might instead be a word meaning 'strong' or the two words might be the same (trees are emblematic of strength).
The Tree-Knowers: How the Word 'Druid' Reached Modern English
In his Natural History Pliny the Elder wrote of Druids venerating oak trees and and climbing them on the sixth day of the moon to harvest mistletoe with a golden sickle *.
"The druids; or the conversion of the Britons to Christianity". Engraving by S.F. Ravenet, 1752, after F. Hayman.¶
This is a vivid story and part of our stereotype of Druids, but perhaps it is just a myth. However we know the concept of the sacred grove plays a prominent part in the religions of many Indo-European cultures (see the WP article on the topic) and in Greece I once visited a holy well in the woods that felt a bit a distant echo of this tradition.
The connects with trees is also supported by the generally accepted etymology (already prefigured by Pliny). Druid seems to come ultimately from ancient PIE roots *doru-, 'tree'§ and *weyd-, 'see, know', so it would mean something like 'tree-knower'.
The word is found in Latin druides and Greek δρυΐδαι (dryidai), borrowed from Old Celtic. Old English had dry, 'magician', a direct borrowing, but Modern English druid came from Latin via French. Modern Gaelic and Welsh have cognates draoidh (dree) and derwydd (dehrooith), presumably directly from Old Celtic. A rough genealogy of these words in shown in this sketch.
* Fans of Asterix the Gaul will be familiar with these details.
¶ Welcome Foundation ICV No 36622 Licensed under Creative Commons.
§ The first root might instead be a word meaning 'strong' or the two words might be the same (trees are emblematic of strength).