Q 01/05

What does the Proto-Celtic root behind the word "druid" most likely mean?

A) Oak-knower

B) River-priest

C) Fire-keeper

D) Star-watcher

Answer · why

A) Oak-knower

The second element comes from a root meaning 'see, know'; Pliny had already guessed at the Greek word for oak in the 1st century.

Q 02/05

Which Roman writer left the fullest surviving account of the druids?

A) Pliny the Elder

B) Julius Caesar

C) Strabo

D) Tacitus

Answer · why

B) Julius Caesar

Caesar's portrait appears only in his survey of Gaulish society; the druids are absent from his campaign narrative.

Q 03/05

Whose single passage gave us the image of white robes, mistletoe and a golden sickle?

A) Lucan

B) Pomponius Mela

C) Pliny the Elder

D) Diodorus Siculus

Answer · why

C) Pliny the Elder

One scholar notes the sickle was more probably gilded bronze, the point being to avoid iron.

Q 04/05

Caesar said the druids met once a year in the territory of which Gaulish people?

A) Belgae

B) Aedui

C) Arverni

D) Carnutes

Answer · why

D) Carnutes

The Carnutes' land, around modern Chartres and Orléans, was reckoned the centre of all Gaul.

Q 05/05

According to Caesar, druidic teaching was said to have originated where?

A) Britain

B) Ireland

C) Germany

D) Gaul

Answer · why

A) Britain

Caesar added that eager pupils still travelled there to study the doctrine.