Bard

Bard, highly trained Celtic poet, composer, singer, and harpist who served as oral historian, political critic, entertainer, and official poet whose task it was to celebrate national events. The poems were passed from one bard to another orally, each adding some personal embroidery to the text; memorization was aided by the use of certain “formulas”, such as fixed phrases and repeated verses or groups of verses. The Celtic bardic tradition dates to ancient times but was most prominent in medieval and postmedieval Wales and Ireland. Many bards were resident in wealthy homes; others were itinerant. The bards of Britain and Gaul were even considered a separate social class and enjoyed special privileges. Bards were particularly important in Wales, where they were often nobles, and where bardic guilds were formed to set standards for writing and reciting. Repeatedly outlawed by the English as politically inflammatory, the institution gradually died out, although the annual gathering of Welsh poets and musicians, the Eisteddfod, was revived in the 19th century and continues today. Some poetic texts survive from the medieval period, but little music remains. Professional musicians with similar functions have existed in many cultures; they include the Armenian gusan, the Yugoslavian guslari, and the aoidos of Homeric Greece.