A man's weapons and shield were buried with him and a woman's
spindle and weaving baton, and perhaps beads or pottery with her.
At times, mounds of earth would simply be covered over piles of
corpses and ashes in urns. In these mass graves, some corpses had
spear holes or sword cuts, indicating death by violence. The Druid
priests, the learned class of the Celts, taught the Celts to
believe in reincarnation of the soul after death of one body into
another body. They also threw prized possessions into lakes and
rivers as sacrifices to water gods. They placed images of gods and
goddesses in shrines, which were sometimes large enough to be
temples.
With the ability to grow food and the acquisition of land by
conquest by invading groups, the population grew. There were
different classes of men. The freemen were eorls [noble freemen]
or ceorls [ordinary free farmers]. Slaves were not free. Freemen
had long hair and beards. Slaves' hair was shorn from their heads
so that they were bald. Slaves were chained and often traded.
Prisoners taken in battle, especially native Britons taken by
invading groups, became slaves. A slave who was captured or
purchased was a "theow". An "esne" was a slave who worked for
hire. A "weallas" was a Welsh slave. Criminals became slaves of
the person wronged or of the king. Sometimes a father pressed by
need sold his children or his wife into bondage.
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