Bard is a poet
who was awarded privileged status in ancient Celtic cultures, and who was
charged with the duty of celebrating the laws and heroic achievements of his
people. In modern Welsh usage, a bard is a poet who has participated in the
annual poetry festival known as the Eisteddfod. The nostalgic mythology of Romanticism
tended to imagine the bards as solitary visionaries and prophets. Since the
18th century, the term has often been applied more loosely to any poet, and as
a fanciful title for Shakespeare in particular. Adjective: bardic.