Wicker man

A wicker man was a large wicker statue purportedly used by the ancient Druids (priests of Celtic paganism) for sacrifice by burning it in effigy, according to Julius Caesar in his Commentarii de Bello Gallico (Commentary on the Gallic War). Contradicting the Roman sources, more recent scholarship finds that "there is little archeological evidence" of human sacrifice by the Celts, and suggests the likelihood that Greeks and Romans disseminated negative information out of disdain for the barbarians. There is no evidence of the practices Julius Caesar described, and the stories of human sacrifice appear to derive from a single source, Poseidonius, whose claims are unsupported.

Archaeological evidence from the British Isles seems to indicate that human sacrifice may have been practiced, over times long pre-dating any contact with Rome. Human remains have been found at the foundations of structures from the Neolithic time to the Roman era, with injuries and in positions that argue for their being foundation sacrifices.