The Hedge Druid

Posts Tagged ‘brittany’

Kermario, Carnac – 8th May 2009

In this sixth installment of the Brittany series, the second part of the Carnac visit, I found possibly the most interesting aspects of the whole Carnac visit (not to put you off the next post, but this is the ‘main feature’, if you like).

Entrance stones

As we walked across the road to the next section, called Kermario, we walked into a larger section of woodland than was around Ménec.On either side of the road winding through this woodland were two large boulders.

I stopped as I reached the point between them. I could feel a barrier of energy! There was a definite flow of energy between them that made my midriff feel a tug, just like when I walk the energy paths down a hill, or stand next to a large menhir. What was the purpose of putting these two stones here? I glanced around. I had missed two other similarly sized boulders that were fifty feet or so away. They were sites in an enclosed field nearby. Two pairs of boulders? The previous pair looked like they might designate the end of the Ménec field, whilst the pair I was standing between might demarcate the beginning of the Kermario field, I wondered? I dowsed between them – a strong male line going back and forth between them. I asked for permission to enter and the energy stopped tugging at my stomach, so I passed through. Hmmm….entrance stones for the energetically-aware?

Nemeton size: more guerrila dowsing

I was glad we were walking instead of driving now. I was seeing much more than if we had just whizzed by on a whirlwind tour from the car as most people seemed to be doing. This fast-paced tick-in-the-box tourism was beginning to become anathema to me. We stopped alongside the Kermario field of stones.

It was an even more impressive sight than Ménec, because you could see down the slope through several fields, and the alignments just kept going on and on into the middle distance. We had found a nice spot amongst some outlying rocks that were not fenced off, but were close to a point that looked convenient for hopping over the fence unseen to most eyes. Whilst I waited for the occasional couple of tourists to wander by I did some dowsing at the edge of the field of stones.

I wondered if all those stones were producing any kind of nemeton field collectively? I walked back into the woods some fifty feet, then asked if I was in the nemeton field and got a “NO” response. I walked towards the fence surrounding the stones until I got the familiar barrier response indicating the extent of the nemeton. It was about 20 feet from the nearest row. I tested for its qualities – FEMALE and NEUTRAL EARTH energies were found. I have begun to differentiate between male, female and neutral earth energies and the corresponding genders of human energies. Kal and I have found that when the earth produces a “white streamA flow of positive energised and healing subtle energy. The white streams usually emanate from a source of good energy such as a holy well, a sacred site, a power centre or a place of worship of good intent. We have found that white stream energy consists primarily of male and female energy combined in a balanced and harmonious blend, such that the two streams “play” with each other, warping and wefting in a dance that invigorates and enlivens everything that comes into contact with it. If a human stands in such a stream then they will feel positive, happy and energised, warm even.” of positive, beneficial energy it is a combination of male and female. Since discovering this I have begun to qualify the energy types by stating whether they are earth energies, radiant energies, or human energies. This nemeton field was earth energy.

The Energy Engine

As we progressed down the path alongside the fields of stones, admiring the amazing lines that flowed in parallel across the undulating landscape we spotted a tower in the distance that looked like a great vantage point from which to view the whole scene.

Before we got there I wanted to ask the rods some more questions about how the purpose of this place. A convenient stopping point was where the path crossed between two fields of stones near to a ‘creperie’, actually a farmhouse built right in the midst of the aligned rows of stones. At this point the rows seemed artificially disconnected by the path and farmhouse, so I took the chance to check my findings so far, and verified them all. Now that I knew the way the energies flowed I was less inclined to continue asking the same questions all over the site. How about finding something out about what this was all for?

I knew that archeo-astrologers and other researchers have picked up on solar, lunar, maybe even stellar alignments, and like most sites I knew that this was a comp0onent of their construction, but not their entire purpose, I felt. Only part of the story. I suspected that the astrological alignments simply told the druids and other people who understood these sites WHEN they would be at their maximum and minimum in terms of their energetic potential. The question now was what would they be doing with this energy, and why was this particular site built like this? I asked the following questions whilst standing in the energy flow between the disconnected rows of two fields of stones:-

• Was the purpose of this site to gather energy by transforming radiant energies and drawing up earth energy like some kind of massive energy generator? YES, came the response.
• Was the whole series of stones all one big engine? Er…NO, not really. OK, let’s be more specific.
• Is this Kermario section all one engine? YES. So, was each named area an engine unto itself? YES.

Wow, this must be some huge engine! Where was the energy going?

• Was the energy produced in each section of the Carnac site going to a specific place? YES.
• In the Kermario field, where I now stood, was there a single nexus point for the energy? YES. Would I be able to locate it? YES.
• Was it on a path accessible to most people (I asked hopefully)? NO.
• Was it within a mile of where I was? YES.

Armed with that much I set off intent on finding this single point where all the energies of this huge field of stones was focused. I asked to rods to take me to this focal point, and I followed them as they led me down the path alongside the field of stones towards the tower in the near distance. As I approached the tower, wondering to myself whether this was the place, the rods swivelled left and I turned with them to see where they were now pointing – at two small green mounds ten feet in at the end of this section of stone alignments! I hadn’t even seen them as I approached, but now they stood out like…well, like a pair of green breasts on a nun!!!

The Mounds and The Tower

Again I hopped the fence. Luckily the mounds were only a few feet away from the path that intersected the fields of stone rows. I asked the rods to take me to the exact place where the energy from the alignments went to. It was the mounds. The rows of stones petered out before the mounds. I couldn’t tell exactly where the energy from the rows came in, but the flow was certainly directed into the mounds. I checked for a nemeton around the mounds and found it circling the two small mounds in a sort of kidney shape, indented more on one side than the other, but flowing around the two of them. It registered for male and female energy combined – a white stream nemeton of earth energies, flowing anti-clockwise. Possibly the male energy went clockwise, I don’t know. I didn’t want to linger too long in this forbidden territory!

I now asked several miscellaneous questions in an attempt to get some idea of its strength. If this was the focal point for all these stones then it might be quite strong. Asked for its relative strength on a scale of 1-10 and got a response at 9. Was it ever a 10, I asked? YES. When? January? YES. February? Less so. March and April? A decreasing response until at April the rods parted. May? The rods began to cross again slightly. June? A more positive response. July? YES. Full cross. August? Less of a response. OK – January and July it was. Two months? I thought about other sites I knew of that were powerful, and asked how this site measured against Arbor Low, for example. Please tell me how many times stronger these energies were. Same strength? NO. 1.5x stronger? NO. I kept going up until I got to 8. Then the rods crossed. Eight times stronger than Arbor Low! Kal would love it here.

When I got back home I checked my “In Tune With The Moon” book which tells me exactly what phase of the moon occurs when in the year. In 2009 the full moon in July coincides exactly with the apogee – one of the two times in the year when the moon is exerting its strongest influence. In January the full moon was at its perigee – i.e. at its nearest, pulling most upon this side of the planet. In July it would be pulling the other side of the planet strongest. I asked the rods if the sun energies would be strongest at the Summer Soltice in June to which the answer was, YES. I was beginning to see how these calendar times meant the times of the greatest energetic potential of the sun and moon radiant energies in relation to the stones at Carnac.

I wondered if the energy came out of the mounds and went anywhere else, so I asked to follow any energy lineThe direction energy takes when moving. It may be straight or curved, in several dimensions and be composed of one or more different types of energies, i.e. negative, positive or neutral. Energy lines can be found at standing stones and ancient sites but are a general feature in all energy fields. coming out of the mounds. I was taken back over the fence and down the path back towards the road. It led me through the woods on the far side of the road, along a barely-visible trail, then back along the road, back up the path and around the tower. Beyond the tower it went into the woods on the other side of the field and emerged again to re-join the mounds (more fence-hopping). The shape was somewhat like a three-fingered hand, or a shamrock, an elongated trefoil shape.

As I was back at the mounds I asked if the field was male, female or neutral. I got a response for a mixture of male and female. So, the area defined was all white stream positive energy. I asked too whether there were any burials within the mounds, as they were suspiciously human sized – NO. Looking down the rows I thought about their placement. Were these rows placed because of the geology of the rock beneath them, I asked? YES. Well, I could investigate this at some future point when I had access to more information. As it turned out, I checked a geological map of the area and found that the alignments were all placed on a shelf of granite that began at Carnac. Interesting. We have found this at every ancient complex of sites – they all make use of solid crystalline volcanic rocks. The crystalline nature of the rock seems important to their function as energy generators or harnessers. This was something I was about to put to the test in my own small way.

A sense of purpose

Now I turned my attention to establishing the purpose of these incredible alignments of stones. What were they here for? I had a series of things I wanted to test for using the dowsing rods. I stood in the field emanating from the mounds and began to ask some serious questions:-

• Was this site an engine to generate energy? YES
• Could it be used for healing? YES.
• Could it be harnessed for transformation of human consciousness? YES.
• Could it be used to create a protective field? YES.
• Could it be used for any ‘magickal’ purpose? YES.

This was amazing. It seemed as though this energy could be utilised in any way that seemed appropriate to the requirements of those who built and used it. This amazing energy generator would create energies that could be employed for any kind of energy work that was needed. As Kal mentioned to me later - is this akin to the legendary Philosopher’s Stone?

Healing with crystals

People were starting to wander up to the tower from the road again, so I hopped back over the right side of the fence. M was sat atop the tower but now she joined me again, complaining about her joint pains, as she frequently does. I wondered if I could harness the positive energies that surrounded us at this moment? I asked if I could use some crystals to do some healing work and the rods happily crossed. I set up my five crystal Venus set according to where the rods said I should put them. It was almost in the usual formation, but two of the crystals were interchanged. I dowsed for where M should stand, and where I could stand to help direct the energies. I asked M to imagine drawing up the energy from the floor whilst I gave the intention to heal her joints. Several minutes later I cleared the crystals away and asked M how she felt. No pain now, she said, but that could have been a placebo effect, however she didn’t complain about her aching joints for the rest of the week, so I guess that tells you something. Believe me – she had been mentioning it several times a day before this incident!
It’s amazing stuff this crystal work. A year ago I would have laughed myself out of the country for doing such a thing (Kal: Don’t worry - I still laugh at you ).

The AlignmentAlignment relates to the concept that humans have their own energy fields that are oriented or formed in a specific way such that the person is either suited better to one energy source of another. Some people have their energy fields empowered by the direct subtle energy force of The Sun, whilst others are empowered by the indirect subtle energy of The Moon. Due to the historical associations and symbolisation of The Sun with masculinity and The Moon with femininity we designate these alignments as either being ‘male’ or ‘female’ alignments accordingly. We interchangeable refer to people as being ‘sun-aligned’ or ‘male-aligned’ and similarly with the female alignment. Stones

Now I hadn’t completely dismissed the idea that there were parts of the complex at Carnac that were used calendrically. As we walked back to Ménec alongside the Kermario field we spotted two standing stones that were a hundred feet off to one side. It looked like a make-shift car park that very few people used, but at the end were two standing stones of an odd shape. We have seen shaped stones like this before at sites. I can think of Callenish in particular where the notched shapes of the stones were almost universally believed to provide sightings for alignments of the sun, moon and with particular stars like Aldebaran. These two stones looked just like those shaped stones. I decided they warranted some investigation.

The taller pointed stone only has one “disfigurement” – a slight chunk taken out of its western edge. The smaller stone which stood only six feet away from it had a profound notch hewn from it that meant that its top half was only half the width of its base. I dowsed for energy coming out of the stones and found that a male line emerged from the hewn edge of the smaller rock and led to the flat hewn edge of the pointer larger stone. Interesting. Again, this correlates with so many other stones that have been similarly worked.

Next, I concentrated on finding out which types of energies these stones might be pulling down from radiant sources or drawing up from the earth. The taller stone was drawing male sun energy and also pulling female energy from earth, as was the smaller stone too. Presumably they were also pulling down moon energy, but I forgot to ask! Silly me. It’s easy to be “completist” about these things after the fact. The two stones were involved with both drawing energy from the Kermario field of stones as well as sending it back to them in a sort of circuit.

I asked the rods whether the notches on the smaller stone aligned to specific celestial objects and got a positive response for sun, moon and star alignments. That confirmed their purpose for me. These stones were here to allow users of the energies to determine specific times of the year when the energies were best suited to their purpose, I theorised.

With that we walked back to the car in order to head out to the furthest field – Kerlescan. Here there was another field of stones, but I wanted to concentrate on the side shows – The Giant’s Stone and The Quadrangle, said to once have been a large tumulus.

Gwas Myrddyn

Following an intuition

Carnac, Brittany - Friday 8th May

The 8th May is a public holiday in France. There are loads of them in May, and it seemed like a good day to be heading down to the seaside, so we packed for a trip to the greatest megalithic site of the whole of France – the legendary fields of aligned stones that constituted Carnac. Carnac is a small town on the south-west coast of Brittany, between the towns of Vannes and Lorient. As I checked the map for a route I noticed that almost every village in that area began with the prefix “Ker“. This prefix means ‘horn’ , or the symbol for a crescent moon. It was going to be a two hour drive to the coast at least so I let M have a go at driving to give me a rest, and to allow me to pick the places I wanted to see, and to navigate – badly as it turned out.

The journey didn’t start well. We got diverted almost immediately and my blood boiled at being unable to get us onto the road that would reduce our journey time by half an hour (not yet into the relaxing part of the holiday). Instead we were forced to go miles out of our way. Luckily the rest of the journey was quiet and trouble-free, through small Brittany towns and villages, and down beautiful stretches of toll-free dual carriageway. After two and a half hours we were approaching Carnac and the excitement was mounting (well, for me anyway). We dived into Carnac town and got a site map from the Tourist Information to work from before heading back out to park at the Ménec centre.

Phases of megalithic building in Europe

The fields of stones are effectively divided into three parts – Menec, Kermario and Kerlescan. Each site is bordered by paths through beautiful woodland, and boasts its own particular interesting element in addition to the fields of aligned stones, as if they weren’t enough to be impressed with! 

We started at Ménec near the visitor centre. The weather was threatening to be warm, but clouds kept rolling over the sun spoiling the photographs. Walking into the tiny hamlet of Ménec we were greeted by our first full view of the field of aligned stones and it was a truly amazing sight. Silence. Standing. Staring. Open-mouthed. Into the distance were eleven rows of stones, some ten feet high, most around four or five feet in height. They just went on and on, snaking slightly with the shape of the land into the distance. Now what is to be made of that? It was my mission this day to try to find out.

View along Ménec field

I had read the various folk tales, myths and archeological theories about their presence, but as with so many other sites they were simply nonsense, or had little substance to them other than being quaint stories. The ideas that have been submitted are:-

1. They are Roman soldiers turned to stone by St.Cornelius as he was cornered by them at the coast whilst trying to escape
2. They are gravestones for every person who has died in the area in ancient times, the larger ones being the rich people and the smaller ones the poorer.
3. They are a solar and lunar observatory used as a calendar to mark specific sacred times of the Celtic year

For me these “explanations” mean nothing. They add nothing to our understanding of the value and immense effort that was engendered into the Carnac sites. The idea that literally thousands of stones would be placed in an East-West alignmentAlignment relates to the concept that humans have their own energy fields that are oriented or formed in a specific way such that the person is either suited better to one energy source of another. Some people have their energy fields empowered by the direct subtle energy force of The Sun, whilst others are empowered by the indirect subtle energy of The Moon. Due to the historical associations and symbolisation of The Sun with masculinity and The Moon with femininity we designate these alignments as either being ‘male’ or ‘female’ alignments accordingly. We interchangeable refer to people as being ‘sun-aligned’ or ‘male-aligned’ and similarly with the female alignment. along a shelf of granite simply to act as a calendar is laughable, and even more so when you’ve actually visited the site. A simple stone circle would have achieved such a calendar function if that was what was intended. It’s clearly only a mere fraction of the site’s purpose. However, I’ll come back to the purpose of the site later. It suffices to say at this stage that these myths do not take into account the energetic intention of the construction. I, on the other hand, had this uppermost in my mind as I strolled along the fenced perimeterof the Ménec field.

Don't fence me in!

Guerilla Dowsing

Yes, fenced. It was all fenced off. Like Stonehenge, apparently we simple souls can’t be trusted to keep our sticky mitts to ourselves and would be hacking away at the stone for souvenirs if we were allowed to, or we would be clambering all over them and felling them left, right and centre if we were permitted access to them. Only a guided tour at specific times of the day (and considerable cost) would allow anyone access to the stones themselves. However, I had not come a hundreds of miles to this place merely to walk along the edges. It was time for some Guerilla Dowsing, i.e. dowsing in places where you were clearly not encouraged to do so and may be arrested for trying to. I did so. I picked a quiet spot, then hopped the fence with my rods and began to take some readings.

Here’s what I found out at Ménec:-

• Two lines of energy run in and out, and in between the stones. One is a MALE energy flowing close to the stones in the usual way, i.e. not deviating much from the most direct course between stones. The second line is a FEMALE energy, as one might expect this energy deviates wildly between the stones, sometimes going up to several feet away from the alignment of the stones. The female energy will also often miss out flowing around one of the stones in the row and be pulled back into a path around the next stone. This is unlike the male energy, which seemed to flow regularly past each stone in turn (although my sampling of this was limited to the occasional sneaky raid over the fence).
• There are 11 rows of stones in each ‘field’ (Ménec, Kermario and Kerlescan) and the energy paths of the male and female energies flowed in one direction down one row, then in the opposing direction for the next row. So, if the alignment is East-West the first row flowed West to East, then the next row flowed East to West, then back to West-East, and so on across all the rows of stones.
• Some stones were MALE (pointed shape) and some were FEMALE (flat-topped stones). The male stones were drawing down SUN energy and transforming it into the male energy lines that I had dowsed between and around the stones. The female stones were drawing down MOON energy as well as drawing up female earth energy, transforming them into the female energy that I dowsed flowing more vigorously along the aligned rows of stones.

That was all that I dared to do at first because there was a constant stream of visitors walking up and down the path that we were on, and I felt guilty about breaking the rules. I didn’t want to be escorted away from the site at this early stage, so I bided my time until I could find a place that was a little quieter. Next time I will book a guided tour, although I’m not convinced the tour guide would appreciate having to stop every few minutes for me to dowse around! Having got to the end of the first field of stones I was eager to see what the next set looked like.

The sun was alternately popping out and back in again behind clouds, which threatened rain, but we walked across the main road towards the next part of the Carnac site – Kermario. As we crossed a stranded field of stones made me wonder how much the roads and the traffic were affecting the power of the sites, but it was too dangerous to dowse whilst dodging the cars!

Gwas.

Following rows upon rows of stones

Brittany, Thursday 7th May
This is the fourth post in my Brittany dowsing series, and for a brief moment I will be back-tracking. On the same day as we went to Mont St.Michel we had a small diversion to Dol De Bretagne, a town just off the main route along the Cotes D’Armour coast between St.Brieuc and St.Malo. In this town, reputed to be the source of the Stuart royal dynasty, we found the Dol De Bretagne menhir, or the Champ Dolent stone.

The Champ Dolent Stone

It would have been rude to pass up such an obvious invitation to dowse some stones before the main event. The fairly large-scale road map we had showed a menhir located in the town of Dol De Bretagne called ‘Le Champ Dolent’ meaning the Field of Sorrows, supposedly. Well, on arriving at the stone the clouds parted and the sun began to smile down on us. Whilst we were at the roadside site (with picnic tables) that surrounded the stone there was a constant stream of visitors. People are still fascinated by these menhirs and ancient sites. I wonder what it makes them think about? I think about the energies there.

Creation Myths made cartoon

As you approach the well-maintained path to the gigantic menhir there is some information on a sign. The cartoons depicted the various ‘creation myths’ that accounted for its presence of the stone, and a tale warning of disaster if it was allowed to wear down to nothing! We see that God dropped the stone to separate two warring armies, and also that Satan, in a jealous fit, threw the giant stone at an Abbey that had been built nearby, but missed. Always amusing how these stories are quite similar all around the megalithic zones along the west coasts of Europe.

The Dowsing Bit

What a stone, though! As I poised the rods I took a moment to take it all in. I didn’t even see the picnic tables dotted around the small avenue of trees and grass that cushioned the narrow path to the menhir. I was captivated by its size. This stone was at least thirty feet high and six feet thick. It was slightly squared and tapered to a beautifully crafted peak. Again, it seemed to be made of the local pink or light salmon-coloured granite. It had very few marks on it either. A few lines and battles scars, but mainly perfectly smooth and sculpted – ‘dressed’ as they say.

I started dowsing at the small ‘King Stone’ that was close to the site’s entrance. This stone was about a foot and a half wide by two or three feet long and just an inviting height to want to sit on. I asked if it had any energy of its own? NO. Was there any energy around it? YES, a female spiral. I dowsed that it came to a spiral on the stone. If this wasn’t the stone’s own energy then I wondered if this stone was just transforming some energy source? I asked if the energy was coming up from the earth into the stone? NO. From the sun (which was now shining merrily)? NO. Going well! From the moon? YES. Fitted with the female spiral. Was this a transformer stone? YES. Like Nine Ladies and many others. A stone that transforms the moon’s radiant reflected energies in some way.

I looked for a link to the big menhir some fifty feet away. Was there any energetic link between the two, I asked the rods? YES. I followed the female spiral out of the Queen Stone as it wound its way from tree to tree, side to side up the avenue of ten feet tall tree that lines the route between the two stones. It ended up going around and close to the menhir before pulling the rods into the left-hand side. Good. A connection made.

The connection between the two stones prompted me to think about the consequences of that link. Which stone was feeding which with this female energy? I checked the direction of flow. From the large menhir to the small stone. But then where? I dowsed to find where the energy went after it reached the Queen Stone and was taken in a circle, across the road on which we had parked, into the field opposite (luckily they don’t go for hedges much in France) and back to the smaller stone again. It was a twenty feet wide circle of a feminine energy field emitted from the Queen Stone. Interesting. I wondered what effect that had on anything, after all – it’s fine to find these fields but what are their effects? I didn’t yet know, either here or anywhere else yet. I turned my attention back to the menhir again.

After my recent experience with the St Uzec stone I was keen to see what the nemeton of this stone was like. I walked all the way back to the small road we had come in on, close to the outlying Queen Stone. I dowsed up the path to the menhir but only travelled some five feet before the rods gave a barrier sign! That was massive – the biggest nemeton field I have ever dowsed, for definite. HUGE! The picture above shows the extent of it. I dowsed all the way along the nemeton’s edge and found it to be not quite as large on the other side where it went through a ploughed field (only twenty-five feet or so). Nevertheless, it encompassed almost all of the path leading up to itself on the side where people would approach it, I checked for male lines – none. Neutral lines? None. This was an exclusively female + moon energy site.

I now felt like doing a little energy work. I asked to find the best place to stand to be in tune with the stone and to feel re-charged, Well, I was on holiday! The rods led me to the left-hand side of the stone again. I tried not to stand in the small dog turd at that spot. We find this kind of thing often at power centres. Animals like to defalcate there for some reason. Not always but too often to have gone unnoticed as a coincidence. I stood near to the stone at that side, touching its huge side and relaxed. Soon I felt a dual drawing-out motion at my feet and a filling-in from above, like being showered in very smooth and light water.

I picked up the rods again, Please show me the most energetic path to walk, I prompted. The rods moved around the back of the stone to pass over the small un-energetic stone that lay at the base of the menhir (another handy chair for tired tourists) and then down through three female spiral power centres until finally curling back around the Queen Stone, inviting you to sit on it and muse awhile, which I duly did. This site felt great. Not at all like the St Uzec stone. Both M and I felt completely at home here, happy to linger for ages. Many people came by, had their sandwiches gazing at the stone, then left only to be followed by yet another person “just stopping off”. It was nice to see that other people agreed with this feeling. It was nice to be around such a beautiful and energetic monument to an ancient people’s harmony with nature,

I asked M to follow me as I wound my way down this energetic trail of three power spirals, and she felt the stone’s intense buzz as she neared it. She had a low grade headache that morning (probably from squinting in the bright sunlight) but by the time she had walked the trail this had disappeared. Coincidence, I’m sure, but this is not the first time that has happened. Psychological and auto-suggestive it may be, but it works every time.

The powerful and impressive Dol De Bretagne menhir is certainly worth a visit if you’re in that area. But I guarantee you won’t be the only one there!

Gwas.

Following everyone else, it seems!

In the third part of my Brittany visit report I will be covering two sites: the legendary Mont St.Michel and the lesser known Temple of Mars.

Mont St.Michel

Mont St.Michel has a number of things about it that should pique the interest of any dowser, or anyone interested in ancient earth mysteries. Firstly, it is situated on a mound that has legendary association with St.Michael and The DragonDragons are spirit or energetic beings that reside in sacred sites and have a particular location in them and also move throughout the day (and or season). They also leave the sacred site on occasion, which again differentiates them from Genius Loci which don’t. – a signifier of the ‘pinning’ or ‘taming’ of earth energies. Secondly, it is part of the alignmentAlignment relates to the concept that humans have their own energy fields that are oriented or formed in a specific way such that the person is either suited better to one energy source of another. Some people have their energy fields empowered by the direct subtle energy force of The Sun, whilst others are empowered by the indirect subtle energy of The Moon. Due to the historical associations and symbolisation of The Sun with masculinity and The Moon with femininity we designate these alignments as either being ‘male’ or ‘female’ alignments accordingly. We interchangeable refer to people as being ‘sun-aligned’ or ‘male-aligned’ and similarly with the female alignment. of sites that Hamish Miller discusses in one of his books. Thirdly, the abbey situated at the pinnacle of the mound is crammed with architecture that references The Green Man, dragons, Celtic motifs and pineal glands – not to mention its ‘divine proportions’. All in all, it’s a full day for anyone interested in the Western Mystery tradition!

Nothing radical happened in terms of dowsing, and no major energy work was done there. Instead I went with the intention of seeing whether the information I had been reading from different esoteric authors was accurate. Was there evidence in the form of symbols, Celtic patterns, sacred geometry, number and legend to believe that the concepts and properties of earth energies were known many years ago? Was there evidence of the veneration and preservation of a very ancient knowledge pre-dating the Christian and Roman civilisations that have dominated historical record and study? Was that knowledge built into the very heart and soul of Mont St.Michel?

In addition to keeping an eye out for historical, architectural and decorative symbolism I was also keen to verify Miller’s scant report from his “In Search of the Southern Serpent” book in which he mentions a ‘crossing point’ in Mont St Michel’s Abbey of the Apollo-Athena ley lineThe term used by many British dowsers to describe an energy leyA straight line of neutral energy linking two or more sacred sites or other energetic centres. This is often confused with Alfred Watkins’ concept of the Ley Line. Strictly speaking a ley line does not necessarily mean a neutral energy line, only a sight alignment between notable places, whereas an energy ley is like a radial spoke in a wheel, with energy flowing outwards across the land in a straight line. It has sometimes been found that the energy ley can be diverted from its strict straight path by changes in the landscape or strong attractors that pull it away from its original course. Energy leys may have inter-twining streams of male and female energies weaving along them, as though the energy ley is an attractor, a pathway or a conduit for the male and female energies.. It is easily confused with ley and therefore its use is not recommended by dowsers., a line that runs between two energy lines – the so-called Becker-Hagens grid. There’s a Google Earth overlay displaying just such alignment points. Mont St Michel is situated between two major lines of the icosahedron, but I have my doubts as to the exact placement of the Becker-Hagens lines. Their major crossing points – the concentration of many lines – fall near to but not on some very important megalithic sites. This got me thinking.

Shifting the centre

If the whole grid were shifted such that the crossing point aligned with The Scilly Isles, then suddenly a lot of lines identified by dowsers begin to make sense – the Apollo-Athena line fits next to the Mary and Michael Line through Stonehenge and Dartmoor, on to the tip of Cornwall. The red line in the diagram below is the Apollo-Athena line, but Becker-Hagens have it fifty miles or so off-centre to where Hamish Miller and John Michell have placed it. That’s just how However, it is possible to align at least two well-documented major ley lines by shifting the centre 67 miles westward onto St.Mary’s or St. Martin’s Church on the Isles of Scilly off the tip of Cornwall. Doing that pulls these lines onto with known energetic centres. If you do that 67 mile shift due West you also connect London with Paris! An interesting correlation. Far from fact yet, but it makes me think about the larger picture and the possibility of mapping these ancient energy points in a mathematically cohesive geometry that works worldwide, and that’s an exciting prospect!

One approaches the abbey via a winding, nay spiralling, path up through the many tourist shops, restaurants, and ‘attractions’ designed to inform the casual tourist of the bloody and saintly history of this place. I ignored the lot and made my way as quickly as possible to the abbey up the steep paths and steps, paying a princely sum for the privilege on arrival at the box office. I have to say that I was not unimpressed by the size and majesty of the place, and the architecture was delightfully intricate and divinely proportioned, but more about that later.

The search for the Apollo-Athena Line

Once I stepped into the abbey I made way to the outside right edge and got rods out. I moved along the abbey’s aisle along a dark and narrow flagstoned floor, past a group of tourists being given a tour in the centre. I dowsed in and out of the small rooms along this southern edge for the crossing point that Miller vaguely described and found it two-thirds of the way down the right-hand side. It was at a point where a stone trapdoor sat in the floor, covered by a pew – a very unassuming and unexpected place!

Looking later at the plan of the abbey I could see that this southern edge had a small chapel beneath it – exactly at the point I had found or so very close to it that it made me sure I’d found the right place. a chapel built into the very rock of the mount itself. I refer you to the book by Marc Déceneux called “The Mont St Michel : stone by stone” for just such a diagram. The exact feature underneath the trapdoor I had found was the ancient Crypt of St.Martin.

On my return I consulted Miller’s book again to compare this point with the description given by Miller in ‘In Search Of The Southern Serpent’ book:

“After three days we somewhat disappointingly located  the crossing at a totally innocuous place in the side aisle of the great Abbey. It was only when the resident electrician pointed out a little used wooden trapdoor revealing wooden steps leading to a cellar below that we began to feel elated. There directly below the spot we had marked, we found the remains of the altar of the first chapel ever built on the island.”

Hamish Miller and Barry Brailsford – Penwith and StonePrint Press (2006)

I couldn’t be sure from that description whether Miller meant that the crossing point was exactly ON the wooden trapdoor, but I would suppose that he would mention that in his original description? Anyway, I found it two thirds of the way along the southern edge, whilst the wooden trapdoor was close to the northern edge, near to the entrance we had come in when first entering the abbey. I checked for the direction of flow for this powerful alignment – it crossed the abbey from the stone trapdoor towards…the wooden trapdoor! Well, that seemed like an interesting alignment.

I later checked the supposed direction of the Apollo-Athena line and found a sketch showing exactly such a NNW-SSE angle. All the correlating information came only when I had returned home to England a few weeks later, I hasten to point out, which made it all the more convincing for me.

Next, on to the other parts of the abbey, most notably the Cloister, although each part of the abbey held some interesting secret – even the seemingly dull parts. It’s all a case of what you’re looking for, I suppose!

Motifs in stone

One of the things that struck me as I walked from room to room in the abbey was the amount of subtle (and some less subtle) carvings of certain features that seemed to depict certain Celtic energy motifs such as:

• pineal glands sprouting from swirling greenery
• three and four leaf designs
• dragons laying at the feet of holy men, subdued by knightly saints, or couched within the greenery
• mythical creatures with human heads

This seemed to me to be remarkable decoration for a Christian church! It spoke to me of the Green Man legends, of the prominence of the dragon as a symbol of natural forces, and of the use of sacred number that was employed throughout the architecture of the whole abbey in terms of its sacred geometrical proportions for rooms, doors and other major features. This whole structure was shouting that mysterious forces were built into the very structure of the abbey, and at one time were not only understood by the inhabitants, but may have been encoded to retain their importance.

There layout of the abbey, its alignment, its architecture – everywhere this church employed and upheld the concept of sacred geometry – in its arches, its floor plans, its vaulted ceilings, its motifs carved in stone, even its gardening. According to the guidebooks the finest scholars came from Paris to lend their special knowledge to its design. Indeed. Such knowledge was encoded everywhere. Threes, fives, sevens, twelves – golden sections and ratios abounded in every ceiling and carving.

(Picture courtesy of ThinkQuest)

The stained glass Celtic designs and rainbow colour tints

In some of the rooms the stained glass windows had decidedly Celtic designs. Apart from the design aspects, another interesting element was the way that the stain of the glass was chromatically ‘spectrified’ – if that’s a phrase that conveys the sense that it ranged through rainbow colours along the length of the window. It was done in such a way that particular colours might predominate at different altitudes and angles of sunlight, I supposed. I wondered what effect this might have on a meditating priest at different elevations of the sun? Would the light falling on his eyes change, and therefore were specific times of the day likely to be accompanied by light of a particular part of the spectrum? I also found it interesting that rainbow colours had been selected for the staining, as we often dowse rainbow colours as part of the nemetons of energy fields around sacred sites.

Frozen dragons and pinning sword of St.Michael

The patron of this joint is St.Michel. Michael to us. Many things to many other cultures, but in the Western Mystery tradition he personifies the triumph of light over darkness. In a slightly deeper interpretation this concept also contains the symbolism of the human ability to ‘pin’ earth energy to a place so as to be able to utilise it’s energies, whether that be for healing, for assisting with spiritual transformation, or whatever other purposes this energy can be used for that may have been known about. Michael is the archangel, the archetype solar hero, the knight who slays the dragon – the dragon being the representative of the feminine or ‘darker’ forces – the subtle earth energy forces of the underground, pinned into place by the lance or sword of pure light, or intention. For me this myth contains an ancient knowledge and shows a dutiful respect for the ones who can tame the raw energies through enlightenment and spiritual ability. From this evolved the Christian concept of conquering evil through the light of truth obtained as a gift from God upon achieving spiritual pureness and holiness.

I followed a spiral path down and outwards until the causeway returning me back to normal consciousness amidst this tourist frenzy and I felt the urge to buy some local cider. Dry but flavoursome. You should try some! I felt that the mound was one of those places that you would just have to come back to. May is a good month to visit it too. I was lucky.

Temple of Mars

On the way back from Mont St.Michel there was just enough time to stop off at a site close to where we were staying – the invitingly entitled Temple of Mars near the lovely town of Corseul. Mars had been used by the Romans as a replacement for an earlier Celtic god called Teutates, or Toutatis. As a god of war, a very masculine pursuit, I was interested to see what this might mean in terms of the energies present at the site, if there were any.

As we approached the site, perched as it was overlooking a typically beautiful Cotes D’Armour valley. We could see the partially re-constructed ruins of a tower built to give an impression of the overall size, scale, height and impressive build quality of the Roman original. I say original, but perhaps the temple had been built upon the ruins of an even older Celtic temple at that place?

The rest of the site had a boundary wall whose size was only inches high, and two stairwells had been re-built to show extent of and entrances to the temple. The reconstructed portion of the temple showed seven levels were originally present in the design of the round tower. That number again. Given the quite large area this temple covered it must have been quite important. I resolved to look it up in the history books on my return, maybe

I got the copper L-rods out and asked for most energetic place of the site. I was shown a slightly raised area in one of the ‘rooms’, shown on the plan map to be of unknown purpose.

The room had a male power centreA place where a person of a particular alignment (see ‘Alignment’) feels particularly comfortable and empowered. The place is an energetic centre where a particularly beneficial combination and formation of energies is formed into a pattern that is harmonic with the person for whom it can be called a power centre. in it and a circle going around that power centre which extended as large as the room it was in. Coming out of that centre point were seven radial lines, each extending outwards beyond the confines of the room. When I stepped back I saw the pattern – it was a sun symbol, and a wheel of life. All male energy here, though. There was no female energy at all in this temple site.

I dowsed as to whether there was any other formation. YES. A spiral went from the nemeton perimeter into the centre point, slicing across the seven uneven radials in a Fibonnaci spiral of divine proportion – the golden section. It looked just like a Hamish Miller picture. So, although I couldn’t be sure whether or not my results differed from Hamish Miller’s at Mont St.Michel, I had definitely seen evidence of one of his regular energy formations at the Temple of Mars. “You lose some, you win some.” With that we returned to our base for cider and cheese.

Gwas

Following a radiant spiral.

Tuesday 5th May – The St.Uzek stone and the Isle Grande ‘allé couverte’

Being up at the crack of dawn to disembark the ferry at St.Malo, then driving an hour in unfamiliar territory, and on the opposite side of the road to reach your holiday base, then unpacking and heading straight out to the Pink Granite Coast in north-western Brittany – a mere two hours away – is all in a day’s work for an intrepid ley-hunter and day-to-day dowser. That kind of enthusiasm is only to be expected when the quarry being chased is so tempting!

On the agenda shortly is Mont St.Michel, but on this first day I headed to the highest point along the stunning Pink Granite coastline in my trusty french steed, with my redoubtable wife. The rewards were indeed worth the hunt. On this first day I got to find a huge menhir called St.Uzec (or St.Duzec) and an “alle couverte”,or “covered alley” – a long passage grave or dolmen, in effect. Details about that later. First – the St.Uzec menhir.

The menhir is to be found in the village of Penvern (which sounds more Cornish than Breton). It is almost signposted and a little faith will get you there. It seems very well visited, but no-one lingers for more than a minute or two. And I found out why! As M and I walked up to it from the little car parking bay, admiring its immense height and red granite composition, there was a moment when things went still and quiet. M decided she didn’t want to go near it and veered off up the small road going uphill to follow a trail leading to the chapel nearby. I walked into the fifteen feet long walled enclosure and dropped my bag off at the base of the menhir, next to what looked like a tiny font placed at its base.

There were some symbols carved into the stone’s upper area – a sun, a geometrical figure, other obscure images, Atop the stone was a cross made from a different stone, and a different time. It was a Christian addition, probably added when the stone was given the saint’s name that it bears now. From ealier drawings and pictures I have seen of this stone it was once adorned by a carving of Jesus hanging from a cross.

I stepped back out of the enclosure with my dowsing rods, walking to the far side of the approach road. I had had experience of the size of the nemeton field for stones of this size before so I was giving it a good run-up! I dowsed for the edge of the stone’s field of influence. I walked forward. And kept walking. When I got four inches away from the stone the rods parted in a barrier reading. Four inches away! What?! I was stunned. On Lewis I had dowsed the Truiseil Stone which had a nemeton of some thirty feet. Now four inches for a stone that was just as tall if not taller, and twice as wide.

I asked the rods some questions. Was the nemeton being restricted unnaturally in some way? YES. Was it a result of human intervention? YES. Were the symbols on the rock related to this in some way? YES. Was it the placement of the cross on top that was restricting the stone’s energy field? YES. Was there something I could do to repair this energy field? SORT OF. Could I do it permanently? NO. Would it be something temporary then? YES. Did I have the means to do this work? YES. But I didn’t have the strength. My rods hung loosely and I started to look around aimlessly. I took a few more photographs then wandered away and met M as she came towards the stone from her travels around the historic route she was taken earlier.

As we walked away from the stone, me explaining that there was something awry with the energy field, I realised that a strong tightness in my temples was lifting. I kept walking away from the stone and it went completely as I got more than fifty feet away from the monstrous megalith. There was something seriously wrong with the energies around that stone – no wonder no-one stayed close to it for very long! You may have noticed from the picture that a cross has been placed on top of the giant menhir. It caught my eye too. Back to the rods one last time: Was the reason that this menhir did not have a proper nemeton directly related to the placement of the cross on top of it? YES. This stone had been “capped” by the placement of this cross. Was it simply the cross shape, I wondered? NO, said the rods. Was it the intentions of the people who put the cross there that inhibited the energy? YES. Time to move on.

We decided to go to another nearby site on the Isle Grande which was only a few miles the other side of the village. Well, after a bit of to-ing and fro-ing we found it, no thanks to the signage! The allé couverte that I was searching for was on Isle Grande. This is also the name that Aubrey Burl gives to the site as well as its location. It was thanks to Burl’s description in his ‘Megalithic Brittany‘ guide that I was able to find it at all. The French, it seems, are only vaguely interested in denoting the presence of their megalithic treasures, much as we English have also mainly achieved. The site was marked by a small knee-level sign that was side-on to the road making it invisible to passing traffic!

The avenue of stones was constructed of flat but wide slabs, with the square entrance way being wide and tall enough to stoop within. There were seven large capstones supported on standing flat stones. There were two chambers, the first being the longer of the passageways utilising five of the capstones in length, whilst the remaining two capstones comprised a second smaller chamber large enough for maybe two men kneeling or tucked in tightly.

As I dowsed the site I found no female energies there at all, which was very surprising, as I can’t remember the last site that I dowsed that didn’t have at least some female earth or moon energies present. This site was simple inhabited by two energetic sources – a male line with two power centres at either end, and a neutral power centreA place where a person of a particular alignmentAlignment relates to the concept that humans have their own energy fields that are oriented or formed in a specific way such that the person is either suited better to one energy source of another. Some people have their energy fields empowered by the direct subtle energy force of The Sun, whilst others are empowered by the indirect subtle energy of The Moon. Due to the historical associations and symbolisation of The Sun with masculinity and The Moon with femininity we designate these alignments as either being ‘male’ or ‘female’ alignments accordingly. We interchangeable refer to people as being ‘sun-aligned’ or ‘male-aligned’ and similarly with the female alignment. (see ‘Alignment’) feels particularly comfortable and empowered. The place is an energetic centre where a particularly beneficial combination and formation of energies is formed into a pattern that is harmonic with the person for whom it can be called a power centre. that looped back upon itself. Finding a neutral power centre was another rarity. Already I was sensing that dowsing in France was going to be an interesting endeavour, and one where I would need to try to be as objective and comprehensive as possible. Unfortunately, on this occasion, time was pressing for us to organise some food for the self-catering aspect of our holiday, and so I didn’t ask all the things I could have.

I did find out that a neutral power centre located at the end of the first longer chamber encompassed the inside and outside left-hand (southern) edge. The right-hand edge of the passageway is fed by a male power centre on the right-hand end of the inner passage, directly opposite the neutral centre. There was another male spiral at the centre of the smaller passage. This came out of a hole between two capstones to join with the male energy travelling along the first chamber.

I did some dowsing as to the purpose of the site and eventually narrowed the concept down to it being a place of transformation and initiation. How that was done exactly I don’t know. Perhaps it’s something you have to try for yourself one moonlit summer’s night?

What a great start to the holiday. Two sites visited on the first day of landing. I honestly didn’t expect that, and was amazed at how many sites there were in the environs around St.Brieuc. Perhaps I would run into some others as we travelled around in the next ten days? Indeed we did.

Gwas

Following the pink coastline (this is not a euphamism)