Posts Tagged ‘initiation’
Arthur’s Stone – Initiation and Concepts of Arthur
Near to the village of Dorstone in the Golden Valley of Herefordshire is a wonderfully preserved ancient monument called “Arthur’s Stone“. The monument is on the borderlands of England and Wales, and as the map below shows there is a congregation of settlements and an alignment of sites along the ridges between the rivers Wye and Dore (“of gold”). Before I go on to explain my findings at Arthur’s Stone I want to discuss a little bit about my current concepts of what Arthur is, or who he was.
My current concept of Arthur
This Arthur fellow – he got about a bit, eh? These days I prefer the interpretation I read recently that “Arthur” is a title adopted or given to many kings, several of whom may have contributed to the myth and legend, the story and history surrounding the King Arthur that we have been remnanted. I like Paul Broadhurst’s idea that the Arthur figure was associated with the fixed constellation of the Great Bear, the guardian of the Pole Star. In my own additional interpretation, Arthur is aligned with and gets energy from the Great Bear’s stars. In particular I think this is the asterism of The Plough, or The Big Dipper as it is also known.
My wife, M, entered the site straight away and went to sit on a small man-sized mound next to the monument. There she settled in for what she expected would be a long dowse. I wasn’t about to go against expectations. I got my dowsing rods out and began to explore, but first I had to find an entrance suitable for me and my energy at that time. I entered the site after asking silently for permission from the spirit of the site. I would be allowed in today – no pushing away or dive-bombing birds, or claps of thunder or anything like that.
As I entered the gate in the fence surrounding the monument I saw two other couples reading the information board provided by English Heritage. I turned my attention away from them, not wanting to overhear anything they might say about the site. I would stay out of earshot until they got bored and wandered away, as most people do at these places after ten minutes. I began by asking to be shown a ritual path that I could follow that would lead me to a power centre that was most suitable for me. I was taken from where I stood in a path that snaked in front of the “false entrance” stone, and then wound its way into the monument from the right-hand side of the covering front stone (seen slanting in the picture below). My path ended in the shadows at the back of the chamber on the left-hand side. I repeated the exercise from three other locations chosen at random and soon I was walking the same snaking path to the front of the dolmen, and then into the right-hand side of the chamber and to the back left corner again and again. By the fourth time I was realising this was a pretty certain dowsing result.
Preparations for Imbolc: The Initiation of the Staff
Penmaenmawr – January 28th 2010
I hadn’t planned to go to Penmaenmawr and visit the Druid’s Circle. Instead I had printed out a map to a dolmen on the Llyn Peninsula in the North West of Wales, and thought that the sea air might do me some good as I was nursing the throb of having had a wisdom tooth extracted the previous day. Salt air – should do me good – so I had picked a site that was new to me, and was right on the coast. Instead, I turned off at Penmaenmawr – call it a ‘divine wind’ – a kamikaze moment.
It was certainly blowing cold and strong by the time I had gently picked my way to the top of the hill. It’s a good half hour walk from the parking place, marked by two ‘chess-piece’ towers up he steep single-track road above the village. As I pulled my scarf tighter against the wind and readies my new ash staff for its first sacred site outing, I saw patches of snow still lying around. Winter was still here, even though Imbolc is around the corner. Initiating my staff, i.e. filling it with positive and useful energies, empowering it, and giving this ash staff my own energetic signature had become the order of the day in preparation for our Imbolc outing to Anglesey. In sight of that very island from Pemaenmawr seemed so intuitively right this day.
My new white ash staff was wonderful to walk with: sturdy, a good height and weight. The only down side was that I had waxed it, and wearing gloves they slipped around along the shaft so that I had to keep re-adjusting my grip. Just wait until the Spring, I kept thinking. On the way up I tried to fall into the usual walking trance that allows me to begin to connect with Nature. The steady footfall rhythm, the clunk of the staff, the beating of the wind, the distant cries of sheep and gulls all made a lullaby that allowed me to sink into the warmth of my Winter clothing and soon I was feeling the weak energies of Winter flowing around me from animals, and along the tracks that people walked.
On the way up I found a small branch from a gorse bush lying in a patch of snow on the main path. It seemed totally incongruous to its surroundings, and I couldn’t see any gorse bushes within sight of where it lay. I knew I should pick it up and take it with me, so I hooked its twisted twin twig form atop my y-shaped fork in the ash staff. I then carried it like Dick Whittington carrying his wares to London Town.
I passed the large standing stone in a field next to a lonely cottage where on my previous visit with Kal we had found negative energies and the sheep had chased us away from the stone. I decided to ignore it until I came back down. This visit had a purpose: to initiate my new staff, not to surround it with potentially harmful energies! I wandered on. As I neared the top I saw the familiar small ring cairn that marks, for me, the beginning of the sacred area above Penmaenmawr. I stood within the ring cairn and felt like I should be doing something cleansing, so I opened up to the wind and allowed it to tear away from me all the energies of the un-sacred places I inhabited as a human “down there” in the valleys and towns. My stuffed-up nostrils cleared, and I felt energetically neutral after a few moments of this, so I said a little thanks and used the nearby ‘erratic’ stones as markers to guide me to the Druid’s Circle. I never seem to want to walk along the main path to the circle, for some reason, and I never have yet, whatever the weather.
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Brittany 8: Créhen’s ‘allé couverte’
Sunday 10th May – Créhen, Brittany
What I thought was the last of my dowsing trips on this holiday was to a small structure situated in the middle of some agricultural land just outside the village of Créhen near the northern coast of Brittany. Luckily the site is signed by one of the small blue signs that show the interested observer (because they’re easy to miss) that a megalithic site is close by. A small area large enough to park two cars allowed us to pull off the D768 road in order to visit it.
The way to the site was along a lovely tree-lined path kept clear for visitors by some helpful agency. We travelled along three sides of a square field until we saw a group of tree-infested large stones that were the remains of the Créhen covered alley. The trees were poking out of every available crack between the capstones, of which there were five, two of them very large indeed – some ten feet square.
I inspected one end and found what looked like a collapsed entrance. Two rounded smoothed pillar stones seemed to mark an entrance and I peered under the leaning capstone to see that the alley extended the full length of the stones, although this was difficult to see with the varying angles of the leaning capstones.
I checked for a nemeton field around the site. Nothing. None existed. I asked the rods if the site was still energetically active and got a positive response. ok. Well, let’s see what that meant. I checked the alignment of the passageway and found it was aligned East-West with the entrance facing eastwards.
I examined the two ends of the structure. Both had a small area large enough for a person to stand in. Interesting. I dowsed for a power centre and found a male centre at the western end in the space where a person could stand. I followed the line as it wandered along the top of the capstones to end in a spiral on the eastern end capstone. Then I asked of there was a female power centre. Indeed there was. It was centred in the small open space at the eastern end of the passage. I followed the path of this energy as it gently meandered along the capstones to terminate in a small spiral on the westernmost capstone. The two energy lines and power centres were mirror images of each other, travelling in opposing directions!
This struck me as full of potential, On the spur of the moment I asked M to stand in the female power centre, whilst I stood in the male power centre. We were about fifteen feet apart. I shouted to her, “Close your eyes – relax – and think of a colour.” I did the same on my male power centre. As I closed my eyes I saw a blue circle appear with a pink centre that then instantly flipped into a dark orange colour. It stayed that colour, as though I had looked too long at a circle of light and was seeing the after-image of it. I looked at M and shouted to her, “Orange!” She opened her eyes in astonishment. “Yes! Burnt orange was the colour I was thinking of !”
She asked if we could repeat the experiment, as she was quite excited at what had just happened. I explained that, like when I pass the cars at particular dark energy spots on the road to work every day, if you think that you can make something happen, i.e. you consciously intend to do something or to make use of this ‘ability’ then it never works out. We should just leave it at that – an extraordinary event of ridiculous coincidence.
We walked back to the car and headed off to the beaches of northern Brittany where we spent a lovely day admiring the coastline, the beaches and the wonderful “galette” crepe pancakes that are a speciality of this area. Strange things can happen when you visit ancient sites. We were now accumulating quite a wealth of such experiences, and I for one was becoming increasingly convinced that magickal things can be brought about by tuning into them.
Gwas Myrddyn.
In search of the strange
Brittany 2: St.Uzek stone and the Isle Grande ‘allé couverte’
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 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)




