Realm of the Ring Lords
Transcription of a Talk by Sir Laurence Gardner
About the Speaker: Sir Laurence
Gardner, Kt St Gm., KCD, KT St A., is an
internationally known sovereign
and chivalric genealogist. He holds the
position of Prior of the
Celtic Church of the Sacred Kindred of Saint
Columba, and is distinguished
as Le Chevalier Labhr'n de Saint Germain
and Preceptor of the Knights
Templars of Saint Anthony. Sir Laurence is
also Presidential Attach’e
to the European Council of Princes (a
constitutional advisory
body established in 1946), and Chancellor of the
Imperial and Royal Court
of the Dragon Sovereignty. He is formally
attached to the Noble Household
Guard of the Royal House of Stewart,
founded at St Germain-en-Laye
in 1692, is the Jacobite Historiographer
Royal by Appointment and
is a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of
Scotland.
Correspondence for Sir Laurence
Gardner should be sent to him care of his
postal address: Columba
House, PO Box 20, Tiverton EX16 5YP, UK.
The Realm of the Ring Lords is a Lecture Presented at the
Nexus
Conference - Sydney, May 1999. What follows is Part I & II.
(A personal introduction given by Sir Laurence Gardner at the beginning
of the Lecture)
It seems like hardly any time since I was here. It’s only ten months ago,
I guess, but in the past few months Genesis of the Grail Kings has been
completed, published and is already making a significant impact in
Britain with launches now taking place further afield.
Duncan has asked me to begin by giving some background about myself once
again. I am involved with a number of organizations - the Celtic Church
being one in particular, for which I’m the Grand Prior in Britain (that
is, the Celtic Church of the Sacred Kindred of St.Columba). Not
necessarily that the established Church organizations like the Celtic
movement very much, but that’s the way of it. I am also appointed as a
Presidential Attaché to an organization called The European Council
of
Princes.
The Council was founded in 1946, directly after the War, and the object
was fairly straightforward. (In fact, some of the financing actually came
from this country [Australia], and a lot from America as well. It was at
a time when there was a tremendous fear about the build-up of further
extremist right-wing factions, and there was also the fear that the
communist left-wing might take a hold in Europe. It was decided,
therefore, to set up a watchdog committee called The International
Council of Government, whose brief was to keep an eye on things and,
once the European Common Market came into being, it became much
more involved with that from the 1960s.
The Council quite liked the idea of the trading agreements and the
general mutuality, although it doesn’t like things too much in the way
they have now developed within the European Union. About ten years ago,
the Council changed its name to become The European Council of Princes.
With the eventual establishment of the European Parliament, there could
hardly be a Council of Government as well. In fact, the Council was not
a
government at all: it was simply an advisory body consisting of
thirty-three European Royal Houses, these might be reigning houses,
dispossessed houses or deposed houses but, what ever the case, various
princes and princesses of these families formed the Council. For the
longest time now, their objective has been a very simple one, and that
is
to look after the constitutional clauses within the various nations
states (European countries, with the exception of Britain, have Written
Constitutions). And so, when the European Parliament decides to enact
this new law or impose that new dictate, the Council of Princes is able
to say, “Look, you can’t actually do that because it contravenes, say,
clause 7 in subsection (b) of the Constitution of this or that country”.
The Council of Princes is not especially political - it is more of a
social Council in practice; and I am appointed as an Attaché by
virtue of
the fact that its President since 1992 has been HRH Prince Michael of
Albany, the current heir to the Royal House of Stuart - the House that
was deposed in Britain since 1688.
The House of Stuart, having taken over the presidency of the Council from
the House of Habsburg-Austria, related it to its one-time Royal Academy,
which was a very scientific establishment. In fact, in the 1700s in
particular, it was highly Rosicrucian - very scientific and alchemical.
From the time of Robert the Bruce, the Chancellor of that organization
was given the title Prince Saint Germain. This title had little to do the
5th-century saint himself (except indirectly), but it had to do ultimately
with the Stuart Royal Court in France, at the Palace of Saint Germain.
The Chancellor title was changed in the 1700s to Count Saint Germain, and
in the 1890s it was changed again to become Chevalier Saint Germain. My
present title is that of Chevalier Saint Germain - which is where the
knighthood comes from. As distinct from an English knighthood, mine is
a
Franco-Scott distinction attached to the Stuart Royal Court of France [as
ratified by King Louis XIV in 1692], in the key Noble Order of the Royal
Palace of Saint Germain-en-Laye, near Paris. Being a Stuart supporter,
I
am not really a great fan of the House of Hanover, as you know. However,
I have now become attached to a particular Hanoverian establishment. The
oldest antiquarian society in the world, constituted by the House of
Hanover [by charter of King George III of Britain] in the middle 1700s,
is an association called the Society of Antiquaries which, in Scotland,
forms an adjunct to Historic Scotland - a Government department. Well as
a non-fan of the House of Hanover, I was privileged and delighted a few
months ago to be made a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland
- so it rather looks as if I’ve been blessed to have a little bit of a
foot in the
establishment’s academic camp.
Now, back to where we are today, I have to begin of course by thanking
Duncan and the Nexus team for affording me the opportunity to link my
first Australian visit for the new book, Genesis of the Grail Kings, with
the Nexus conference. And I would like to thank those of you who, since
I
was last here, have written to me. Some of you may have had a reply by
now, my correspondence was more or less up to date around Christmas, but
it has fallen behind again. So, if you’re still waiting, please bear with
me; I will respond.
I first began to talk publicly about the subject matter of Genesis of the
Grail Kings back in October 1997 and, indeed, we covered a good deal of
related ground at the Nexus Conference last July. So, with the book now
completed and published, I guess the time has now come to move on to
other things in preparation for future works.
Originally, and beginning with Bloodline of the Holy Grail, I had planned
for a series of three books on the Grail theme, covering some 6000 years
of Messianic inheritance from the time of Adam, through King David and
Jesus, down to the present day. However, in the course of compiling this
genealogical descent and its fascinating history, the concept for another
book has arisen. This has come about more by popular demand than by
strategic planning, and I have become so enthused with the idea that
there will now be four books in this particular series. It is, in fact,
about this additional book (rather than the apparent Genesis successor)
that I would like to speak today.
Bloodline of the Holy Grail covers an historical period, from the time
of
Jesus, through the past 2000 years. Subsequently, Genesis of the Grail
Kings was written to answer the most asked of all resultant readers'
questions: 'Why was the Grail Bloodline so important in the first place?
Why was the kingly line which descended to Jesus and beyond so unique
from the outset in old Mesopotamian times? This was the subject which we
discussed here last year, and we saw how the Messianic succession of
Grail dynasts (or Dragon Kings) was alchemically conceived and
purpose-bred for the role of earthly leadership. We looked at the records
of ancient Sumer, which talked of the Anunnaki gods and their 'creation
chamber'. We saw how the great vulcans of the era produced the enigmatic
Highward Fire-stone (the white powder of monatomic gold) that was used
to
feed the Light-bodies of the Babylonian kings and Egyptian pharaohs. And
we saw how this substance, when ingested, had stunning effects on the
body's endocrinal system.
Ultimately, we followed the senior line of royal descent (a line that was
genetically determined by the Mitochondrial DNA of the Dragon Queens)
down to the time of Moses. And we visited the Temple, discovered in 1904
high on the Bible's Mount Horeb, where the monatomic Fire-stone was made.
Now we shall take a look at the wider scheme of things in terms of the
folklore and fable which have emanated from the alchemical realm of the
Pendragons. And we shall consider, in particular, the long-standing
disputes which have prevailed between the sacred Bloodline and the Church
establishment.
These stories and their historical roots (whether portrayed in fairy
tale, nursery-rhyme or Gothic romance) will form the basis of a
forthcoming book, entitled Ring Lords of the Dragon Beyond the Portal of
the Twilight Realm. So, today, we shall be looking at the world of
enchantment, with a little myth, a little magic and a good deal of
historical fact, as some of the characters of popular legend take their
place on the stage of reality. And, at the conclusion of this talk, we
shall open the door to one of the most intriguing, but suppressed,
secrets of our heritage.
On the face of it, the Grail-related stories (whether of Cinderella,
Robin Hood, Sleeping Beauty or Count Dracula) each hold their separate
mysteries and enchantments - but it is not generally understood that they
all stem from a common historical base which is rooted in the culture of
the Grail Kings. Even though some of the themes have their origins in
very old lore, the majority of tales (as we know them) were newly slanted
from the Dark Ages onwards - and especially from medieval times, when the
Church's persecution of Grail heretics was in full swing, leading to the
great Inquisitions.
The Classic Fairytale "Sleeping Beauty"
Among the best known of these heterodox Christians (or 'heretics') in the
Middle Ages were the Cathars - the Pure Ones of the Languedoc region in
southern France. And they, in line with the Dragon tradition of the
Ouroboros Ring Lords, referred to the Messianic bloodline as the Elven
Race. As we shall see, the terms elf, fairy, pixie and the like were all
representative of various castes within the kingly succession.
The Ouroboros (as detailed in Genesis of the Grail Kings) was a symbol
of
wholeness, unity and eternity - usually identified by a serpent (in the
form of a ring) clutching its own tail. With a cross positioned beneath
the ring, the emblem becomes the familiar device of the female - the
Venus symbol (as portrayed on the cover of Genesis of the Grail Kings).
Alternatively, with a cross positioned above the ring, it becomes the
masculine Orb of sovereign regalia. And, with the cross positioned within
the ring, it becomes emblematic of the Holy Grail itself - identified as
the Dew-cup, or the Rosi-crucis. In the Cathar language of old Provence,
a female elf was an (elbe) - and Albi was the name given to the main
Cathar centre in Languedoc. This was in deference to the matrilinear
heritage of the Grail dynasty - for the Cathars were supporters of the
original Albi gens - the 'elven bloodline', which had descended through
the Dragon Queens of yore, such as Lilith, Miriam, Bathsheba and Mary
Magdalene. It was for this reason that, when Simon de Montfort and the
armies of Pope Innocent III descended upon the region in 1209, it was
called the Albigensian Crusade.
Through some thirty-five years, tens of thousands of innocent people were
slaughtered in this brutal campaign - all because the inhabitants of the
region were champions of the original concept of Grail kingship, as
against the pseudo-style of monarchy which had been implemented by the
papal machine. In practical terms, Church kingship prevailed from the 8th
century and it has continued, through the ages, to the present day. But
the fact is that, under the strict terms of Sovereign practice, all such
monarchies and their affiliated governments have been illegitimate.
So, what is Church kingship? It is precisely that with which we have
become so familiar. It applies to all monarchs who achieve their regnal
positions as a result of Church coronation - by the Pope or, in Britain,
by the Archbishop of Canterbury. In terms of true kingship, there is no
necessity for coronation because kingly and queenly inheritance are, and
always were, 'in the blood' - to be precise, in the Mitochondrial DNA of
the Sangreal. In the old scheme of things, kingship was automatic because
it was an alchemical inheritance which, in practice, had nothing to do
with ruling over anyone or anywhere. By virtue of an illegal dictate,
however, monarchies were brought under Church control and the magical
Realm of the Ring Lords was supplanted by the material and territorial
reigns of the papal kings.
One might ask why this was allowed to happen. Why did no one stand up for
the legacy of the Holy Grail? Well, the fact is they did; the Cathars
did, the Knights Templars did, the Rosicrucians did. Indeed, any number
of gnostic groups and fraternities did - and it was this open support
which led to the hideous tortures and executions of the papal
Inquisitions and witch-hunts that persisted through so many generations.
By the Middle Ages, the Church controlled the majority of European
monarchies (with Scotland a notable exception - as a result of which King
Robert the Bruce and the whole Scottish nation were excommunicated). The
Church, therefore, influenced governments, parliaments and educational
establishments (as it still does today). And, by implication if not by
direct instruction, the military forces of the pseudo-kings operated at
Church command. The Church held such enormous financial, political and
military power that the Grail adherents became an 'underground stream'
-
living in fear of their lives at every turn.
They were not only heretics, they were singled out for punishment as
sorcerers and, since they did not conform to papal dictates, they were
clearly satanists! The women, of course, were all whores - but this was
nothing new; the Roman Church had forged this dogmatic classification at
the time of its earliest constitution!
Before looking at some aspects of the Ring legacy, it is important to
consider the original document which made Church kingship possible in the
first place. In this context, I do not use the word 'important' lightly,
because the implementation of this particular document some 1248 years
ago led to just about every social injustice that has since been
experienced in the Christian world. The document to which I refer is
called The Donation of Constantine. All monarchical and governmental
practice has, for centuries, been based upon the initial precept of this
charter but, as we shall see, the precept is wholly invalid.
There are those in our midst today who, under the dynastic rule of Grail
entitlement, are rightful kings and queens. But many of the dynasties
which have actually reigned have done so with little or no sovereign
heritage. They have gained their positions simply because it suited the
Church to crown them as its puppet representatives. Moving forwards in
history from the pharaohs of Egypt, from the Davidic Kings of Judah and
the Dragon Kings of Scythia, we arrive in the Dark Ages with the Celtic
kingdoms of Europe and, essentially, for the purposes of this story, with
the Fisher Kings in Gaul (which later became France).
It is because of this continuing period of Grail sovereignty in the
Celtic realms that conventional history now refers to the 'Dark Ages' -
about which we are told there is so little documentary record. There is,
however, any amount of surviving material from the era. The period is
only 'dark' because the Church and the Imperial overlords decided to veil
it from scrutiny - removing documentary evidence from the educational
environment in order to perpetuate the myth that everything and everyone
outside the Roman establishment was ignorant and barbaric.
As detailed in Bloodline of
the Holy Grail, the Church of Rome (founded
by Emperor Constantine the
Great in the 4th century) had little to do
with the Nazarene style of
Christianity, which it officially superseded
and had hitherto persecuted.
It was an entirely new hybrid form of
male-dominated 'churchianity'
based upon a contrived Apostolic succession
of popes.
The separate Nazarene movement
(often called the Celtic Church) continued
in opposition under the direction
of Grail dynasts from the family of
Jesus - and they were styled
the Desposyni, meaning Heirs of the Lord. At
that time, the bloodline houses
of the Desposyni held the reins of Dragon
kingship in Europe - a tradition
which the bishops of the Roman Church
sought to undermine. They
eventually managed this in the 8th century,
when they deposed the Merovingian
Fisher Kings of the Franks after some
300 years of regional succession.
With the sudden, contrived
demise of this Grail dynasty in 751, a new
style of kingship was introduced
in the West - kingship not by any right
of succession, but by individual
decree of the Pope - and it was this
which led to much of the fairy
tale and folklore which is so familiar today.
The new style of papal kingship
was made possible by the so-called
Donation of Constantine which,
although now known to have been forged,
was not open to debate at
the time. When the Donation made its first
appearance in the middle 8th
century, it was alleged to have been written
by Emperor Constantine 400
years earlier (although, strangely, never
produced in the interim).
It was even dated and carried his supposed
signature. What the document
proclaimed was that the Pope was Christ's
elected representative on
earth, with the power to 'create' kings as his
subordinates.
The provisions were put into
operation by the Vatican in 751, whereupon
the long-standing Merovingians
were deposed and a whole new dynasty was
supplemented by way of a family
who had, hitherto, been Mayors of the
Royal Palace (the equivalent
of Prime Ministers). They were dubbed
Carolingians and their only
king of any consequence (through some 236
years) was the legendary Charlemagne.
As a result of this strategy,
the whole nature of monarchy changed from
being an office of 'guardianship'
to one of 'rule'. Henceforth, the papal
monarchs were territorial
governors rather than patriarchs of the people.
By virtue of this monumental
change, the long-standing Grail Code of
princely service was forsaken
and European kings became servants of the
Church, which had the power
to make them or break them. How do we know
today that the Donation is
a forgery? Well, there are many reasons, but
the most obvious is that its
New Testament references relate to the Latin
Vulgate version of the Bible.
This edition was translated and compiled by
St Jerome, who was not born
until the year 340 - some 26 years after
Constantine (who died anyway
in 337) supposedly signed the document!
Indeed, there was more than
half a century between Constantine's alleged
signing and the appearance
of the particular Latin Bible that was used in
its content. Notwithstanding
this, the language of the Donation was, in
any event, that of the 8th
century and bore no relation to the writing
style of Constantine's day.
The truly ridiculous aspect
of all this is that the Donation was proved
to be a forgery some 550 years
ago, during the Renaissance, but its
overwhelming dictate, which
cemented the Pope as the supreme spiritual
and temporal head of Christendom,
has prevailed regardless. As explained
in Genesis of the Grail Kings,
the monarchs of the Grail succession were
called Messiahs (Anointed
ones) because, in the early days in Mesopotamia
and Egypt, they were anointed
with the fat of the sacred Messeh - the
holy dragon (or crocodile).
By virtue of this, they were also called
Dragons. The Dragon (emblematic
of wisdom) was the epitome of the Holy
Spirit which, according to
the Book of Genesis, moved upon the waters of
time, while the Grail was
the perpetual Blood Royal: the Sangreal.
Originally, in old Mesopotamia,
it was called the Gra-al - the sacred
blood of the Dragon Queens
- and it was said the be the 'nectar of
supreme excellence'. The ancient
Greeks called it Ambrosia.
The concept of fairies (the
fair folk) was born directly from this base,
being a derivative of fey
and relating especially to 'fate'. In the Celtic
world, certain royal families
(especially those of the Pendragons: Head
Dragons) were said to carry
the 'fairy blood' - that is to say, the fate or
destiny of the Grail bloodline
- while the elf-maidens of the albi-gens
were the designated guardians
of the earth, starlight and forest.
But how was it that the dragons,
fairies and elves of history became
enveloped within a shroud
of supernatural enigma? Why was it that their
stories were moved from the
world of reality into a domain of romance and
nursery tale? What had all
this to do with the Donation of Constantine?
To answer these questions,
we must now step through the Portal of
Enchantment, into the Twilight
Realm of the Shining Ones, for theirs is
the enlightened Realm of the
Ring Lords.
Three Rings for the Elven
Kings under the sky,
Seven for the Dwarf Lords
in their halls of stone.
Nine for Mortal Men doomed
to die.
One for the Dark Lord on
his dark throne,
In the Land of Mordor where
the shadows lie.
One Ring to rule them all.
One Ring to find them.
One Ring to bring them
all
And in the darkness bind
them
In the Land of Mordor where
the shadows lie.
So it is cited by Gandalf the
wizard in Tolkien's “The Lord of the Rings”
- one of the most popular
tales of all time.
In essence, the contested ownership
of the One Ring is little different
to the enduring quest for
the Holy Grail. Although presented from quite
opposite standpoints, both
are quests for the maintenance of sovereignty
- but each has been misapplied
at various stages of history by those who
perceived the Ring and the
Grail as power weapons. Hence, it was
imperative (in the respective
stories) that access to the Grail was
protected by severe questions,
just as it was essential to keep the One
Ring from the evil Sauron
of Mordor, who eventually lost his power when
the Ring was destroyed in
the fires of the Mount of Doom. There is,
however, an essential difference
between Tolkien's One Ring, which is
portrayed as dark and divisive,
and the Golden Ring of Grail romance,
which is a ring of love and
enlightenment.
The latter was further symbolised
by the iron-clad ring of knights who
sat at the Round Table - a
ring that was broken (leading the land into
chaos and waste) when Arthur
forsook the Celtic Code in favour of the
Roman persuasion. (Or, as
the later Christianized version of the story
differently explains, when
Guinevere was unfaithful to Arthur with
Lancelot.)
It has been said, on occasions,
that the great genius of the 19th-century
composer Richard Wagner was
that he recognized the Ring saga as a version
of the Grail quest. However,
if anything, the reverse is true. What he
recognized was that the popular
Holy Grail legends were, in fact,
stylized retellings of the
more traditional Ring Quest. Both Richard
Wagner and Alfred, Lord Tennyson
(in his Arthurian writings), understood
that the Grail Quest was a
spiritual aspect of the Ring Quest - but that,
in essence, they were alike,
if not the same. What they also recognized
was the fact that both the
Ring and the Grail could bring disaster,
though by different means.
The power of the Ring had to be withstood,
otherwise it would enslave
its master, whereas the power of the Grail
would retaliate with vengeance
if misused. Either way, the moral is the
same in that, ultimately,
power is self destructive when achieved through
selling one's soul. Hence,
the ouroboros Ring can be a halo or a crown -
but it can equally become
a noose.
Adolf Hitler's fanatical obsession
with finding the Hallows of Grail
Castle was a prime example
of this misconceived notion of power. In his
search for the Hallows, he
obtained an ancient lance (said to have been
used by Charlemagne), which
he insisted was the Longinus spear that
pierced the side of Jesus
at the Crucifixion. This, he reckoned, was the
sacred Spear of Destiny, so
revered in Grail lore. With this in his
possession, Hitler was confident
that his Empire would be as strong as
that of Charlemagne. But legend
had it that, after many great victories,
Charlemagne was doomed to
defeat from the moment he lost the magical
weapon. And so it was that
on 30 April 1945 - the very day when the
American 7th Army, under General
Patton, seized the lance from Nuremberg
Castle, Adolf Hitler accepted
his defeat and shot himself.
Whether applied in fact or
fantasy, the concept of the Ring and the Grail
was such that it inspired
hope for the social and natural environments.
The Grail Hallows (the Sword,
Chalice, Ouroboros and Spear) were
traditionally regarded as
tools of princely service but, when presumed to
be weapons of power, they
would always, one way or another, destroy the
wielder from within. These
Hallows were represented in the four suites of
the Tarot's Minor Arcana as
the Swords, Cups, Pentacles and Wands -
subsequently to become the
Spades, Hearts, Diamonds and Clubs that we
know today.
Throughout the best part of
this Millennium, no organization has misused
the Grail Chalice symbolism
to greater effect than the Christian Church
establishment. From the earliest
times, the Rosi-crucis (the Chalice and
wine of the Grail sacrament)
was a prerogative of the Albi gens - being
emblematic of the Blood Royal
in the womb of the Dragon Queen. However,
the Church has long misappropriated
this aspect of the Hallows ceremony
to become its Eucharistic
power-weapon - supposedly to bind its followers
into communion with ecclesiastical
dogma. But, as time goes by, this very
power is being seen to subside
as the congregations diminish in the quest
for greater truths and more
substantial enlightenment from legitimate
sources.
In William Shakespeare's A
Midsummer Night's Dream, the queen of the
fairies is Titania, whose
name represents the pre-Olympian god-race of
the Titans. In particular,
she is the moon goddess Diana. Their king,
Oberon, however, had an historical
base, being inspired by an ancestor of
Shakespeare's colleague, Edward
de Vere, 17th Earl of Oxford. He was a
founding member of Elizabeth
Tudor's 16th-century Court Poetry and Magic
Syndicate - along with Francis
Bacon, John Dee, Edmund Spenser and others
of the Rosicrucian 'underground
stream', who aided and guided much of
Shakespeare's work. Edward
de Vere was, at that time, Lord Chancellor of
England - as had been many
generations of his forebears, including
Albrey, the 12th-century Prince
of Anjou and Guisnes, whose titular name
(Albe-Righ) meant 'Elf King'.
What the Syndicate knew full
well was that, despite their loyalty to
Elizabeth, the House of Tudor
had no prior right to the English throne,
having simply taken it, by
might of the sword, from the preceding House
of Plantagenet.
That apart, the Plantagenets
themselves were a junior branch of the House
of Anjou, whose senior branch
was the House of Vere. Indeed, in 1861, the
noted royal historian, Baron
Thomas Babington Macaulay, described the
Veres as 'the longest and
most illustrious line of nobles that England
has ever seen'. Their ancestry
was jointly Pictish and Merovingian,
descending from the ancient
Grail House of Scythia. Here was a true
kingly line of the Elven Race,
and it was for this reason that Oberon (a
variant of Aubrey/Albrey,
the historical Elf King) became Shakespeare's
King of the Fairies. Such
was the translatory nature of all Rosicrucian
symbology, whether portrayed
in stories, artwork, watermarks or the
Tarot.
Sometime earlier, in 1408,
Edward de Vere's ancestor, Richard (Lord
Chamberlain and 11th Earl
of Oxford), had been invested a Knight of the
Garter by King Henry IV at
Windsor Castle. Also invested, at the same
time, was King Sigismund of
Hungary, who had revived the ancient Egyptian
Order of the Dragon, within
which Richard de Vere held the hereditary
distinction of Lord Draconis.
One way or another, the nursery
tales which emanated from the
'underground stream' were
stories of lost brides and usurped kingship -
based upon the subjugation
of the Grail bloodline by the Church of Rome
and, in later times, by the
sectarian Puritans of the Protestant movement.
The Catholics had their Dominican
Grand Inquisitor, Tom’s de Torquemada,
and the Puritans had their
equivalent in Matthew Hopkins, the Witchfinder
General. Favoured executions,
in each case, were hanging, drowning or burning
at the stake, and the common
command was: 'Kill them all; God will know his own'.
The fairy tale concept was
essentially geared to stories relating to
these persecutions: allegorical
accounts of the predicament of the true
Royal Family - the Ring Lords
of the Sangreal, whose fairies and elves
(having been manoeuvred from
the mortal plane of orthodoxy and status quo
were confined to a seemingly
Otherworld existence.
They were tales of Grail princes
who were turned into frogs; of Swan
knights who roamed the wasteland,
and of Dragon princesses locked in
towers, or put to sleep for
hundreds of years. In the course of their
persecution, the elf-maidens
were pricked with bodkins, fed with poisoned
apples, or condemned to servitude
- while their champions swam great
lakes, battled through thickets,
and scaled mighty towers to secure and
protect the matrilinear heritage
of the Albi-gens. These include such
well-known stories as the
Sleeping Beauty, Cinderella, Snow White and
Rapunzel. In all cases, the
underlying theme is the same, with the
Bloodline princess kept (through
drugging, imprisonment or some form of
restraint) out of reach of
the Grail prince, who has to find and release
her in order to preserve the
dynasty and perpetuate the line.
For the most part, the establishment
of the 'Mother Church' was
symbolized by a malevolent
stepmother, an evil witch or some other
jealous female with an opposing
vested interest. Always, the stories are
reminiscent of the Lost Bride
of the King in the Old Testament's Song of
Solomon. Their content also
embodies the forlorn aspect of Mary
Magdalene, the bride of Jesus,
whose royal heritage and maternal legacy
were so thoroughly undermined
by the Christian bishops.
An interesting feature of many
classic fairy tales is that they truly are
very old stories. Take Cinderella,
for example. If asked who wrote
Cinderella, many people would
answer 'the Brothers Grimm'. Others will
say 'Charles Perrault'. However,
these men were not actually writers of
fairy tales as is commonly
thought. They were collectors, compilers and
interpreters of the tales.
The story of Cinderella can be traced back to
the Carolingian era, with
its first known version appearing in the year
850. Perrault published his
well-known edition in 1697 in France, while
the Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm
produced their German version in 1812.
Over the years, many people
have likened Tolkien's wizard, Gandalf, to
Merlin of the Arthurian tales.
At the same time, Tolkien's Aragorn has
been likened to King Arthur
but, as Tolkien himself pointed out, there
was really a closer similarity
between Aragorn and the historical
Charlemagne. The challenge
which faced Charlemagne (having been charged
by the Church to establish
a viable Empire from various disunited
kingdoms) was not unlike that
which confronted Aragorn, who reunited the
divided kingdoms of Middle
Earth. But there was a marked difference in
practice - for Aragorn was
far more like Arthur in having an advisory
wizard, whereas Charlemagne
did not, because the Church would not consent
to counsellors outside its
own appointees.
Aragorn's was, therefore, more
of a Celtic-style environment, with the
enemy being the evil Sauron.
Charlemagne, on the other hand, was a
champion of the Roman Church,
whose adversaries were the supporters of
the unlawfully ousted Merovingian
establishment - an establishment to
which Aragorn would personally
have been well suited.
In the event, it became essential
for the Church to settle some form of
Ring entitlement upon Charlemagne,
so that he was perceived to conform to
the Dragon tradition. And
so a suitable tale was invented to the effect
that a serpent appeared at
his court with a golden ring in its mouth - an
enchanted ring that compelled
him to love whoever's finger it was on. At
this stage, it is of interest
to note that a newly proposed three-film
series of Tolkien's The Lord
of the Rings is currently in its early
stages of development. After
some 18 months of negotiation with the
American film company, Newline
Cinema, the $260m contract has been
acquired by the New Zealand
film-maker, Peter Jackson. Various parts of
New Zealand will, apparently,
make ideal Middle Earth locations for the
project, and it is hoped that
the first film (based upon Book I of Tolkien's 1950s
trilogy) will be released
within the next couple of years. This film, The Fellowship
of the Ring, will subsequently
be followed by The Two Towers and The Return of the King.
With a speaking cast of about
sixty, and many thousands of extras, it has
recently been rumoured that
one of the key roles, that of Gandalf, is
hotly tipped for Sean Connery.
Given that The Lord of the Rings has been
voted 'the most popular book
of the century', and with stars of this
calibre, we could well be
looking at one of the first mammoth box-office
attractions of the new Millennium.
The composer Richard Wagner's
personal association with Grail lore and,
of course, his own famous
Ring Cycle are well known. It is, therefore,
very appropriate that one
of the present hopeful contenders for The Lord
of the Rings film score is
Richard's own descendant, Adrian Wagner, who
is now in touch with the film
company in this regard. When Bloodline of
the Holy Grail was released,
I was heartened to learn that the Wagner
Grail tradition of Lohengrin
and Parsifal was still very much to the fore
and, at that time, Adrian
released an album in parallel with my book,
called The Holy Spirit and
the Holy Grail. Now, as a companion to my
latest work, he has composed
the compelling new musical suite, Genesis of
the Grail Kings.
One apparent fact about Tolkien's
elven folk is that, unlike the cute
little elves of many children's
tales, these characters are actually
larger and more powerful than
average mortals. They are also endowed with
greater powers of wisdom;
they ride magical horses and closely resemble
the ancient Irish king-tribe
of the Tuatha D'e Danann. In this regard,
Tolkien was quite accurate
with his assessment of the original Ring Lords
of the Albi gens who, in the
far distant years BC, were called the Lords
of the Sidh’e (pronounced,
'Shee').
The Sidh'e was a transcendent
intellect known to the druids as the Web of
the Wise), while 'druid' (druidhe)
was itself a Celtic word for 'witch' -
an English form of the Saxon
verb 'wicca', meaning to bend or yield, as
indeed do willow and wicker.
The Tuatha D'e Danann (or Dragon Lords of
Anu) were masters of the transcendent
Sidh'e, and were duly classified as
'fates' or 'fairies'. Before
settling in Ireland (from about 800 BC) they
were the world's most noble
race, alongside the early kings of Egypt -
being the Black Sea princes
of Scythia (now Ukraine). Like the original
dynastic pharaohs, they traced
their descent from the great Pendragons of
Mesopotamia - and from them
sprang the kingly lines of the Irish Bruithnigh
and the Picts of Scotland's
Caledonia. In Wales they founded the Royal House
of Gwynedd, while in Cornwall
(in the South West of England), they were the
sacred gentry known as the
Pict-sidh'e – from which derives the term 'pixie'.
So, from a single caste of
the original Blood Royal - whether known as
the Sangr'eal, the Albi gens,
or the Ring Lords - we discover many of the
descriptive terms which sit
at the very heart of popular folklore. For
here, in this one noble race,
we have the 'elves', 'fairies' and 'pixies'. Not
beguiling little folk, but
distinguished kings and queens of the Dragon
succession. One of the most
important Scythian words was uper, which meant
'over' or 'above' - a word
that we still use in today's English, in such definitions
as 'superintendent' or 'supervisor'.
In titular form, a Scythian Uper was an
overseer or, more importantly,
an Overlord - the equivalent of a Pendragon.
Later, in the Hungarian and
Romanian regions, the word gained the variant
pronunciation, Oupire. Until
the medieval fabrications of the Christian
Church, there was nothing
remotely sinister or supernatural about the
definition Oupire - but this
was eventually destined to change when the
witch-hunts began, for the
priest-kingly Oupires were, in the eyes of
Rome, the equivalent of magian
druids. They were, therefore, witches, and
the Sidh'e definition (Web
of the Wise) became newly dubbed as the Web of
the Weird. In the main, outside
the Celtic regions of Britain, the traditional
Oupires had been apparent
in the Balkan and Carpathian regions of Europe –
having prevailed from Transylvania
to the Black Sea in ancient times.
They were, therefore, not only
associated with witches, but with gypsies.
The Church bishops and Inquisitional
friars suspected them as being the
ultimate rulers of the Land
of Elphane - the twilight realm of fairy
gold, magic springs and the
abiding lore of the Greenwood - all of which
were anathema to the Church.
They were said to be wandering people of the
night, who consorted with
evil spirits and, at that stage, a new word was
born into the language of
Christian Europe. The word - a straightforward
corruption of Oupire - was
'Vampire'.
In addition to vampires, another
classification was soon to enter the
Inquisitional vocabulary as
the Dominican blackfriars and the Franciscan
greyfriars compiled their
list of undesirables. They had now moved beyond
the realm of ordinary heretics
and pagans for, alongside their fabricated
vampire myth, they conjured
another form of shapeshifting phenomenon -
the 'Werewolf'.
Quite suddenly, there appeared
to be no end to the fantastic creatures
who were reckoned to stalk
the streets and forests in search of
unsuspecting victims - but
the beauty of all this was that it had the
effect of making people lean
more heavily upon the Church, which was the
only perceived route to salvation.
These vampires and werewolves, it was
said, could not be killed
by conventional means. Even God was out of the
picture, for only the power
of Jesus Christ (the Saviour of humankind)
could defeat these diabolical
beings. They were portrayed as devils,
demons and emissaries of Satan,
who had to be exorcised and destroyed by
the monks and clerics. And
so the Church was in business with a whole new
genre of scary folklore to
counter the Grail Quest legends and esoteric
artwork of the 'underground
stream'.
On the one hand there were
the Albigensian tales of Swan princes, Dragon
queens and Elf maidens - comprising
the lore of the forgotten Bloodline
and the Lost Bride - wherein
knights and chivalric champions battled
against all odds to preserve
the sacred heritage of the Holy Grail. In
these stories, there were
wizards of the druidic school and wise hermits
to guide the knights upon
their journeys and missions. But nowhere in
these tales of enchantment
did a gallant priest or bishop ever ride to
the aid of a damsel in distress,
for the Church was, in practice, the
adversary.
Part II
At the 1545 Council of Trento,
in Northern Italy, the bishops formally
blacklisted and outlawed the
Prophesies of Merlin - withdrawing all
related material from the
public domain. Then, in order to weigh the
literary balance in the Church's
favour, a new breed of writing was born,
which came into its own as
Gothic Romance. The premise behind these tales
was not so much about saving
victims, but rather more about destroying
the enemies of contrived 'churchianity',
with crucifixes galore and
gallons of holy water being
the essential weapons in the dreaded
undertaking against the sinister
'evil ones.' Then, in time, the Christian
movement had a wonderful idea
for its own Merlin competitor - not a
wizard as such, but an early
Church bishop with canonized status. But,
what a very strange choice
thy made!
Back in AD 325, one of the
characters at Emperor Constantine's Council of
Nicaea was a certain Nicholas,
Bishop of Myra. At this Church conference
the bishops were debating
the nature of the Holy Trinity, and of how
Jesus was not simply the Son
of God, but was also God incarnate. The
ageing Libyan priest, Arius
of Alexandria, was not at all happy about
this new concept and decided
to make his feelings known But, when he rose
to speak, Nicholas of Myra
immediately punched him in the face!
This, of course, brought the
debate firmly back onto the required track -
subsequent to which, the violent
protagonist was rewarded for his effort
and duly became Saint Nicholas.
This titular name was later corrupted in
parts of Europe to become
Sinterklaas or Sintniklaus - and then, in the
English-speaking countries,
to 'Santa Claus'. Now, by virtue of a good
deal of strategic propaganda,
he is lovingly revered by children as the
jolly gift-bearing Father
Christmas - a far cry from the original vindictive
bishop of historical record.
Within the Celtic Church of
the Dark Ages (in the days of Merlin and
Taliesin), there had been
some very prominent adepts of the old wisdom:
abbots and culdees such as
St David, St Patrick and St Columba - all of
whom were denounced, in their
day, by the Roman Church for their
so-called wizardry and pagan
beliefs. Even the later papal establishment
regarded them all as necromancers
and sorcerers - but this is not the way
things are currently portrayed.
Although the writings of Merlin were
expressly banned by the Council
of Trento, the teachings of David, Patrick
and Columba were so firmly
cemented in society that the Church pursued a
different strategy of incorporation.
A thousand years after the
lifetimes of these druidic magi, the Vatican
elected to bring them into
the orthodox saintly fold so that the real
truth of their Celtic environment
would be overshadowed. Then, only a
couple of years ago, the British
Post Office and the Anglican Church
joined forces to promote the
gentle St Columba of the Celts alongside his
bitter Catholic rival, St
Augustine of Rome, who came to England with an
express papal brief to destroy
the Columban movement immediately after
Columba's death in 597.
Notwithstanding this historical
fact, however, the 1400th anniversary
postage stamps and substantially
hyped propagandist material of 1997
portrayed these two arch-enemies
as if they had been blood brothers in a
common cause - proving, beyond
doubt, that new myths of 'churchianity'
are still being created to
this day.
With regard to the werewolves,
who were said to manifest at the height of
the full moon, the definition
were means, quite simply 'man' (hence,
werewolf is 'man-wolf'), but
it comes rather more precisely from an
ancient high druidic caste
of Wood Lords (called Weres or Wallans). Their
totem animal was the wolf
- just as other tribes were represented by,
say, a boar or a horse. These
totems were really no more than the early
predecessors of heraldry,
whereby families became identified by the
animals, plants, shells and
other devices on their banners.
Historically, the Wallans became
very influential, founding great kingly
dynasties in Ireland, Wales
and England. The great Cadwallan of Wales was
of this druidic race, as was
King Casswallan, the intrepid son of Beli
Mawr - the greatest of all
the sovereign Wood Lords in about 100 BC.
Other totems, of course, were
the various god and goddess representations,
and it is especially relevant
that one of these still holds a prime British national
position today, having persisted
though the centuries from the early culture of
the Wood Lords.
The original Wallans were apparent
in Mesopotamia around 3800 years ago,
in about 1800 BC. They were
called the Yulannu, which meant, quite simply,
Wood Lords. Indeed, it was
from their culture that the original Yule tradition
derived, subsequently making
its way across Europe to Scandinavia.
The venerated Goddess of the
Yulannu was Barat An-na (Great Mother of the
Fire-stone). The Sumerians
called her Antu. She was the wife of the god, Anu,
and the mother of Enki.* In
later times, she was identified with Diana of Ephesus
(Diana of the Nine Fires).
The cult of Barat An-na spread across Syria into the
Phoenician kingdom, where
they began to portray her on their coins. In these
representations, she sat by
the sea-shore with a torch of fire, and at her side was
a round shield bearing the
cross of the Rosi-crucis.
Along with the Wallan druids,
the culture of Barat An-na was brought to
the British islands, where
her name became compacted to Bratanna. And in
those islands, her image persisted
to the extent that she became the great tribal
goddess - a goddess who, despite
all the emergent centuries of Christianity, has
prevailed to this very day.
Her image on the coins has barely altered, except that
her flaming torch became a
lighthouse, and the Rosi-crucis cross of her shield was
amended to become the Union
Jack. But, after all this time, she is still the Mother
Goddess of the land - the
Lady of the Fire-stone: 'Britannia'.
Earlier, I mentioned the mighty
King Casswallan, who reigned in Britain
at about the time of King
Herod the Great. By virtue of being the son of
of the great Beli Mawr, he
was not only a Wood Lord, but was also a Ring
Lord of the Cassi - Hence,
he was Cassi-Wallan or Casswallan.
The Cassi tribes were also
from Mesopotamia, prior to which (having
previously settled in the
northern Zargos Mountains along with the
Yulannu) they were Carpathian
princes of the Sidhé. They were, in fact,
of the Tuatha Dé Danann
fairy strain. They reigned in regional
Mesopotamia from the 18th
century BC and, from about 1600 BC, they
governed all Babylonia for
another 500 years.
This particular race developed
one of the oldest Ring cultures in history
and, in ancient Ireland, they
were the sacred race of the God-men - the
'Vere-Bolg'. The greatest
of their Ring shrines still exists today - known as
Newgrange - originally a sacred
royal seat identified as a Rath. These shrines
(or 'fairy-rings') were called
the Creachaire (or temple-tombs) and they housed
the Raths - which were turf-built
mound dwellings, constructed upon a
framework of poles.
In later times, they were called
Tepes (pronounced 'Tepesh') - akin to
the the American Indian Tepee
- and they were reckoned to be Portals to
the Netherworld - the sacred
domain of ancestral souls. It is from this
mound-dwelling practice that
the tribal name of the Cassi kings evolved -
for a Cassi was a 'Place of
Wood'. They were the seats of the Portal Guardians:
the Oupires - the Ring Lords
of the Sidhé who, as we saw earlier, were later
dubbed Vampires.
One of history's best known
Grail fairies was Princess Melusine, daughter
of the Pictish King, Elinas
of Alba - a descendant of the 2nd-century
King Vere of Caledonia, Lord
of the Dragon. In the year 733, Melusine
(maintaining the family heritage)
married Rainfroi de Vere, Prince of
Anjou, and among their offspring
was Count Maelo, the commander of
Emperor Charlemagne's army.
From Maelo's own marriage to Charlemagne's
sister, sprang the Vere Counts
of Guisnes who, as previously mentioned,
were the reputed Elf-kings
and became England's Great Chamberlains and
Earls of Oxford.
In the Arthurian and Magdalene
traditions of the Ladies of the Lake (as
discussed in Bloodline of
the Holy Grail), Melusine was a 'fountain fey'
- an enchantress of the Underwood.
Her fountain at Verrières en Forez was
called Lusina (meaning 'light
bringer'), from which derived the name of
the Royal House of Lusignan
- the Crusader Kings of Jerusalem. The Fount
of Melusine was said to be
located deep within a thicket wood in Anjou,
and she was often depicted
as a mermaid, as she is still beguilingly
portrayed in an old painting
at Count Dracula's Bran Castle in Romania.
In the 12th century, Melusine's
descendant, Robert de Vere, 3rd Earl of
Oxford and legal pretender
to the Earldom of Huntingdon, was appointed as
King Richard I's Steward of
the forest lands of Fitzooth. As Lord of the
Greenwood and titular Herne
of the Wild Hunt, he was a popular people's
champion of the Sidhé
heritage - as a result of which he was outlawed for
taking up arms against King
John. It was he who, subsequently styled
Robin Fitzooth, became a prototype
for the popular tales of Robin Hood.
Of all the monarchs who ever
sat upon the Throne of England, the Tudor
Queen, Elizabeth I, was by
far the most in tune with ancient cultures and
wood lore. She was even called
the 'Fairie Queen' and, before being
formally crowned, she was
installed by the people as their Queen of the
Greenwood. This was an ancient
ritual of the Shining Ones - the elven
race of the Albi gens. The
ceremony was conducted in the mist of early
dawn in the depths of Windsor
Forest and, to facilitate the installation,
the customary Robin Hood legacy
of the House of Vere was brought into play.
At that time the Queen's Lord
Chamberlain was Edward de Vere of Loxley,
17th Earl of Oxford, and it
was his office to invest Elizabeth by first
deposing the Caille Daouine.
This was the traditional King of the Forest
(whose name had given rise
to Scotland's Pictish realm of Caledonia) -
the mighty Stag of the Seven
Tines, upon whose back Lord Vere rode into
the ceremonial clearing.
Edward de Vere of Oxford was
a friend and student of the Rosicrucian
alchemist and Secret Service
operative, John Dee, and he worked closely
with the statesman and philosopher,
Francis Bacon (later Viscount St
Albans). Between them (along
with others) they comprised the Royal Court
Syndicate, which was responsible
for providing much of the material for
the works of their playwright
colleague, William Shakespeare.
As mentioned in connection
with Melusine, fountains, springs and water in
general were always associated
with the Ring Lord female line. This stems
from the very earliest times
of the Anunnaki, whose founding mother (as
explained in ancient Mesopotamian
literature) was Tiâmat the sea-dragon.
In later times these queens
were commonly represented as mermaids (mere
maids), and were often called
Ladies of the Lake. This was a style granted to
Mary Magdalene when she had
settled in Provence from AD 44.
While the male descendants
of her and Jesus became the noted Fisher Kings
in Gaul, the female line retained
its Dragon Queen status, in a quite separate
dynasty, as the matriarchal
Queens of Avallon in Burgundy. They were known
as the House del Acqs (the
House of the Waters) and among their number was
the great 6th-century Queen
Viviane, revered as the Lady of the Lake in Arthurian
romance. This heritage was
so important to the Celtic Church that, when King
Kenneth MacAlpin united the
Scots and Picts in 844, his extant installation
document made special mention
of his descent from the Queens of Avallon.
The true significance of King
Arthur was his immediate joint descent in both the
male and female lines of the
Albi gens. His father was King Aedàn of Dalriada, the
Pendragon of Britain in the
year 559 – a descendant of the Wood Lord, Beli Mawr.
His mother was Ygerna del
Acqs, the daughter of Queen Viviane, whose grandson
(by Ygerna's sister, Viviane
II) was the legendary Lancelot del Acqs. Ygerna
(sometimes called Igraine
in the Grail tradition) was the High Queen of the Celtic
kingdoms and her daughter,
Morgaine (by her first husband, Gwyr Llew of Carlisle),
was High Priestess of the
Sisters of Avallon.
There have, over the years,
been any number of speculations concerning the historical
Arthur, but these are mainly
fronted by tourist establishments endeavouring to claim the
Arthurian heritage for their
particular parts of England or Wales. The fact is, however,
that (in line with the traditional
accounts) there was only ever one High King of Britain
called Arthur. There was only
ever one Arthur born as the son of a Pendragon. There was
only ever one Arthur whose
mother was Igraine of Avallon and whose grandmother was the
recognized Lady of the Lake.
There was only ever one Arthur with a son named Modred, and
there was only ever one Arthur
with a sister called Morgaine (or Morganna as some of the
stories refer to her). In
this regard, the old annals of Scotland and Ireland, along with the
records of the Ceeltic Church,
are unanimous in identifying Arthur mac Aedàn of Dalriada.
He was invested as Sovereign
Commander and High King in the year 575 by the druid,
Merlin Emrys, and his primary
seat was at Carlisle in the north of England, from where he
controlled the military defence
of the English-Scottish Border country.
Reverting, once more, to the
Raths (or royal mound dwellings), we should perhaps consider
the fact that, as mentioned,
these Portals to the Netherworld were called Tepes - for this was
the very style afforded to
one of the most enigmatic of all Gothic figures - Count Dracula.
Historically, and quite outside
the Christian propagandist mythology which surrounds the
vampire character of Bram
Stoker's famous novel, Dracula was Prince Vlad III of Wallachia,
who is often referred to as
Vlad Tepes.
Since the word 'Tepes' relates
to wooden poles, it is often thought that Vlad's descriptive
nickname relates to his individual
method of executing enemies of the State by impaling
them upon wooden stakes. Hence,
Vlad Tepes is sometimes said to mean Vlad the Impaler.
This, however, is completely
untrue. He was called 'Tepes' (as were many other druidic
elders before him) because,
within the ancient Ring Lord culture of the Sidhé, he was an
appointed Creachaire Portal
Guardian.
Vlad Tepes, a 15th-century
Prince in Romania, founded the capital city of Bucharest.
His popularised name, Dracula,
means, 'Son of Dracul', and Dracul (or Dragon) was a
style by which his father
was known within the Grail fraternity of the Ordo Draconis
(The Imperial Court of the
Dragon) from 1431. During this past century, ever since the
1897 novel, Dracula, was published,
Vlad has become an archetype of the Church-promoted
Gothic tradition. However,
the establishment's real fear of Dracula was not his harsh
treatment of enemies, as is
so often cited, nor that he was a blood-sucking vampire in the
Stoker tradition. What they
feared was his in-depth knowledge of alchemy and the fact
that he was truly an operative
Oupire - a venerated Overlord of the Rath - a Portal
Guardian in the ancient Yulannu
manner of the Ring Lords.
Those of you who have read
Bloodline of the Holy Grail, or maybe even Genesis of the
Grail Kings, will be familiar
with the terracotta portrayal of the Sumerian goddess,
Lilith, from around 2000 BC.
In this depiction (as in those of other Anunnaki hierarchy)
Lilith is seen to be holding
the Rod and Ring of Divinely Measured Justice. The Rod was
actually an instrument of
measure - and in some portrayals it is very clearly marked in
calculable units (like a modern
ruler). By Babylonian times, it was referred to as the Rule,
and the one who held the Rule
was the 'Ruler' - which is from where our governmental
term derives.
The Ring (as mentioned at the
beginning of this talk) was a symbol of wholeness, unity
and eternity. It represented
a continuance of divine justice - a justice that was measured
by the Rod (or Rule). Hence,
the Ring was the ultimate insignia of the Anunnaki overlords –
the enigmatic Oupires who
were responsible for the establishment of municipal government
and kingly practice - for
they were the progenitors of civilization from about 4000 BC.
In view of this, it is of particular
interest to note that Tolkien answered (when asked
about his book's Middle Earth
environment) that he perceived its setting to relate to
somewhere around 4000 BC.
"The cauldron has always been boiling", he said, "We simply
add new ingredients to the
soup". In this respect, his popular tale, although enthralling,
was not actually new in concept.
From the earliest of European times, the Saxon god,
Wotan (or Odin - the equivalent
of the Sumerian Anu), was said to have ruled the world
with eight rings – having
one more, the ninth ring (the One Ring), to govern the others.
During the medieval days of
the Church's persecution of heretics and, indeed, through
the Middle Ages and beyond,
all manner of Grail-related subject matter fell prey to the
wrath of the bishops and friars.
Unsuspecting victims were accused of any number of
apparently unsavoury practices,
and any association with the Ring culture was proscribed.
Indeed, when Joan of Arc was
accused of witchcraft, one of the charges laid against her
by the bishops was that she
used magical rings for enchantment and curative purposes.
As a result, she was burnt
at the stake in 1431. But recently, in 1920, the Church
reconsidered her case and
she was pardoned and canonized!
As detailed in Bloodline of
the Holy Grail, not only were proscriptions levelled against
the Prophesies of Merlin -
with a good deal of other literature confined to the supposedly
'lost' coffers of the Dark
Ages - but pictorial art also came under close scrutiny and many
new rules were made. One of
these was that the Virgin Mary must only be portrayed
wearing blue and white (just
as she is commonly depicted today). The reason for this was
that other colours, especially
the red of the cardinals, might have implied that she held
some form of ecclesiastical
office within a Church that afforded no clerical status to women.
What is not so commonly known
is that the Church's regulations als applied to music –
in particular ancient music
which could be traced to cultures other than that of Rome,
Greece or Lydia. It is by
virtue of these implemented regulations that so many of today's
reference books determine
that, for the most part, music evolved either from Greece, or
from various parts of the
Roman Empire.
It is precisely the same with
the English language, which is largely, but quite erroneously,
said to derive from Greek
or Latin. To cement this notion very firmly into our culture, we
are taught from the classical
literature of Homer and Virgil - but what is always forgotten
is that both the Greek and
Roman languages themselves evolved from other, far older,
sources. Much of the language
of Europe, including the English language, can be traced
back into Phoenicia, Syria,
Egypt, India and Mesopotamia - with many of the word stems
being thousands of years old.
In the world of music, we have
the very same scenario and, by virtue of discoveries made
in the past few decades, there
is no doubt that structured and sequenced music played a
major role way back in the
days of the Babylonian kingdoms and beyond. Silver pipes, bells
and drums, along with beautifully
ornamented harps and lyres, have all been unearthed in
ancient Sumer from graves
dating back five or six thousand years, and it is known that
lutes were also used.
Buried along with kings and
queens of the Dragon succession, these finely produced
instruments were clearly ceremonial,
and would appear to have been used in ancient
Star Fire and Fire-stone rituals
described in Genesis of the Grail Kings. The Fire-stone
ritual (the ritual of the
goddess Antu - or Barat An-na) was largely a levitation ceremony
conducted with the monatomic,
superconductive element of the Highward Fire-stone
(the White Powder of Gold).
Even in modern times, music
has been used to perform levitational feats - notably in
Tibet, where prohibitively
large stone blocks have been lifted and positioned high in the
mountains by using anti-gravitational
sound frequencies. The ritual involves 19 musicians
and, behind them, 200 monks,
radiating outwards in lines (in groups of five) at 5-degree
intervals facing towards a
mountain cave.
The musicians use 13 barrel-drums
of variant sizes (weighing up to 150 kilograms apiece)
- suspended from wooden frames and
directed towards a bowl-shaped cavity in which the
required boulder is placed, between
the musicians and the cave. Also, there are six long
trumpets positioned at intervals
between the drummers. On command, the trumpets and
drums begin, with the monks at the
rear providing a baffle whilst chanting. The time-span
before levitation of the stone occurs
is four minutes and, in this manner, stones have been
lifted some 400 metres to be lowered
into their necessary mountain temple positions.
Having made an intensive study
of the intricacies of this ancient procedure, Adrian Wagner
has recreated a musical enactment
in The Phoenix and the Fire-stone track of the Genesis of the
Grail Kings album - strategically
breaking the sequence with a Golden Mean partition and
concluding immediately before
the four-minute deadline. Locked within this are frequencies
that are so low as to be inaudible
to conscious awareness, but which resonate directly with the
frequency of the pineal gland.
This, as many of you will know, is the gland responsible for
heightened states of awareness
and perception.
Also included within the Genesis
album are aspects of musical harmonics which were banned
by the Vatican in the Middle
Ages, subsequent to their use by the Knights Templars and
Cistercian monks in the construction
of their Magdalene-dedicated Notre Dame cathedrals,
which are noted for their
architectural defiance of gravitational theory. The Knights of this
particular branch of the Templars
(constituted by King Baldwin of Jerusalem in 1118) were
called The Guardian Princes
of the Royal Secret.
One of these musical sequences
is the most famous of all - a Tritone dubbed by the Church
as the 'Devil's Interval'.
This is a direct extraction from the discovered harmonic scales of
ancient Mesopotamian deities,
which include the Enki Scale, Enlil Scale, Anu Scale, Marduk
Scale, Kingu Scale, Inanna
Scale and others [See Nexus Audio Reviews, last issue:
August-September 1999].
No composer has done so much
to preserve the legacy of Ring lore as Adrian's great-great-
grandfather, Richard Wagner.
His renowned 16-hour, 4-part Nibelungen Ring Cycle
(The Rhinegold, The Valkyrie,
Siegfried and Gotterdamerung - The Twilight of the Gods)
was largely drawn from Burgundian
folklore, and to some extent from the very old Norse
mythology of the Volsunga
Saga.
The Ring's ultimately key character
is the warrior Siegfried who, while under the spell of
a potion, betrays the woman
he loves - a goddess turned mortal called Brunhilde - who then
masterminds his death. Subsequently,
however, she realises her error and throws herself upon
Siegfried's funeral pyre to
be with him in eternity. The magical Ring that Siegfried gave to
Brunhilde is retrieved from
the ashes by the Rhinemaidens - the rightful water guardians
of the gold. And, by virtue
of this, along with Brunhilde's self-sacrifice, a hitherto curse (placed
upon the Ring by Alberic the
Nibelung, Dwarf-lord of the Underworld) is lifted.
The Ring had originally been
stolen from the Rhinemaidens by the Nibelung, who lost it to
Brunhilde's father, the sky-god
Wotan. Then Siegfried had won it by killing a dragon. But, upon
the final cleansing of the
Ring by the Rhinemaidens, Wotan perishes, together with his dream
kingdom of Valhalla. With
the Ring now back in its rightful hands, the world is redeemed and the
Cycle is complete.
And so, once again the traditional
Ring lore is apparent - just as in Tolkien and the Grail
stories, for the Ring is finally
seen to destroy those who hold it without the right of affinity.
The golden Ring itself (forged
from the enchanted flat-stone of the Rhinegold) had the power
to afford its master the lordship
of all the world, but only at the cost of forsaking love and
selling his soul to the Ring's
awesome power. In terms of the straightforward Messianic line
of King David and Jesus, the
most powerful of the Ring Lords was King Solomon who, in the
traditional Judaic writings
of the Talmud, was said to be the mightiest magician of his age.
His great wisdom and considered
judgement as a sorcerer-king were directly attributed to his
ownership of an enchanted
ring, and the legend of King Solomon's Ring was clearly a major
inspiration for Tolkien.
In the same manner as Solomon,
Tolkien's Ring Lord, Sauron, used his One Ring to command
all the demons of the earth.
Solomon used the demons to build a Temple of Jerusalem, whilst
Sauron used them to build
the Tower of Mordor. The rings were also similar (as is usual in the
tradition) in that each had
the power to corrupt and destroy its master. Solomon's ring achieves
his downfall through the agency
of the demon Asmodaeus, whereas Sauron is, in effect, his own
destructive demon.
Along with the rings, there
are also story similarities concerning the possession of light-
radiating jewels, with Solomon's
being the Schamir and the Elf-king Thingol's being the
Silmaril - each of which is
said to be an heirloom of the respective King's race.
By virtue of such Jewish writings,
the Dominican wrath of the Spanish Inquisition (from
about 1480) was largely directed
against the Jews - especially those connected with
Kabbalistic studies - and
it was really s a direct result of this persecution that the
itch-hunts began.
Prior to that, the Roman Inquisition
had been more concerned with eterodox Christians:
those heretics who were Christians
of one sort or nother (Arians, Nestorians, Nazarenes,
or whatever), but were not
embers of the Roman Church and whose culture revolved, to
ome extent, round traditions
of magic and alchemy that were outside Church control.
But, here were the Jews putting
forward their own versions of the old lore - particularly
hose in the Narbonne region
of the Spanish Marches, here the House of David had once
een given privileged rights
of rincely independence by Emperor Charlemagne. It was
recognized, therefore, that
the net should be cast over a wider arena, so as to take account
of those of completely different
persuasions. It was no longer a matter of the Church simply
endeavouring to clean up the
Christian house. What of the Jews? What of the Muslims?
What of the pagans in general?
And so, from the late 15th
century, the Inquisition began a thorough process of 'ethnic
cleansing'. No one who was
other than a full-blooded and obvious Catholic was safe. But,
there had to be some new form
of classification to pull all the prey into the ever expanding
net. The Grand Inquisitor
at the time was the brutal Tomâs de Torquemada, senior
direction the answer was found
and, very soon, the friars had set their
sights upon what it called
'the most diabolical heathens who ever
conspired to overthrow the
Roman Church'.
In 1484, two Dominicans, Heinrich
Kramer and James Sprenger, published a book called
The Hammer of Witches. This
evil but imaginative work gave full details of what was
perceived to be the hideous
new threat posed by all the practitioners of satanic magic.
The book was so persuasive
that, two years later, Pope Innocent VIII issued an official Bull
to authorize the suppression
of this blasphemous sect. Up to that point, the cult known as
'witchcraft' (to the extent
that it existed at all) had not really constituted a threat to anyone.
It rested mainly in the continuation
of pagan ritual and fertility rites by the peasant classes.
In real terms, it was little
more than the vestige of a primeval belief in the divine power of
natural forces, focused above
all on Pan, the mischievous Arcadian god of the shepherds. Pan
was traditionally portrayed
with the legs, ears and horns of a goat, but the creative Dominicans
had other ideas about the
pipe-playing Horned One, and they blackened his image so that he
was seen to correspond to
the very Devil himself. However, since the Inquisitors were all men,
it was determined that witchcraft
must be a form of depravity linked to the insatiable
wantonness of women!
The problem was that nobody
really knew who these presumed witches were - and so a series
of ludicrously tragic trials
and tests was devised to root them out. In the midst of all of this,
the harsh Puritan sect became
politically allied to the Roman strategy, implementing their
own witch-hunts in England
and, later, in America. Over a period of some 250 years, more
than a million innocent men,
women and children were murdered by the delegated authority
of the witch-finders.
It was against the backdrop
of this religious fanaticism and persecution that the Renaissance
movement was born - an era
of rebirth and resurrection facilitated by an environment of
democratic free-thinking.
This era (with its height in the early 1500s) was the age when
Leonardo da Vinci, Raphael
and Michelangelo developed the harmony of classical art to its
highest form. And it was the
age in which the excitement of pagan-orientated scholarship
re-emerged in a burst of colour
to cross new frontiers of science, architecture and design.
During the course of this,
in 1614 and 15, two tracts known as the Rosicrucian Manifestos
emerged from Germany. These
were immediately followed by an associated romance called
The Chemical Wedding, written
by the Lutheran pastor Johann Valentin Andreae. The
publications announced a new
age of enlightenment and Hermetic liberation in which certain
universal secrets would be
unlocked and made known.
In view of the advent of Britain's
scientific Royal Society and the inspired work of Isaac
Newton, Robert Boyle, Robert
Hooke, Edmund Halley, Christopher Wren and others a few
decades later, the prophecies
were correct enough but, at the time, they were veiled in allegory
and appeared to convey an
even more pertinent message. The writings centred upon the
travels and learning of a
mysterious character named Christian Rosenkreutz - a Brother of
the Rosy Cross. His name was
plainly designed to have Rosicrucian significance, and he was
depicted wearing the apparel
of the Knights Templars.
The action of The Chemical
Wedding takes place in the magical Castle of the Bride and
Bridegroom - a palace filled
with lion effigies, where the courtiers are students of Plato.
In a setting worthy of any
Grail romance, the Virgin Lamplighter arranges for all present
to be weighed on the scales,
while a clock tells the motions of the heavens and the Golden
Fleece is presented to the
guests. Music from strings and trumpets is played throughout,
and all is cloaked in an atmosphere
of chivalry, while knights in Holy Orders preside.
Beneath the castle stands a
mysterious sepulchre bearing strange inscriptions, and outside
in the harbour lie twelve
ships of the Golden Stone flying their individual flags of the Zodiac.
Amid this curious reception,
a fantasy play is conducted to tell the compelling story of an
unnamed princess who, cast
ashore in a wooden chest, is discovered by a prince, whom she
marries, thereby causing a
usurped royal heritage to be restored.
This is another Lost Bride
fairy story of the type we have already seen. But, when combined
with the two earlier publications,
The Chemical Wedding's Grail significance was blatantly
obvious, and the Church wasted
no time in bringing the full weight of its condemnation
against the Rosicrucian movement.
Having considered the historical
fairies, pixies and elves, we can now take a look at some
others of the so-called Shining
Ones: the sprites, goblins and gnomes.
The definition 'sprite' means
no more nor less than a 'spirit person' - one of the transcendental
realm of the Sidhé.
The original Sprites were the ancient Scythian ghost warriors, who painted
their bodies grey-blue to
look like corpses when they entered the battlefield.
In Shakespeare's A Midsummer
Night's Dream, the character, Puck, is described as a 'sprite'
and, in traditional English
wood lore, Puck is identified with a certain Robin Goodfellow,
who was said to be a 'goblin'.
His father was Herne the Hunter. Hence, Oberon and Herne
are one and the same. The
name, Oberon (a variant of Albrey the Elf-king, as we have seen) is
itself a derivative of the
Scythian Oupire (meaning'over') and Ron (meaning 'reign'). Oberon,
therefore, means 'Over Reign'
- which is the same as High King or Pendragon.
The description of 'goblin'
stems immediately from the Germanic word, 'kobelin' - and the
'kobelins' were said to be
mine-workers or those who worked underground. In the context of the
Ring culture, goblins were,
in essence, attendants of the Oupire Portal Guardians of the Rath –
the mound dwellings of the
Tepes gateways to the ancestral Netherworld - and they were just
as human as the Oupires themselves.
Gnomes, like goblins, were
said to be the guardians of the underground treasures - which is
why the word is today associated
with banking, as in the Gnomes of Zurich. The word root is
in the Greek equivalent of
gno, from which we get gnosis and gnoble (noble). The gnomes were,
therefore, once again, of
the noble race and were referred to as the Wise Ones. Their job was
indeed one of guardianship:
they were guardians of the gnosis (the knowledge) and of the
sacred bloodline of the Albi
gens. It is by way of the noble (or gnomic) distinction that the fairy
race in of the Pict-sidhé
(the pixies) who were the ultimate custodians of law and culture. Their
female counterparts were the
Behn-sidhé (the Banshee), which, in old Irish, simply means 'wise
women'.
In life, when presented with
a seemingly unsurmountable problem, one can either submit to
the stress and pressure that
it causes or, alternatively, one can mentally diminish the problem.
That does not mean that it
goes away, but it can appear less harassing and more controllable.
Well, that was precisely what
the Church did with the Dragon succession: the Ring Lords of the
Albi gens - the sacred Bloodline
of the Holy Grail. By way of redefining all the original names:
fairies, elves, pixies, gnomes,
goblins, sprites or whatever, they diminished the problem by
miniaturising the nominal
significance. In so doing, the transcendental race of the Sidhé
were
portrayed as minute little
figures and were moved into the realm of mythology. The fraudulent
Donation of Constantine was
then brought into play and, henceforth, only the Church could
determine who was and was
not a king!
If this strategy did not work
sufficiently on its own, as was indeed the case in the Renaissance
(a period of a more general
awareness and enlightenment), then Part-2 of the plan was brought
into operation. This was more
specifically targeted at the key members of the Messianic strain -
the ultimate Dragon succession of
the Albi gens: the dynastic kings and queens of the Sangréal
and their senior Oupires. These
people were real, and everyone knew that - so they could not be confined
to the superficial realm of fantasy. They could, however, be portrayed
as if (being of the
Dragon blood) they were of
a weird, half-human strain, beyond the Christian pale. At best, they
were perhaps mermaids and,
at worst, they were vampires but, either way, they were the evil
shapeshifting emissaries of
Satan!
The fact that anyone believed
such nonsense is difficult to comprehend in these more level-
headed times. However, the
myth is still operative and, to some extent, it is still working with
a vengeance. It is even working
on some whose apparent mission in life is to expose such
propagandist dogma, but who
(by way if its own cleverly contrived strategy) have actually
fallen prey to it. In this
regard, at this very moment, there are some well-known, supposedly
intelligent folk, who should
know better, claiming that the British Royal Family, along with
myself and others, are really
hideous reptiles from another planet!
One of the most surprising
things about the Scythian Ring Lords is that their preserved
remains from thousands of
years ago (discovered even as far north as Siberia) show their
bodies substantially tattooed
with ring-tailed lemurs. Lemurs, we are led to believe, are
native to (and pretty much
restricted to) Madagascar and the Comoros Islands off Mozambique
but here they are, where we are
told they never were, in Northern Europe and the Black Sea
regions!
It has long been known that
there was once a continent, inhabited by a great king-tribe,
which was noted for its lemurs.
Hence, it has been dubbed 'Lemuria' - setting a good many
enthusiasts searching for
its sunken whereabouts beneath the Atlantic, Pacific or Indian
Oceans, as if it were the
Lost City of Atlantis. Maybe such a concealed territory does exist.
However, the fact is that
(by whatever name it was once known) the mightiest Lemurian
land tract was never lost.
It was the great mainland continent which still exists today –
stretching across eastern
Europe through the one-time USSR.
This was the original realm
of the great Ring Lords - tracing back to about 40,000 BC –
the homeland of the Oupires
of the Pict-sidhé. It was the land of the mighty Warlords
of the Dragon before they
migrated and battled their way southwards in the ever cooling
climate of the last Ice Age.
Undoubtedly, the environment was once very warm there, as is
proved by the fact that the
lemurs travelled about as far south as they could possibly go by
land before Madagascar and
the Comoros broke away from the southern African mainland.
What did these early God-kings
look like? Well, they are now thoroughly identifiable from
their preserved remains, which
have been excavated at various sites from as far afield as
Transylvania and Tibet. With
their light-brown to red hair and pale eyes, the leather-clad men
stood at least 6ft 6ins and
upwards, while even the women were over 6ft tall. Undoubtedly,
these forebears of the Gaelic
and Celtic High-kings were among the most awesome warriors
of all history.
Of particular interest is the
fact that the Anunnaki gods were as much a part of the Sidhé
culture as they were of the
Mesopotamian tradition. It was not for no reason that the
settlement of Anu was hundreds
of miles north of Sumer on the Caspian Sea. It was not for
no reason that the ancient
centre of Scythopolis (Sidhé-opolis), which the Syrians called
Beth-Shean (the House of Power),
was 800 miles away in Galilee.
Indeed, It is now suspected
that the Ubaid culture of southern Mesopotamia - the culture
which introduced municipal
structure from about 5000 BC - was actually the 'Uper-ad' culture:
that of the Scythian Overlords
- the Upers (or Oupires). It is also reckoned that the subsequent
culture of the region, phonetically
called 'Sumerian' (pronounced Shumerian), was actually
Sidhé-murian (Shee-murian).
In fact, the case for this is now considerable, since the early
Ring Lords of Scythia (the
Tuatha Dé Danann king-tribe) were actually called the Sumaire.
And in the language of old
Ireland - to where many of the caste migrated - the word sumaire
meant 'dragon'.
So, why have we not learned
about these people in our histories? The answer is straightforward.
They were, in practice, the
real Elves and Fairies of our heritage, but their story was quashed
from the earliest days of
Roman suppression and subjugation - as the diminution of their
figures caused a parallel
diminution of their history.
The fact is, however, that
for all we have been told about our cultural identity being from
the
classical scholarship of Greece,
or from the imperial majesty of Rome, these things are entirely
untrue. Such establishments
appeared very late in the day. The true sovereign heritage
of our culture - the culture
from which derived all the so-called myth and legend which sits so
comfortably within our race
memory (no matter what the Church and academics might say in
their attempts to sway us)
- comes from one place alone. It comes from a place and time that
might just as well be called
Middle Earth as by any other name. It comes from the long distant
Realm of the Ring Lords.
Sir Laurence’s Mythic
Domain:
>http://www.geocities.com/CapitolHill/Parliament/3460/survey.html