Writer’s Muse and Humanity’s Oversoul

Om, Omega, Oversoul

VERSOUL: that Unity within which every man’s Being is contained and made one with all other; that common heart
Ralph Waldo Emerson

Yesterday was Emerson’s birthday. He and his fellows would have celebrated in style. He and his contemporaries, Henry David Thoreau, Emily Dickinson, Walt Whitman and others of the American Transcendentalist movement, believed in

“The writer (in his ‘right state’) as an expression of Man Thinking; in degenerative state as a parrot of other men’s thinking“.

“It is the essence of poetry to spring, like the Rainbow Daughter of Wonder, from the invisible, to abolish the past, and refuse all history” Emerson, Representative Man

A clergyman, but one whose words are sometimes more Gautama than Goethe, Emerson, 1803-1882, had great fondness for the Oversoul, whom he called the Rainbow Daughter of Wonder.

He was first to concede, however, that she is fickle.

Rainbow Daughter of Wonder
Writers have it hard — they have to maintain focus. Whatever is going on in their own private, particular world, they have a daily obligation, an assignation, to tune in and connect with their Muse.

I speak with especial deference to those writers who blog frequently and find consistently interesting subjects to blog about, without losing touch with their own reality. I am in awe, for instance, of the blogger-author-writer capabilities of The Burrow consortium, who blog far more prodigiously than I and have a composite following of thousands. Their 2011 June writing contest, BuNoWriMo –filled with supportive banter and genuine writerly urgings– is imminent (June 1st). I have featured some of their writerly profiles here in the past — and shall again.

For now, let’s take a look at the science behind the Spirit/Muse: They say that as a writer, all you need is a rhythm –the habit– of making time every day to sit down and write. That the Muse, hovering entity that she is, knowing that you are down there, sitting –plodding sometimes; at others racing ahead with ideas pouring from your fingertips– will take pity and come down and join you.

And then there is the growling anti-Muse: the Musebloc, the Great Doubt. But we won’t go there. I have spent the last month in the arms of Rite R. Bloch. He’s not my favorite companion. I am the first to revel in the relief at the end of the tunnel where light as a chink is merely spied — because at least you know the great black hole of negativity does indeed have an event horizon, a finite edge. The cloud of uncertainty and hesitation is passing. Will soon pass. One can hold one’s head up again.

BuNoWriMo, design by Joris Amerlaan

In the case of BuNoWriMo, I am certain their joint Muse — their Oversoul — is watching and will oversee a hugely productive month (followable on BuNoWriMo”>Facebook) from their respective pens/keyboards. We shall await amazing results.

They say the Oversoul/Muse is energized by positive encouragement. Just like the individual who uses positive affirmation to get out of bed each day, spurring her/himself with thoughts of creating something new, building a world never before imagined; the Oversoul is there –omnipresent– waiting for a chance to pop into our conscious mind and guide us to a more-inspired place.

In Emerson’s sense, then, I may be blogging as the parrot, but I do it with the sincere intent to clear a way for the intellect of one of humanity’s great Men Thinking to come through.

Terence McKenna was a Muse unto himself. Permanently connected to the Oversoul through a lifetime habit of listening to the Voice Within, he had a phenomenal hold on Humanity’s future — and its past. He foresaw the times we live in now –the speeding up of time and all experience; the overwhelming of numbers; the love-hate relationship between science and spirituality; disconnection between Individual and State.

He had himself experienced firsthand the fantasy worlds which the human mind is capable of entering, manipulating, accepting, and reinventing. He had little faith in the machinations of ‘mindless’ men, but he had ultimate belief in the presence of an Entity, an Overbeing/Overmind — his ‘Novelty’ — known to Emerson, Hermann Hesse, Aldous Huxley and Sri Aurobindo as the Oversoul; and to Carl Jung as the Universal Unconscious.

To McKenna it was both Oversoul and Eschaton: it is the Intelligent Design of the Universal Mind.

In his view it has tricks up its sleeve.

McKenna died in 2000, as world population reached the six billion mark. A year before he went to the Great Amusement in the Sky, the ‘altered statesman’ revealed a semi self-deprecating tale of his version of humanity’s love affair with the UFO phenomenon.

Oversoul as Saucer
“There is building in global society an increasingly intense expectation of the intervention into human history by UFOs: that is very similar in tone to the buildup of expectation in the Hellenistic world in the century before the birth of Christ. The leaders of Roman society might have been caught off-guard by the appearance of Christ, but they had no-one to blame but themselves, as millions of people in the ancient world were expectantly awaiting the appearance of some kind of Messiah.

“So today, science and government poo-poo the idea of world contact with UFOs, but the contact cults grow ever larger and more insistent that contact is about to occur.

“Imagine, therefore, what you may never have seriously imagined before: imagine what would happen if UFOs were to appear. Imagine a spaceship of the Close-Encounters-of-the-Third-Kind variety suddenly appearing in orbit around the earth.

“Television and mass media would carry this image to every man, woman and child on the planet. Governments would be paralyzed, science would be helpless to explain where it came from or how it got here.

“Millennarian hysteria would break out everywhere.

“The UFO would be hailed as savior, and denounced as anti-Christ.
The end of the world would appear imminent. And all this would occur before the contact of more than a visual image.

Saucer cult: 'Science would be helpless to explain where it came from or how it got here'

“Then the UFO would begin its revelation: vast displays of benificent power can be expected; perhaps it would mysteriously neutralize all weapons of mass destruction or it might use some sort of ray to cure all terrestrial cancer. Whatever it does, one may be sure that its actions will be impressive: its actions will convert millions to the UFO religion in a space of hours. Indeed, its actions would be specifically designed to overwhelm us with the reality of its power and presence. That will close the first phase of the revelation.

“The second stage would be the ‘teaching’. Telepathically imparted, the specifics of the teaching cannot be anticipated, but they will urge love, voluntary simplicity, concern for one another, renunciation of war, perhaps the renunciation of the destructive application of science. Whatever the teaching, the UFO will promise immense rewards for those who follow them and dire consequences for those who do not. The teaching will be delivered in so poetically-perfect a way, so rich in understanding, and appealing nuances, that no-one will doubt their origin in a being so wise and good –and immensely superior to ourselves.

“The delivery of the teachings will set the stage for the third and last –and most shocking– phase of the revelation: the departure.

“The saucers, promising vaguely to return, will simply disappear.

“The entire process could take less than a month. If this seems a short time, recall that the entire public career of Christ lasted only three years. Christ’s career occurred in a world where information could move no faster than a horse’s gallop. Yet three years in one small part of the world was all that was necessary to launch a world religion that remained vital for 1500 years.

“In a world of electronic communication the impact of the Saucer’s arrival, miracles, teaching and departure would be incalculable, even if it all occurred within a month. The Saucer would leave in its wake a science utterly unable to provide any answers to the important questions the event had brought on. The vast majority of people would be fanatical converts to the teachings of the Saucers and any institution in opposition to those teachings could expect to be swept away almost overnight.

“The departure of the UFO would create a sense of abandonment, the agony of which would be expected to echo in the human psyche for centuries.

“The only panacea would be the religion of the Saucer, the religion left behind. Science would be discredited and soon abandoned in favor of a thousand or more years of exegesis of the Saucerian message.

“Is this not a familiar pattern we see in our lives with events happening right now?”

“What will never be said in the wake of such an event, and so must be said now –while there is still time for all of the above to occur and yet still be deception — of a non-deception designed to save us from our advanced science and infantile efforts, but a deception nevertheless:–

“The Saucer –no matter how alien the theory, no matter how advanced its demonstrations of power– is not a vehicle from some other star system.

‘It is the Oversoul Of Humanity– up to its oldest tricks.’

“If one knows this, one can live through the revelation and the destruction of our scientific world, and thus evade the immense power of this most powerful of all transparent phenomena, and thereby maintain integrity of one’s own soul and spirit.

“Remember, I am not a debunker of flying saucers or a defender of science. I am a contactee and this is the painstakingly-told story of my own involvement with the UFOs. I am one of those pinpointed as being a carrier of ideas that paved the way for the scenario I have just described.”*
Terence McKenna

“Yet, from it all I have learned that there is no religious revelation more satisfying than the hard-won food of simple understanding.

“And there is no liberation to compare with seeing oneself as the illusions and delusions of the Age in which one lives.

*”I reached these conclusions in my encounters with psylocybin and psychedelic plants. They immerse their users in the world of the Oversoul and make one privileged to have reached at least a part of the tectonics of operation.” TM

“They allow a private dialogue with the Oversoul that is outside the context of the struggle between science and revelation –that leaves no choice between the alienation of the rationalist and the pious formulae of the fanatical believers. These mind-expanding substances hold out the possibility of healing the breach between science and morality at the level of the individual, thus freeing one to evolve, independent of the chaos and transformation the UFOs may seem to bring to humanity.” ©TMcKenna

“[UFOs are], in other words, something which in order not to alarm us has disguised itself as an extraterrestrial being, but is in fact the collectivity of the human psyche signaling a profound historical crisis.” ©TMcK

If you thought that was a tale worth telling, McKenna is capable of much, much more. Along the way, you may have watched part one (above) of his great vision from the Oversoul: Storytime story of how we evolved through science. It is a tale of parallel universes. Here is part two.

The Crop Circle Connection

May 4th 2011 crop circle at Barat Cikarang, Java, photo courtesy Nur Agustinus

Contemporary news reportage worldwide includes UFO sightings over metropolitan areas; with video footage and recordings corroborating each other. Recent disclosure announcements by US government sources relate to alien craft, formerly denied. Indonesian news services speak openly about current and earlier (January 2011) crop circle appearances in ricefields in that country as UFO-related phenomena. This was most recently reinforced when aerial footage of the May 2011 crop design in Cikarang was taken from a small craft whose instruments suddenly failed in the electromagnetic surge over the formation and it crashed.

While this blog was being written, Peruvian television showed footage of a ‘breaking news’ craft in their airspace.

The Sanctuary, Avebury crop image late May in early barley, photo Stuart Dike

Through it all, and curiously, the British crop circle season has been slow to start, its symbols sporadic in appearance and design and leaving the conviction of its followers seriously dented. Some have even suggested the Indonesian designs are more advanced than the British 2011 season, so far.

Perhaps our communal doubt is being reflected in McKenna’s trickster Oversoul. As he would say, we shall have to wait and see.
©2011 Marian Youngblood

Java Crop Circles highlight Earth Changes

Mount Merapi in Java, Indonesia: constantly active, the stratovolcano last erupted November 5th 2010

Surprise appearances of near-’twin’ formation crop circles in ricefields in two districts of Yogyakarta near Mount Merapi, Java last week have recruited Indonesians to the crop circle phenomenon and prompted a statement by the Sultanate whose palace, the Kraton, in Sleman district (central Yogyakarta) lies within one kilometer of one of the designs. It appeared two days after its companion, a complex vortex-like mandala figure arrived overnight in a southern suburb of the same city, six kilometers to the south of the Palace. Many believe they predict an increase in earth’s volcanic activity.

First crop circle in Indonesia, January 2011, has spiritual community on alert

The first crop circle (January 23rd 2011) in rice near the Palace in Sleman district, central Yogyakarta, is located 30 kilometers south of the 3000-meter (9,000 feet) stratovolcano Mount Merapi which is almost continuously active and last erupted for a whole month in October 26- November 30th, 2010.

The second crop circle (January 25th) lies in the Bantul district of Yogyakarta, 6km south of the center (and the Kraton Palace) in a rural district which suffered severe structural damage and loss of life in May 27th 2006 when a 6.2 magnitude earthquake tore through the village. Bantul is known internationally as an important artist’s colony which produces posters using a technique called cukil, daren kidul and Dono Kerto Turi.

Thousands of Yogyakarta residents and visitors from all over Java thronged to see the phenomenon

Crop circle followers worldwide are struck by the synchronicity of the crop circle sightings — these are unique in Indonesia; the first time crop circles have appeared — with their closeness in date, design and proximity to Mount Merapi’s seismic field. Even local Indonesians are contemplating the coincidence of the two designs’ choice of location as a warning of further earth changes in this volatile region. Within days, thousands of visitors lined up to walk through the rice fields to experience the phenomenon first-hand.

Many had never heard of crop circles nor read of the phenomenon and several reports described the marks in the fields as the ‘imprint of landing UFOs‘.

The Sleman design, close to the Yogyakarta Sultan's Kraton Palace, reminiscent of the base chakra

In a statement from the Yogyakarta Sultanate by Java’s spiritual counsellor, HRH Prince Karyonagoro (Kandjeng Pangeran) the Sultan’s family is ‘taking these appearances seriously’.
However the design of the circles has struck him as very interesting as it appears to replicate the form of the Javanese Muladhara, or the base chakra of the kundalini.

“From the standpoint of  ‘Merging with the One philosophy’, the appearance of the crop circle phenomenon in Sleman, Yogyakarta, in the form of Muladhara symbol means that there will be Nature’s selections in this country shortly, because the symbol is related to the genetical mapping when microcosm synergized with macrocosm waiting for a birth in the third dimensional place and time. I hope my brothers and sisters will be all right in welcoming this pending event. Stay alert!…”
HRH Prince Karyonagoro

Several spiritual groups in the city have indicated they believe the appearances are reminiscent of omens predicting an imminent natural disaster.

Muladhara or the symbol for the base chakra in the kundalini

Yogyakarta, once the capital of Indonesia during the National Revolution (1945-1949), is known for its strong Javanese traditions in art, culture, theater and the crafts of shadow puppetry, batik and sublime dance movement originating in the royal Court. Having gained independence in the 18th Century from the colonial Dutch, Yogyakarta has maintained historical architecture from both its colonial past and its Javanese heritage. It is home to Indonesia’s most prestigious state unversity, the Gadjah Mada University, as well as several other private universities which make their home in the region. Yogyakarta is the only province in the country with Special Administrative Region status (SAR) and is alone in being headed by a monarchy. The prince is also head of the spiritual welfare of the people and for this reason a statement on crop circles from the Sultanate is taken to be of great importance.

Second crop circle in Java: reported January 25th, 2011 in Bantul district of Yogyakarta

The Bantul crop circle of January 25th (6km S of the city center) also appeared in rice, prompting a rash of local media and news reports linking the appearance to a massive 6.2 magnitude earthquake in the same district on May 27tth, 2006 when much of the village was destroyed and over 1000 people lost their lives.

Bantul is known to international art collectors as the home of an artists’ colony which produces unique poster designs called cukil, daren kidul and Dono Kerto Turi.

As much of the population in Yogyakarta are resident students attending universities in the city, the crop circle phenomenon has been a popular diversion, with much international discussion being generated and shared with the international crop circle community on Facebook and other social networks. The appearances in rice come at a time when the northern hemisphere — in the winter doldrums between the end of the 2010 (English) season and the beginning of the next, around April 2011 — did not expect to be surprised. The appearances in rice — along with similar anomalous layering of crop and gentle folding and tufting seen in Wiltshire crop circles — have triggered much interest worldwide.

Some suggest the timing and synchronous appearance of the designs as presaging seismic activity or earth changes within the next two weeks. Other fears suggest that it presages world shortages in the food supply, specifically rice.

Borobudur temple, 40K NW of Yogyakarta set on a 9thC 9-level step pyramid --its lowest level is buried. Crop circle design shows 9 'levels of consciousness', according to Sultanate's spiritual alert

Given recent (European) seasonal pointers to sacred places and ancient pyramid structures, along with inter-faith meetings and ‘convergences’, it is tempting to connect the designs with the 8th/9thC Buddhist temple set on its 10-layer step pyramid at Borobudur, 40k NW of Yogyakarta on the other side of Mount Merapi. The temple’s magnificent ornately-carved 8thC structure was for centuries buried under (Merapi) volcanic ash and only rediscovered in 1814. From above, the pyramid takes the form of a Mandala symbolically depicting the path of the bodhisattva (novice aspiring to enlightenment) from samsara to nirvana. The ten steps of the pyramid signify ten levels of ascension. Compare this with the Sultanate’s statement likening the ‘mandala’ of the crop circles to Muladhara, the base, or primary of the seven chakras in Hindu Tantrism,

‘relating to the Earth, the densest of the seven grades of manifestation.’

The temple’s design is thought to be a recreation of Mount Meru, mythical home of the Hindu gods, called Sumeru i.e the “Great Meru” and a sacred mountain in Hindu, Buddhist and Jain cosmology, considered to be the center of all physical, metaphysical and spiritual universes. It is also the abode of Lord Brahma and the Demi-Gods (Devas).

One Indonesian source –local media– suggested:

“Crop Circles are telling you, in a universal language, of coming events, and we are speaking here not only of physical events, such as the pending pole shift, but spiritual as well. In the past, these simple but eloquent messages were left, with increasing frequency and urgency, leading up to the shift.”

A further –third crop circle– has appeared since this post in the Magelang district which draws the other two into geometric alignment not just with Mount Merapi, but also with Mount Tidar, the mountain known as the ‘Nail of Java’. According to myth, If the Nail does not hold, the Island will blow apart.*

These ideas are sparking a following on several continents.. We will be following volcanic activity in the vicinity of Mount Merapi, (Central Java) and Mount Bromo (East Java) which has also been threatening activity lately.

On the seismic and croppie scene, we shall keep you posted.

*Feb.2 update: Tet and Year of the Cat
Since posting the above, a third crop circle has appeared in Magelang. More on Java circles here.

Hathor Blessing: Crop Circle finale & farewell

Salutation to Hathor, goddess of love, music and beauty and Lady of the Stars, whose ritual Menat necklace represents the Souls of the blessed ones

Last week on Friday the thirteenth what may be seen as the swan song of the 2010 Crop Circle season appeared: an Egyptian-style ritual collar with trailing neckgear shining from a Wiltshire field of golden corn. It is the height of the harvest, days before they start wholesale cutting of wheat and barley in the western countryside.

The formation’s simple lines and clear message to crop circle followers may be overlooked among a plethora of dimensional designs which have dominated the 2010 crop circle season.

Linking its unadorned but glorious glittering shape to a Menat necklace — the symbol of primeval mother goddess Hathor in both the Old and New Kingdoms of ancient Egypt — is not difficult. A ritual curving jewelled shoal of splendour, its form is emblazoned in our collective memory, even as a northern species, derived from classical and prehistoric civilization of Europe and the Mideast.

She is the world’s most ancient goddess, embodiment of the planet Earth herself. It is she who cradles the sun each night as he sinks in the west.

Even the current fashion in heavy female neckware harks back to that classical curve: row upon row of minute turquoise beadwork and beauty created to invoke delight in a child, desire and pleasure in a model on the catwalk.

In present-day Wiltshire, we may not admit to being familiar with Egyptian hieroglyphics, hieratic script or deathmasks and tomb-paintings of the earliest dynasties (Great Pyramid of Khufu, 2589 – 2566 BC). But we have dormant memory banks, our bodies contain suppressed genetic code which probably remembers such a time, can ‘feel’ the weight of such a beautiful collar round our necks, desire the touch of such a ritual necklace.

It belonged to the Earth’s primeval goddess, Hathor: bringer of love, abundance, joy, fertility and regeneration.

As a swan song for the Wiltshire crop circle season of 2010, it seems a fitting statement to place at the height of English summer, when crops of wheat, barley, maize and even oats glorify in eight-hour days of beating sunrays pounding health and vitality into their stems and cells, literally seconds on the cosmic clock before the combine harvesters slice through life, growth and celestial graffiti.

Judging by a pronounced extra-terrestrial bent to this season‘s creations — despite a fairly good supporting cast of ‘plankers’ (man-made designs) — and with Science now firmly convinced of genuine CC enhancement in grain nutrient value and crop size by ET’s ‘light treatment’, I fervently hope someone is buying up Wiltshire wheat to bake into ‘DNA-enhanced’ bread, or wonder-pasta for our general wellbeing!

While there have been many man-made attempts this summer to emulate the light-bent nodes of superluminary crop circles, the Beckhampton message from the goddess appears to be genuine.

But, back to symbolism. Why Hathor? Why choose to imprint English fields — and thereby all of croppiedom — with a blessing from an ancient goddess who ruled heaven and earth before most of the western world could write?

Hathor, Earth-Mother Cow-Goddess bestowed bounty

Some time in Egypt’s pre-dynastic past the Goddess Hathor came into being, considered a major force in the creation of the world. Hathor was worshipped for over 3,000 years. Alternate forms of her name are Hwt-Hrw, Het-Hor, Het-Hert, Athor or Athyr.

Hathor, frequently seen as Egyptian Cow Goddess whose horns ‘held the Sun’, is probably Earth’s most ancient female deity. She encompassed so many different qualities and roles that it’s near impossible to list them all. She has been known as Sky Goddess, Sun Goddess, Moon Goddess and Goddess of the West. She was known as goddess of Moisture, and of Fertility, Agriculture and Motherhood; Goddess of the Underworld, Mistress of the Necropolis and, in her role as Protectress of the City of the Dead at Thebes, she became Goddess of the Dead.

Amenhotep III's ritual Menat necklace of bronze, faience, stone, glass and turquoise was gifted by goddess Hathor to pharaoh to engender his rebirth; courtesy Metropolitan Museum of New York

She was worshipped as Goddess of Love, Ecstasy and Beauty, and enriched the lives of her followers as Goddess of Music, Dance, Drinking and Joy. She was patroness of Women and Marriage and Protectress of Pregnancy. Hathor ultimately became special guardian spirit for all women and all female animals, and had such titles as ‘Lady of the Turquoise’ and ‘Lady of the Sycamore.’

The Menat Necklace was a ritual object first seen adorning the neck of the goddess and later used in ritual ceremonies to Hathor. The bejeweled necklace had many strands which ended in a counterpiece that, when originally worn as a collar, would hang down the back of the neck. In later use it had a ceremonial purpose and was wafted and waved as an amulet over the devoted to convey a blessing from the Goddess. The Menat symbolized fertility, and some sources see its offering a mystical union between the Goddess and her followers.

Are we earthlings now ‘followers’ of the wise goddess? Do we rate a heavenly blessing from the most high?

All summer long we’ve been expecting a message from God. Finally, as the year turns to autumn, we get a blessing from Goddess.

Much like the goddess Ishtar, Hathor’s attributes were a complex combination of the sacred feminine, death and the afterlife. It was she who bore bodies of the dead to the Underworld, she who actually took ownership of them. In this role Hathor became Queen of the Underworld.

Sun blessing embedded in a Wiltshire crop circle: Hathor regalia ends the 2010 season

In her association with Sun God Ra, Hathor was granted the title ‘Golden One’, while also sharing the name, ‘Eye of Ra’ with goddesses Sekhmet and Bast. Hathor was Protectress of Horus, the falcon god, and called a wide variety of names in that role. Some attributes appear conflicting and confusing and, as Mother Goddess, Hathor was often confused with both Isis and Nut. What confuses even more is the fact that she subsequently ‘became’ Isis who, in a later period, absorbed and acquired many of the aspects previously attributed to Hathor.

When she governed in her principal place of worship at Dendera, Hathor’s role as Goddess of Fertility, Women and Childbirth was venerated specifically. Her temple there was filled with incense, intoxication and pleasure. At her other temple in Thebes, however, Hathor changed into her robes as Goddess of the Dead, known as ‘Lady of the West.’ In Thebes she cradled in her arms the sun god Ra, as he descended below the horizon in the west.

Goddess Hathor wearing the Menat, holding her sacred Sistrum (rattle)

Hathor has represented the erotic in femininity and procreation, and was frequently identified with Greek goddess Aphrodite, Roman Venus. In her role as Goddess of Fertility, Hathor represented Nature’s creativity, and as Goddess of Moisture, she was associated with the annual inundation of the river Nile. In this aspect, Hathor was linked to dog-shaped constellation Sothis (Sirius, ‘dog-star’) which, at its heliacal rising on the eastern horizon — immediately before the Sun — announced yearly flooding of the Nile in July.

Eventually, in a later period, when Hathor’s role began to change, Isis/Osiris (Serapis) cults gained popularity in Egypt and then spread through the Roman empire and Greece. Because of her fertile and life-bringing nature, Hathor was considered capable of reviving the dead; she welcomed them to the Underworld, dispensed water to them from the branches of a sycamore tree, and offered them food. In various New Kingdom tombs at Thebes Hathor is depicted embracing the dead.

In pre-dynastic times, and certainly in the early dynasties, Hathor is seen as the cow-consort of the Bull of Amenti, the original deity of the Necropolis. As queen or ‘Lady of the West’, her mortuary title as Protectress of the Necropolis valley on the west bank of the Nile, in her role as protector she not only oversaw where the sun (Ra) went down, but this choice location for later kingdoms’ burial tombs.

Amazingly Hathor, one of the world’s greatest goddesses, was worshipped for a longer period than Christianity or Islam have reigned. Hathor’s religion of joy and celebration dominated for over 3,000 years. It continued strong throughout Egypt, and through both Greek and Roman empires, where it spread and became assimilated.

Her cult was in its heyday when the first great pyramids were built and used as sacred pharaonic tombs, and lasted until pyramids were no longer used for that purpose, by which time royal patrons continued under her protection on the west bank of the Nile in the great Necropolis Valley of the Kings.

She is the equivalent in Nordic, Celtic and Anglian territories of the Old Goddess of the pagans. She perpetuated in popular speech, in rituals of hearth and earth, in festival custom with its cargo of symbol and myth. She was seen as the source of life, power and wisdom. People prayed to her for wellbeing, abundance, protection, and healing. They invoked her during birth, and the dead returned to her and moved in her retinue.

They say that the Old Goddess, Crone who rode the winds, caused rain and snow and hail on earth, and that she revealed omens of weather and death and other momentous things to come.

In this sense she and Hathor are one and the same: primeval Eve, Brittonic Bride, Norse Auohumla, the great cow-giant goddess, true ancestor of the Norse gods. She is also Gaia, Sumerian Antu (who later ‘became’ Ishtar, goddess of love and procreation).

Apex of inspirational 'Hathor crop circle' at Northdowns, Beckhampton, Wiltshire, photo courtesy Bert Janssen

It is significant, too, that the ‘Hathor crop circle’ at Beckhampton appeared on a Friday the 13th.

The superstition held today of Friday the 13th being unlucky may stem from the betrayal of the Knights Templar on Friday, October 13th 1307 (Old calendar) when their monastic military order in France was arrested en masse by King Philip. The Spanish, however, hold Tuesday as their unlucky day; so the suggestion is a tentative one. Perhaps ET used the date merely to get our attention. It’s a familiar technique he’s employed over the years to combine crop images and Calendar.

An alternate explanation occurs: in later European tradition Friday was observed as ‘holy day of the goddess’, beginning with its eve on Thursday night. In that sense she is Norse goddess Freyja. The dark of the year was sacred to Old Goddess. On winter solstice nights, she was said to fly over the land with her spirit hosts. Tradition added that shamanic witches rode in her wake on the great pagan festivals, along with the ancestral dead.

Reverting to the Hathor connection, one ancient tale is retold of a group of goddesses, bearing cow horns and playing tambourines who went by the name the Seven Hathors. These Hathors were able to foretell a child’s destiny; similar in many ways to the weaving of the Tapestry of Life by the Fates, the Norns or the Disir. The Hathors were more than clairvoyants who could see into the future. They were questioners of the soul as it made its way to the Land of the West. In addition to knowing a child’s destiny, the Seven Hathors could foretell the exact hour of his death.

Egyptian mythology held that a person’s destiny was decided by the hour of his death and therefore his fortune, or lack of it, stayed with him throughout his life. The Hathors were known to have extreme powers, and were able to replace a prince, born with a bad fortune, with a child born with a good one. In this way they had the ability to protect both the Dynasty and the nation. The Seven Hathors are presently receiving some attention through the works of musician and psychic channeler, Tom Kenyon. When Hathor’s ‘old’ attributes became overshadowed by those of Isis and new kingdom beliefs, the Hathors were sent into the sky. There they have become identified with the Pleiades.

In more northern latitudes, reverence was paid for centuries to the Old Goddess in planting and harvesting, baking, spinning and weaving. The fateful Spinner was worshipped as Holle or Perchta by the Germans, as Mari by the Basques, and as Laima by Lithuanians and Latvians. She appears as Befana in northern Italy and as a myriad faery goddesses in France, Spain, and Celtic countries (Brittonic Bride). In Serbia she is Srecha; in Russia Mokosh, Kostroma or the apocryphal Saint Paraska.

Corn dollies embody ancient goddess Mother Earth

The Old Goddess was commonly pictured as a crone or aged woman, and origins of her veneration are lost in the mists of time. While goddesses of ancient ethnic cultures have unique qualities, they share traits, a deep international genetic root. Old Goddess is like the weathered Earth, ancestor of all, a tangible presence in forests, grottos and fountains. In her infinite guises she manifests countless forms: as females of various ages, she shapeshifts to tree, serpent, frog, bird, deer, mare and other creatures. Surviving the European Reformation, she remained beloved by the common people.

When farmers, and those who worked the land, were less dependent on technology to produce our food, Mother Earth and nature played a much more important role in the annual cycle of life. In particular, the harvest of cereal crops was a major event in the calendar.

We are now three weeks into ancient Lammas, the traditional harvest season.

In pre-industrial times a summertime ‘Lord of the Harvest’ would be given the responsibility of planning the harvest and marshalling the workforce, and when harvest was finally done they would celebrate with a ‘Harvest Home’ feast.

Corn Dolly made from the last (Clyack) cut sheaf, held sacred through winter, a blessing of Earth's bounty

The first and last sheaves of corn to be cut had major significance. Grain from the first sheaf (the ‘Maiden’) was made into a sacred loaf of bread while the last sheaf – the Clyack – was reserved for transformation into a corn dolly: symbolic of Mother Earth and the Spirit of the Corn.

Straw from this last sheaf was woven or plaited into the complex shapes of corn dollies, as cornucopiae, horns of plenty, horse shoes, knots, fans and lanterns. Ultimately, shape depended on local tradition, but in every case a symbolic ‘dolly’ graced the top table at the end-of-harvest feast and was then carefully guarded over the winter months. When spring crops were sown, the dolly re-emerged to be carried round the fields to pray that Nature and corn goddess delivered up another good crop.

In Wiltshire they’ve already started the harvest. Even in my native Aberdeenshire winter barley is going under the combine. Three weeks into Lammas (which pivots round August 1st), harvest is in full swing.

Our consciousness these days has become less aware of such natural cycles of food-cultivating-and-cutting; we are lulled into ignorance of the provenance of our daily bread. Perhaps it is this lulling that the crop circle presence wants to jerk us out of: to rekindle in us an appreciation — even reverence — for Earth’s bounty and her unconditional gifts of life and nourishment. More significant may be the appearance of a ritual symbol in the crop to help us understand our civilization’s most ancient ancestral traditions which show respect for (Earth’s) sacred creator gods.

Hathor was probably civilization’s earliest goddess. Her blessing showered on us now from above, five thousand years after the zenith of her devoted following, emblazoned in golden grain for our delectation and visual appreciation (aerial photographs superbly provided by Frank Laumen and Bert Janssen, thank you guys); it sparks our earliest memories of civilization. Are we being given a futuristic jab in the arm, to trigger our DNA? or to learn to appreciate more fully what our ancestors understood?

Our senses are being stroked, honed, we are receiving her gifts again. Not only was she goddess of birth and death, she was goddess of REBIRTH.

It’s just possible she has returned in essence now to show us that — at the end of the 2010 season of remarkable cosmic signs — our species is poised on the brink of rebirth: that we humankind are jointly headed for regeneration.

Dare we hope? As we come together as a race, as we feel joy in our rebirth, may we also see a faint promise of Hathor’s greatest gift? Immortality?

Our Saturn Return and The New Earth

Earth squeezed in a T-square between planetary giants in retrograde motion

The full moon in Aquarius just brightened last weekend, before plunging us and the planet back into the thick of our current conflict, heavily buttressed by a planetary T-square, the next most-challenging astrological lineup to hit us after June’s Grand Cross. It’s not that the Grand Cross has gone away: it’s just hovering, waiting to return on August 6th/7th. Saturn is dominating the astral path right now, being just about the only major planet in direct motion. And while that might not be seen as a positive aspect, its qualities as harsh taskmaster, cleanser, ruler of passion are being given a position of balance at the doorway (0º) to Libra. Right behind it, also moving direct, come Mars at 27º and Venus at 17º in Virgo. Meticulous attention to detail in love and control over unruly emotions are the best paths to tread. This is not an easy time for society (Saturn 0º Libra), the ‘real world’ of banking establishments, government departments experiencing major change. They are being directly opposed by all things expansive, generous, abundant — Jupiter at 3º Aries — and Uranus, planet of societal change at 0º Aries, encouraging us to stay alert, to think anew. Their drag is being felt most severely as both these giant planets are in retrograde motion. We are abandoning the old draconian systems, throwing out defunct legislation and top-heavy bureaucracy that no longer works. Changing channels.

Late July until August 9th: revolutionary changes in lifestyle, personal relationships, community, globally

Clustering close by, particularly since last weekend’s full moon in Aquarius, now moving through emotional and soothing Pisces, we are being guided by watery Neptune, 27º Aquarius, also retrograde, and in direct opposition to Mercury at 27º in Leo with the Sun, but suggesting a spiritual solution, steering a clear course for us through this unprecedented storm. Across the bows of these two opposing bulkheads of the zodiac stands Pluto, the planet of death and rebirth, at 3º of Capricorn, in control within its fixed, immovable T-square.

Not an easy time for mankind. But help is at hand.

It’s been said when all hell breaks loose, only the most peaceful, most love-centered and most ‘allowing’ natures will move through into the next dimension. For that is where we are: standing at a new portal into humaniity’s future.

Thirty years ago a whole generation was born into a world where Saturn stood at the doorway of Libra. That 1979-1980-1981 group of children are now, as the current golden generation of thirty-somethings, experiencing their first Saturn Return. For the Baby-Boomers, the late-’40s/early-’50s generation born after their parents’ return from war, this moment in 2010 is their second Saturn Return, the second time the giant ringed planet has made its 30-year circuit. It is no wonder the ethos of their teenage years — the glorious Sixties — is coming round again and we’re hearing the kind of special spiritual advice which was common speech in that magical era.

Two voices in particular are being heard above the clamor.

One is that of Dr Carl Johan Calleman, long-time student of the Calendar of the Maya and supporter of mankind’s entering the Ninth (and last) Wave of the calendrical system with focused intent. He suggested the weekend of July 17th-18th as an initiation to this new wave, calling it the Conscious Convergence, to tie in with the Harmonic Convergence of August 1987 which started the consciousness ball rolling again.

“Maybe it (Conscious Convergence) will be humanity’s last chance of setting such an intention, which almost with necessity must exist at an early point if we are to elevate ourselves above the economic chaos that we may expect in the years ahead.”

We the human species are, according to Dr Calleman in his interpretaion of the calendar, due to emerge from the sixth Night of the Mayan Underworld on November 2nd later this year (“Yellow Galactic Seed“) and will enter the Ninth and Last ‘Universal’ Underworld in February 2011. Conscious Convergence thus gives us a headstart for ‘Unity Consciousness’.

Those unfamiliar with Dr Calleman’s work will find multiple links on his page, but for beginners it might be helpful to start here.

There is another voice — a young female voice — who has been making herself increasingly more audible since spring this year. A young thirty-something herself, Kiesha Crowther is the daughter of a white father and a native American mother and is a tribal shaman and youngest-ever wisdomkeeper. Since spring 2010 she has been getting people’s attention by speaking about her people’s ‘New Way’ to wake up and pay attention to ‘who we really are’. Her suggestion to us, the world Tribe of Many Colors, is that the world changes today, in 2010, and she gives eight ways we might try to change our thinking about the physical. These are her pointers to helping us as a planetary family ascend.

Flower of Life: from our heart

Kiesha Crowther says: ‘the Light Beings are returning and they’re bringing their families!’ These are her suggested Steps to Enlightenment a new way of seeing;
Self-Memory – how to remember who you are;
Sustainable Lifestyle; and
Achieving higher consciousness

1. There is a Higher Knowing than ourselves.
There is a Grand Design: we are part of something greater than ourselves that has conscious intent. We can tune into that and become one with the Universe.

2. History is not an evolution of technology and production. It is the evolution of thought and we are moving through the process of thinking around the heart.

3. A new understanding of the physical world:
All things are alive and have energy. This enegy is keeping us alive.

4. Energy: Exchange energy with plants; share/take energy from the Earth. Instead of taking energy from others, get your energy from the Earth. We don’t have to take others’ energy. It is a gift from the planet: breathe in new energy from a tree, the river, the blade of grass, the rose. The Earth has energy for us. Stop giving it away. Go outside and fire yourself up. Fill up with Mother Earth energy.

5. Stop fighting to be heard or be in charge.
We do not need to feed off each other’s opinions of ourselves. If we fill ourselves up with Earth Energy, breathing it in and giving our energy back out to Mother Earth, we don’t need anybody else’s energy — nor do we need to let someone take our energy away.
We need to stop hurting each other, depleting the energy of another. Go outside and fill up with all the energy you need.

6. What do you stand for? Who do you want to be?
Why are you here? Ask yourself that and listen for the answers. You are the creator. Make a decision and watch it unfold.

7. Ways of Knowing:
Dreams are not just dreams. They come from the Higher Self. Thoughts pop out, we have daydreams; something comes into our heads. These are promptings from Spirit. Listen to them. Pay attention to your dreams.

Ask the right questions and listen. Listen to one another, listen to where the answers come from. From coincidences, through dreams, pay attention to what’s happening in your head. When you stop thinking so hard, and pay attention to what’s happening around you, you begin to receive some real information.

8. Do not become addicted to other human beings. This will stop your growth.
If you failed at something you love, why did you fail? Did you give your energy away? Did you let somebody else tell you you’d failed? We don’t have to be addicted to someone else’s opinion of us. We have our own inner path.

Things are not happening by chance. We chose to come here: to be here now. We belong to something enormous. We are part of a greater plan.

Stop thinking so hard and connect heart and mind. Start using mind to think about change from the heart. Our thinking is beginnning to realize there is more. We are realizing we are creators. Use our brains to connect with our inner knowing.

Energy
Seeing energy, sensing beauty. Filling ourselves up with energy from the planet, not from each other. Learn to take energy from plants, the mountains, trees, experience joy in the earth instead of stealing it from another.

‘We have been using energy the wrong way. That is a huge failure on our part. Now is the time to change. All the energy we need exists already on the planet. Go outside and breathe it in from an acorn, an apple, a plant, from the animals, streams, mountains. We are being asked to stop taking from others and to stop giving our energy away.’

‘All your life’s energy exists outside. If you feel weak. If someone says negative things about you, don’t let that make you feel bad. How silly! Sit outside and fill up with energy. Why does it feel so good? Because you’re plugging yourself in. Mother Earth is Everything.’

Little Grandmother Kiesha Crowther firmly believes that there is no hierarchy in this New Way of living in the New Earth. We each have the power to gather our own strength from the Earth Mother and grow at our own pace. There are no leaders, no followers. We are all equal, she says.

There is right now a physical group of around 32,000 people living this way, actually working on growing this consciousness larger. She warns: ‘If you can’t commit to it, don’t commit to it, but if you can, please stick with it.’

‘Stop telling yourself you can’t, because you can.’

Change the Channel
In order to change the balance from fear to love, she gives the advice of the ‘Grandfathers’, the Elders who say: ‘Change the Channel.’

‘If you are sitting next to someone who speaks ill of someone else or is not speaking from the heart, don’t be afraid to change the channel: shedding off what we are used to agreeing to on a daily basis and stopping it. If you hear negativity, stop listening to it. You cannot give your energy to something that is not good and expect it to change. If you give your energy to it, it will thrive. If you don’t want to have negativity in your life, change the channel.’

‘When you read something negative in the newspaper, your energy level plummets. If every one of us agrees to this contract, we will not listen to negativity.

We are the Ones we have been waiting for
‘The Grandfathers were not making it up when they said you are the very ones you have been waiting for. There is no savior who will come and change this planet. So I ask you as my brothers and sisters, people of my heart, people of the Tribe of Many Colors, will you join the cause? Will you stop listening to negativity? Will you change the channel? Then we change the world.’

‘We will charge ourselves and be responsible for ourselves and we will change the world.’

How do we change it?
‘We each have responsibility — all the answers are right here, We just forgot how to look at them. Truth is always easy. It’s the manade rules that are so hard to follow.

Through love
‘Through love this whole world is changing. Through love the light beings are returning and through love they’re going to show us the way. And through love all of those things we didn’t know before are going to become manifest to us. And through love all of our dreams are going to come true. And through love this planet earth is going to be magnificent and we’re going to be reborn. She will be reborn through love. And through love everything is possible.’

Kiesha Crowther would like us to share her message. We chose to come here NOW. We are all Creators. We are part of something enormous and it’s happening now. It is time for us to share the wisdom of the Grandfathers and Grandmothers with all people of the Tribe of Many Colors on the planet, Mother Earth.

So while Dr Calleman and Kiesha Crowther both envisage a movement of people changing for good, the Calleman ‘convergence’ focuses on the movement, while Kiesha’s advice is directed at the individual.

Both believe we can change the world.

Kiesha Crowther has a website at http://www.littlegrandmother.net and Live at Santa Fe, an Evening with the Youngest Wisdomkeeper and both she and Carl Johan Calleman have recorded and live video talks available on YouTube.

Phantom’s Child and the Scent of Roses

PHANTOM’S CHILD

Fyvie eastern front, showing contrast between older apartments and Seton's grand front

‘FYVYNS riggs and towers
Hapless shall your mesdames be,
When ye shall hae within your methes,
From harryit kirk’s land, stanes three–
Ane be in Preston’s tower,
Ane be in my lady’s bower,
And ane below the water-yett,
And it ye shall never get.’
Thomas the Rhymer

In November last year a group of us writers decided to take part in the NaNoWriMo marathon: a project to write a novel of at least 50,000 words in 30 days. One of the carrots dangled before our writerly eyes — slaving over our Muse-filled computers — was the offer by Amazon’s CreateSpace that ‘winners’ who reached the target would have their novels published by them: one proof copy provided free. Too good to be true. Several of my blogging friends took part and we had until June 30th 2010 (today) to edit, rewrite, get feedback on and submit the resulting MS. It was truly a marathon. I and a number of my blogging buddies miraculously succeeded in reaching the wordcount. Below is an excerpt from one of the chapters of my entry: ‘Phantom’s Child’. Another was featured on this blog back in November last year. The evocative bookcover (shown below) was designed by my talented illustrator friend Joris Ammerlaan. Thank you, Joris.

A haunting scent of roses follows Lady Lillias

‘I AM not as I appear. I have taken many forms. The greatest of these is the one they call the Greene Ladye, but I am many. I have always lived, never died. It is my wraith they see in the drawing room, but my spirit is abroad for all Time. I cannot die.’

History is a strange thing: its tellers and retellers say one thing, historians in books something else. Mother’s tale had such immediacy, such clarity; I might have been there with her.

Kings, queens and courts of old had royal bards recite their oral history. This clever method of continuity made the past sound real. In the earliest times, when only clerics and kings could write, it served a dual purpose: to keep tradition alive (books and manuscripts could be burned and stolen), and to instill in the young a pride and knowledge of their heritage, so that they, too, would pass on a love of nationhood to their children.

Mother’s tale had such tragedy and yet it was full of poignant meaning, I didn’t want her to stop. At first I had no idea why she was discovered searching the Fyvie Charter Room for what I thought was the wedding dress of her ancestor at Straloch. It was only after some details emerged that I knew, not only was she living the life of her Straloch ancestor in her mind. She was being dragged through the minds of all her ancestors; my ancestors; through a long line of past lives.

Dame Lillias Drummond, the wraith who haunts the Ladye's Bower

I have since wondered whether she has passed on to me the ability she expressed that fateful day in the car on the way home with the boys. They were quite oblivious, lost in their ‘I Spy’.

I have many times since then felt myself in my mind standing in a room I do not recognize. If I had been able to ask Mother, I would have tried to find out what to expect. As it turned out, her need to express the tale was so vital, her slight frame shaking throughout, it was beyond us to make her stop. And after the tale was told, I’d already lost my opportunity.

Mother was already in the realm of the ancestors, caressed by their timeless fingers – a flimsy ribbon of time and space, of genealogy and upbringing – which holds the family together.

* * * * * * *

OF course I’d heard of the Fyvie curse. We all had. Many families in the Shire had similar stories. When your family tree is a product of generations of intermarriage and strategic connections, there’s bound to be an overlap. It’s understandable.

Fyvie started out as a domain of kings. Even before 1200 there were royal charters. But in the mists of unrecorded time, local knowledge, a few recopied Pictish Chronicles, and placenames in the countryside were all one had to go on. We knew there was a Pictish royal settlement, nay, even a royal lineage through the female line there, but records were sparse.

The only real window, though, the window of history, had some significant dates.

One I learned at school was the event with ‘all-the-2s’: Alexander II of Scotland held his court there on February 2nd 1222. He was not the only king to make his residence in the turreted stone keep. William I ‘the Lion’ was there before him and probably had something to do with the earlier curse – the curse of the weeping stones.

Mother was less concerned about the stones and more about the second part of its pronouncement,: that, as these displaced sacred boulders would never be found, the ladies of Fyvie would be cursed forever; to survive in the knowledge that they could not bear sons who would live to reach maturity.

I doubt whether the original builder realized he was desecrating sacred ground when he took three stones to build the first stone tower. It’s called the Preston Tower, but it was standing long before that family owned Fyvie in the early 15th century.

Mother didn’t concern herself with such details. She said she was sure it was a Pictish citadel before the Normans took it over in the 12th century, and the Picts hadn’t moved the stones, because they held sacred heritage dear. So it couldn’t have been them.

I guessed the Normans — after 1066 — were the culprits. It’s a long time for a lineage to pay the price of something as simple as moving three sacred boundary stones from Churchlands and building a tower on top of one of them. But that, it seems, is what caused the curse.

And while two of the stones have been found — one in the foundations of the Preston Tower and one residing in a bowl of its own tears in the Charter Room where Mother was caught red-handed — the third is never going to come to light. Thomas the Rhymer, author of the sad song of ‘hapless mesdames’, was fairly clear on that.

Mother said he had it in for Fyvie because he thought they were inhospitable and slammed the great door in his face.

‘But it was only the wind.’ She spoke in a whisper, as if she remembered the day personally.

Great Iron Yett swung shut when Thomas the Rhymer approached

‘Thomas of Ercildoune. Berwickshire was his home. What he was doing up this way, I cannot fathom.’ She continued. ‘He liked to think he was a seer of sorts. He warned Fyvie of his visit, and admonished them to keep the yett open, but it took him two years to arrive. I imagine by that time they’d forgotten or were concerned with other things. He was singing ballads and pronouncing oaths and prophecies at the feast tables of all the nobles between Edinburgh and the North. Anyway, when he finally arrived, a fierce storm arose and the winds caused the great iron yett to slam shut before he reached it. They say, too, that while the castle was surrounded by a vortex of high wind, he stood in a pool of calm just a stone’s throw away.’

His curse certainly had a far-reaching effect. Not just through time in this amazing place, but through generations of families in other houses in the county as well.

It was common knowledge in our circle that since 1433, the castle, its lands and its title of barony had failed to descend through the firstborn son. Since the mid-fifteenth century until it was purchased by the National Trust for Scotland in 1984, the firstborn male of every generation at Fyvie died. The castle changed hands too. So the curse wasn’t family-specific. Mother made me remember that. Or rather, she used to tell me: ‘it goes with the family AND with the house.’

That meant the female line was cursed too, even if it married into another line.

I was never very sure — until that day in the car — whether our family had Fyvie links or not. But now I am certain of it. And, if you believe in curses – and this one seems ironclad – there isn’t much one can do about it.

In 1290 it was king Robert III of Scotland who gave Fyvie to Henry Preston, whose tower remains. He had no male heir, so the castle changed hands through marriage in 1433, passing with Preston’s eldest daughter to the Meldrums. It is known that they did indeed build the second tower to mirror the first.

Their firstborn son died.

However, as the Meldrums had houses elsewhere, they chose not to live at Fyvie and somehow escaped the curse for a generation or two.

The Meldrums sold Fyvie to the Setons, another great Northeast family with houses all round the county. Sir Alexander Seton, first earl of Dunfermline and Chancellor of Scotland who bought it in 1596 had no time for the curse; his dreams of creating a dynasty did not include ‘such nonsense’, Mother said; and he began plans to make it an architectural masterpiece.

Alexander Seton's great south front at Fyvie

His building of the grand southern front which greets visitors today, was inspired by castles he had visited in the Loire and valley of the Rhône, and his vision was truly spectacular. He consolidated the south front with a five-storey wing connecting both the Preston and Meldrum towers and built a great extended work of staterooms and offices stretching out back toward the North. His glorious south façade culminated in central twin towers which greeted his famous guests and royal visitors: it is this Great Entrance which is called the Seton Tower. In dividing his time between the court in Edinburgh, a palace in Dunfermline and creating such grandeur in Aberdeenshire, he had little time for his wife and four daughters. He had no male heir.

‘It was during his grandiose schemes that time passed and he forgot about me.’

I jumped. I had forgotten Mother was still consumed by her persona as one of the Fyvie ladyes: Until that moment it hadn’t occurred to me to ask which of the ‘hapless mesdames‘ of the castle had become the one with which she identified the most.

'Phantom's Child', 2009 NaNo winner picked up by Amazon CreateSpace publishing arm

So it was Lady Lillias Drummond, wife of Alexander Seton, later to be known as the ‘Greene Ladye’.

I might have known. Lillias was a sad soul. She gave him five daughters, all hale, healthy, nubile and ready to marry into the best families of the land. But because of his position, or perhaps because he had to prove that the curse was no match for his power and wealth, he wanted a male heir. The long awful tale began with his plan to marry another.

In order to do that, however, he had to be rid of Lillias.

‘I was too strong. He couldn’t poison me and, while he tried, he was unable to starve me to death. I died of a broken heart.’ I’d read many versions of the tale, but wanted to hear it from Mother’s lips.

Lillias heard of her husband’s plan to marry Grizel Leslie and gave up early in 1601. Her husband had her locked in her bower, the so-called Murder Room, and fed her gruel. They said she died there and her body was left to decay. Another story is told of her being walled up in a secret panel. However, Mother was not going to let me dwell on details.

‘He left me there to die, but for the sake of decency, did not take a second wife until October of that year. I was in my room from May till October.’ She made her own death sound quite surreal; her disembodied voice came from another layer of reality. ‘Only on their wedding night, I declared I’d had enough of the charade. He needed to be punished. He did not believe in the curse. He and Grizel were going to have a son, whatever happened to me. I made sure they remembered their act was murder. I stalked them that night. I stalk them still.’

The tale is told to present-day Fyvie visitors that on the night of October 27th 1601 the newly-wed couple had to spend their wedding night in the bedchamber above the Charter room in the old tower, because the new apartments Alexander was decorating for his bride in the Seton Tower were not yet finished. They were disturbed by strange scratching sounds outside their bedroom window, accompanied by heavy sighs which went on through the night. In the morning they discovered a name scratched on the outside window sill upside-down:

‘D. LILIES DRUMMOND’.

As the bedchamber is on the fourth storey, fifty feet above ground in the old defensive wall which has no footholds, it was thought the carving might only be achieved by someone with powers of levitation — or the ghost now called the Greene Ladye.

Mother loved this part of the story. I know she liked being Lillias. She said it was because she has free rein to wander throughout the apartments at night, as she did when she was mistress, but I think it is something simpler.

Lillias always left the room with a lingering scent of roses

Mother always loved her garden and roses were her particular favourite. Whenever I found her in latter years, she had, season permitting, a rosebud in her hand. Lillias, or the Greene Ladye, has been seen by many Fyvie custodians. She is one of their favourite ghosts. And whenever there is a chance encounter, or one of the guides or visitors feels a presence over his shoulder, it is usually accompanied by the scent of roses as the apparition moves through the room.

Mother read my thoughts.

‘Yes,’ she said. I am glad. They took my home, my children and my life. But I was able to bring my roses.’ She smiled and I was certain that she was right. For a moment, in the old family car filled with noise, childish laughter and song, on Mother’s last drive from the coast to the security of home I was sure I smelled the scent of roses.
©2010 Marian Youngblood
This is an excerpt from one of the chapters of Marian Youngblood’s forthcoming historical novel ‘Phantom’s Child’, published by Amazon CreateSpace