by Philip Carr-Gomm
Now I knew I was on the South Downs Way - for here at the top of the
hill is a great wide way that runs west and east along the crest of the
Downs. Having spent the morning down in the basin, sheltered from the wind
and feeling warm despite it being February, I was now acutely aware of the
season. The wind was blowing and the sun began to hide behind cloud. But
the view was magnificent. To my right I could see the sea for the first
time - silver-grey and striking in its flatness - as it lay contrasted behind
the foreground of the Downs whose curves, like the great buttocks and thighs
of an earth-goddess, dipped down to the sea at Newhaven far below to the
South. And as if the land does indeed reveal the forms of the goddess, the
river Ouse winds its way through open thighs to Lewes in the distance. And
in the old times they knew that the land and the rivers were of the goddess
- here the Ouse derives from the great mother-goddess Isis - Camden's Brittania
tracing its origin as "Usa, or Ouse, in times past Isa".
I can still see the bright green tump - far away now, but seeming to shine
with light, and it is as though the sea-god Mannanan has swum the goddess'
river to lay his seed where the water meets land. And the result is this
glowing hill - pregnant with the god.
Up on the Downs and starting for the first landmark, Red Lion Pond, I can
sense the presence of a hawk close by, even though I can't see him. I remember
the piglet I began my journey with....he's gone now. He was my companion,
my familiar of the plain, but here it is the hawk who flies high and sees
all and whose spirit I can feel as I continue along the track.
This Downland landscape has such power. Now I understand why the occult
writer Dion Fortune said that the chalk Downs were the best place to evoke
the old gods, for they are the primeval landscape of southern England, and
have been admired and written about by countless Englishmen and foreigners.
John Aubrey (1626-1697) the father of the English Druid revival in the 17th
century said of this landscape: "They are the most spacious plains
in Europe, and the greatest remains that I can hear of the smooth primitive
world when it lay all under water. And, to speak from the very bottom of
my heart, methinks he is much more happy that at ease contemplates the universe
as his own, and in it the sun and stars, the pleasing meadows, shades, groves,
green banks, stately trees, flowing springs, and the wanton windings of
a river, than he that with fire and sword disturbs the world, and measures
his possessions by the waste that lies about him".
The chalk downlands were created from about 100 million to 65 million years
ago, during the time the dinosaurs became extinct - before mammals, birds
and flowering plants even existed. At this time the sea extended over most
of what is now Britain. This sea was warm and filled with sponges and plankton.
As the coccoliths - which are a part of the plankton - died and sank to
the sea-bed, they created what we now know as chalk - combining with the
sponges, and fish, sea-urchins, sea-lilies and ammonites - which we can
now find fossilised in the chalk. This bed of chalk was then raised up out
of the sea, like a great white whale of land comprising two thirds of England.
And as though this event occurred only yesterday, as opposed to 40 million
years ago, we find ourselves walking these 'broad backs against the sky',
as Gilbert White called them, feeling literally the 'lifting up' of the
land as if it were still happening - raising us closer to the gods by the
minute.
And when we examine the geology of Logres we discover that the central node
of the chalk downs was, and still is, Salisbury Plain. From it, outcrops
run eastwards to the Hampshire Downs, and to the North and South Downs,
westwards to the z-shaped Dorset Downs, and north-eastwards to the Marlborough
Downs. So at the centre we find again the land of The Giants' Choir - Stonehenge.
And here - on the South Downs - I was on one of the long flailing spiral
arms of the Giant - or rather of the goddess - for what could be more feminine
in any landscape the world over than the soft sensuous curves of the Downs?
But why are they called Downs when they are really Ups? Because the modern
English word Down derives from the Old English and Celtic Dun - meaning
a hill.
H.J.Massingham, making his home in the Downs, and feeling their likeness
to the human body and their connection with our heritage, called them 'star-gazing
shoulders...islanded in the past.'
And on this shoulder I was 500 feet up - not star-gazing but staring instead
at a black cloud crying hard over the sea by Newhaven. Although not superstitious
by nature, I sensed that I should not have looked at it - for it seemed
to spot me observing its sorrow and decided to rush headlong towards me.
I found myself walking faster, furious that I had forgotten to pack waterproofs.
It seemed only minutes before the black cloud had caught up with me.
How absurd it was for me to be walking so fast - as if somehow I could reach
a place of shelter on this open hilltop miles from any house or tree. The
Druids practised divination by clouds - calling this art neladoracht - but
it didn't take much art to divine the future from this cloud. Before I could
determine exactly what black demon was determined to soak me I was pelted
with hail and then with rain. I tried to pretend it was wonderful but it
wasn't - I was drenched. But then as quickly as it had come it went - to
find some other soul to pelt.
And then the miracle occurred.
As the cloud and its rain moved North, the sun came out and a vast rainbow
spread across the landscape - stretching from Rodmell down by the Ouse where
I had just been, far across to Firle in the east. And straight ahead, directly
beneath and beyond the rainbow stood Lewes picked out in the sunlight.
I found myself shrieking and jumping up and down in my soaking trousers
- what a gift that demon had given!
Something happens when you walk in this way. The exposure to the elements,
the sense of height and openness, the increased oxygen intake and the effect
of physical exertion all combine to produce a powerful feeling of elation.
Throw in a rainbow and the effect is devastating!
If someone asks what Druid practice consists of, one way of answering is
as follows: it involves working with the chalice and the wand or sword.
The chalice is the magic circle, the circle of stones or the grove of trees.
The sword or wand is the Old Straight Track, the path, the journey. Our
lives consist of rest and motion alternately, of being and doing as alternate
states. In the Sacred Grove we find rest, we are calm, we are seated. We
work our magic, we open ourselves to the breath of Awen, of inspiration,
we find support in letting go of our obsession to do and to have. With the
wand, the lance, the spear, the dagger, the sword, we move into the realm
of Doing - we act in the world- we 'go forth', we journey. And in the Druid
context we do this by literally journeying in the physical world. We throw
a pack on our shoulders, a map in our pockets, and set forth on our own
tradition of vision-questing - walking the old tracks.
And what we find when we begin questing can sometimes be disturbing.
One of the reasons for following a spiritual path, for taking that strange
journey into the Self and into the world, is to discover the truth - the
truth about ourselves and about Life. This is, in essence, the quest for
enlightenment - for coming to an experience and a knowledge of 'What Is'
as opposed to being ensnared by 'What Is Not' - illusion, samsara, untruth.
After the initial elation of setting off on the journey and discovering
the wonders that are there for our exploration, we come to a point where
we encounter demons and dragons. The sun is hidden behind clouds, it rains
and the wind blows. The journey isn't that pleasant any more and we wonder
why we began it.
From behind the clouds comes the dragon and we are faced with a choice.
Do we fight it, or flee from it? If we fight it, we may well preserve the
status quo, but at the cost of burying the power that the dragon represents.
At an individual level, this may mean that we repress and foolishly believe
we have conquered our sexuality, or our greed, or our lust for power. At
a collective level we may repress an awareness of the dragon force of the
earth currents that run through the land. If instead of supposedly fighting
and mastering the dragon, we flee from it, it will continue to haunt the
woods and the hill-tops or the sea - ready to harm us if we ever return
there. A third approach - the approach of both the ancient wisdom traditions
and of psychoanalysis - involves befriending the dragon.
One of the purposes of vision-questing is to do just this. In the Native
American tradition you stay alone in a secluded place outdoors for at least
three days. In the Tibetan tradition these quests occur for three day, three
week, three month or three year periods. In the Christian tradition isolated
retreats have also been part of spiritual practice. In Lewes we can still
see the cell inhabited by an anchorite hermit. In the Druid Tradition, some
groups call this practice 'Hero-Questing' for we are seeking the Hero Within.
Sometimes these quests would have occurred in circumstances designed to
create the effect of sensory deprivation - to which end trainee Bards would
seal themselves in pitch black rooms and lie with a stone on their chest.
The stone seems a strange prescription until we realise that the Bards were
making use of a technique well known to modern psychology - that of creating
one over-riding sensory input in order to block out all others. Nowadays
we use 'white noise' fed in through headphones to the seeker in an isolation
tank. Shamans use drumming partly for a similar purpose. After a while the
brain becomes habituated to this one monotonous repetitive input and blocks
even that out. A familiar example of habituation is that of a ticking clock
- even though it may be loud, after a while we don't perceive the ticks
any more: our brain 'hears them' but stops bothering to pass the message
up to our consciousness until it changes.
And once the over-riding input is blocked out we are floating free - free
of experience coming to us through our senses. What happens then is that
experience comes to us in different ways - rising out of our subconscious
as strange waking dreams, flooding in from our superconscious as powerful
experiences of elation and inspiration. We find we can slip free of our
physical bodies to explore a realm in which dragons can either be great
sea-worms rising from the mud to haunt us, or jewel-encrusted mountain dragons
guarding caves which hold for us those secrets which will change our lives
forever.
But hero-questing or vision-questing can also be undertaken not in isolated
places of retreat - in caves or dark bothies - but whilst walking the old
dragon-paths - whilst journeying from place to place. The outer journey
then becomes a metaphor for the inner journey. The dragons that we find
will then be either inner ones or outer ones - tied either to our souls
or to the soul of the landscape we are exploring.
Lest we think, however, that we can befriend all dragons, we must beware
- because there are dragons that are truly dangerous and are best left alone.
We should not fall into the trap, so well laid by modern psychotherapy,
that seduces us with the idea that every repression can be lifted, every
pain healed. It is an over-simplification to see evil as pain turned outwards
as hatred. All we apparently need to do is fix the hurt and the evil will
go away.....but 'fools rush in where angels fear to tread' and the wise
know that the stories of dragons are there to teach us that the guardians
of the treasures of the soul if approached naively or at the wrong time
will wound and damage us. The individual and collective energies, complexes,
call them what you will, that can be symbolised as dragons, are extremely
powerful and can only be faced at the right time - and not before. And there
are some dragons - demons perhaps rather than dragons - which are the result
of evil thoughts and deeds and which only the gods can face without harm.
But what are and were dragons?
Up on this ridgeway I look north towards the Weald - a great expanse of
lowland that lies beneath the Dun and which continues until the North Downs
again rise up to provide another ridge of high ground. In the old days this
was completely forested and much is still woodland. Thirty miles deep from
north to south, from east to west it stretches across 120 miles of countryside:
from Romney Marsh in Kent to West Meon in Hampshire. At one time this massive
forest was called the Waste of Ondred, and at another time the Forest of
Anderida. The Venerable Bede described it in 731 as "thick and inaccessible....a
retreat for large herds of deer, wolves and wild boars." And here,
a little to the north-west just two miles from Horsham lived a dragon in
the forest. In 1614 he was still alive - terrorising the neighbourhood.
Described as being nine foot long with black scales on his back and red
scales on his belly, the dragon "rides away as fast as a man can run.
He is of countenance very proud, and at the sight or hearing of men or cattle,
will raise his neck upright and seem to listen and look about with great
arrogance. There are likewise upon either side of him discovered, two great
bunches so big as a large football, and (as some think) will in time grow
to wings; but God, I hope, will (to defend the poor people in the neighbourhood)
that he shall be destroyed before he grow so fledge."
Some believe such creatures were exotic reptiles which had escaped from
private menageries or were fictions put about by smugglers who needed to
keep ordinary folk away from their hide-outs in the forest. The suggestion
that dragon stories relate to a race memory of early man encountering dinosaurs
cannot be correct, since 60 million years separate the final days of the
dinosaurs from the appearance of humans on earth. Velikovsky believed that
dragons were comets passing close to earth bringing disaster in their wake.
Their bright heads and dark forked tails became the fire-breathing monsters
of folk tales.
But to truly understand dragons and their relevance to the ancient traditions
of this land, we need the help of Merlin.
Up here on the ridge overlooking the Waste of Ondred are two old dewponds
- Red Lion Pond and White Lion Pond. Dewponds were probably being made up
on the Downs as far back as Neolithic times, although some historians suggest
they are of far more recent invention. A hollow would be dug out and lined
with puddled clay and straw and then more clay - gradually building a waterproof
lining to the hollow which would gather rainwater and the dew each morning.
These dewponds have been maintained by local farmers to this day - although
now, sadly, they tend to be lined with concrete. Why should one be called
Red and the other White? We are reminded of the story of Merlin's boyhood
when he and his mother were brought before King Vortigern, the king having
been advised to sacrifice Merlin so that his blood could be smeared on the
stones of a tower he was trying to build. Geoffrey of Monnmouth in his Prophecies
of Merlin, continues the story in this way:
"Merlin...approached the king and said to him 'For what reason am I
and my mother introduced into your presence?' - 'My magicians,' answered
Vortigern, 'advised me to seek out a man that had no father, with whose
blood my building is to be sprinkled, in order to make it stand.' - 'Order
your magicians,' said Merlin, 'to come before me, and I will convict them
of a lie.' The king was surprised at his words, and presently ordered the
magicians to come, and sit down before Merlin, who spoke to them after this
manner: 'Because you are ignorant of what it is that hinders the foundation
of the tower, you have recommended the shedding of my blood to cement it,
as if that would presently make it stand. But tell me now, what is there
under the foundation? For something there is that will not suffer it to
stand.' The magicians at this began to be afraid, and made him no answer.
Then said Merlin, who was also called Ambrose, 'I entreat your majesty would
command your workmen to dig into the ground, and you will find a pond which
causes the foundation to sink.' This accordingly was done, and presently
they found a pond deep under ground, which had made it give way. Merlin
after this went again to the magicians, and said, 'Tell me ye false sycophants,
what is there under the pond.' But they were silent. Then said he again
to the king, 'Command the pond to be drained, and at the bottom you will
see two hollow stones, and in them two dragons asleep.' The king made no
scruple of believing him, since he had found true what he said of the pond,
and therefore ordered it to be drained: which done, he found as Merlin had
said; and now was possessed with the greatest admiration of him. Nor were
the rest that were present less amazed at his wisdom, thinking it to be
no less than divine inspiration.
Accordingly, while Vortigern, King of the Britons was yet seated upon the
bank of the pool that had been drained, forth issued the two dragons, whereof
the one was white and the other red. And when the one had drawn anigh unto
the other, they grappled together in baleful combat and breathed forth fire
as they panted. But presently the white dragon did prevail, and drave the
red dragon unto the verge of the lake. But he, grieving to be thus driven
forth, fell fiercely again upon the white one, and forced him to draw back.
And whilst that they were fighting on this wise, the King bade Ambrosius
Merlin declare what this battle of the dragons did portend."
Merlin then proceeds to utter a series of prophecies which begin with the
overcoming of the red dragon (the British) by the white dragon (the Saxons)
and continues by prophesying how the Boar of Cornwall (Arthur) will trample
the Saxons. In an extraordinary sequence of powerful and often obscure images,
Merlin predicts the history of Britain till the end of days, when the constellations
of the Zodiac will cease to turn and the Goddess 'shall lie hidden within
the closed gateways of her sea-beaten headland'. We shall return again to
consider this prediction, but in the meanwhile why are the dragons white
and red, and why are the dewponds here named after white and red lions?
The sacred animals of the inner world, like language, meet and merge with
each other - producing fabulous beasts that portray features of the landscape
both human and terrestrial. The lions of heraldry and alchemy, that once
in the flesh roamed this land, are images of the zodiacal sign of Leo, of
the sun and of the element fire. Transformed into the winged lion, symbol
of solar light and the morning, we can see its closeness to that other winged
beast symbolising the element of fire - the dragon: as if the noble lion
has united with the proto-dragon, the Worm - a creature famous in Britain
in such places as Lambton and Linton, and recognised in the landscape at
such places as Worm's Head in the Gower.
Another term for the dragon, common here in Sussex, is Wyvern. This term
comes from the old French, wivere meaning both the adder and life. And suddenly
one of the key themes of Druidry is illuminated for us. The Druid term for
life-force is Nwyvre - an old Welsh word meaning energy and vigour. In common
with Eastern symbology, the snake is seen in Druidry as the prime symbol
of the life-force that snakes both through the land and through us. If we
want to understand this life-force it is not enough simply to discover it
within ourselves - we need to discover it in the world around us too - for
we are not separate from the earth, but a part of it. Here we find a contrast
between the inward-turning methods of the east, and the outward-turning
approach of the west - although both ways lead to the same point. Wivere
derives from the old Gaulish Wouivre, meaning spirit, and this became Vouivre
in certain parts of France, where the dragon became depicted as half-woman,
half winged snake - a fitting symbol of the goddess' energy which snakes
the land.
How beautiful it is that like Celtic knotwork both language and symbolic
animals interweave to show us the relationship between ourselves and the
land - between the dragon in our own body and the dragons of the earth.
Inner and Outer, Self and Other, dance together as do the words Nwyvre and
Wyvern - the Druid kundalini and the fire-breathing dragon - the kundalini
of the earth goddess.
The purpose of both dragons, inner and outer, is the same. They convey the
creative fire, the fertilising breath that brings life and abundance - both
to the individual and to the land. For all sorts of reasons beyond our understanding,
these dragons have been allowed to sleep. But in the old days they were
awake - and it was the old sage, the Druid or Druidess, who knew how to
direct and utilise this inner and outer fire, to creative ends. The quest
for personal fertility - of ideas, of children, of song and music - and
of earthly fertility in abundant crops - were united in the ancients, and
need to be united by us again as we try to extricate ourselves from the
wasteland we have created within and around us.
And it is in the two colours of white and red that we find the clue to this
fertility we need to rediscover: for white and red symbolise male and female,
sperm and blood, moon and sun. Still to this day in somewhere as far away
as Bulgaria, an old territory of the Celts, everyone will be seen wearing
small pom-poms of white and red in March, in conscious recognition of the
coming Spring, and in unconscious recognition of the Spring Equinox on March
22nd and of the need to unite the two principles to create an abundant life.