Journal of Geomancy vol. 3 no. 1, October 1978

{9}

TELLURIC LINES

by Colin H. Bloy

From a talk delivered to the First National Congress of Radiesthesia, 24/6/’78, Barcelona.  Translated from the Spanish. 

I am indebted to the Congress for giving the first opportunity to our group to make a public presentation of our work.  May I first say that the word ‘telluric’ is not adequate as a description, but we are on new ground, and it will serve for the moment.  I wish to draw attention to the work of two Englishmen of great integrity and observation.  First, I should mention Alfred Watkins, a merchant, of Hereford in the 1920s.  After many years of working in the field, he published his book The Old Straight Track.  With detailed observational study, he proposed the theory that megalithic man had the necessary technical knowledge to calculate over large distances, straight alignments which passed through lakes, valleys and mountains – thus they were not tracks for journeying – visiting sacred sites of antiquity – and for hundreds of kilometres. 

Due to our good fortune in England to have at our disposal the most excellent maps of the Ordnance Survey, Watkins was able to demonstrate to the satisfaction of a small circle of ‘aficionados’ that these alignments indeed existed – using a statistical basis coupled with observation on the ground. 

His work was neglected for some 40 years until more recent scientists of established reputation demonstrated that megalithic man indeed had a mathematical and astronomical knowledge which obliged even the most conservative of archaeologists to reappraise our ideas about the stone age.  {10}

At the same time that Professors Hawkins and Thom were presenting their findings, a small posthumous book appeared.  It was entitled The Pattern of the Past by Guy Underwood, after 50 years of remarkable work – alone.  Underwood was a dowser – and like most of us, by pure chance. 

When he was talking to Reginald Allender Smith, keeper of the antiquities at the British Museum, he learned that Smith had the theory that the method whereby the sacred sites of antiquity were selected depended on confluences of underground streams.  Underwood went dowsing for them – found them, and another with his life changed – and 50 years of work, noting and observing – hundreds of medieval churches, Stonehenge, Avebury, Carnac, the Acropolis, sacred groves, standing stones etc.  He concluded they all had something in common – that they were placed over confluences of subterranean water where there were springs or ‘blind’ springs.  And it appeared to him as if there was a very precise code for identifying the site exactly. 

A blind spring is recognizable to the dowser as a spiral of 7 loops, always 7, and this spiral is a terminal point of the serpentine subterranean streams connecting the sites.  As Watkins suggested by implication, Underwood too felt more openly that there was something mysterious, magic, in this phenomenon.  Both said that this was a phenomenon of great antiquity because, although medieval churches were in the system, it was the policy of the early Christian church to build on the sacred sites of pagan religion.  But … Underwood noted that the form of the church or cathedral itself indicated by the position of its fonts, piscinas, stoups and other architectural features, that the architects of early Christianity had maintained an understanding of this knowledge.  Was this, asked Underwood, the famous secret of the Freemasons? 

Underwood did not connect Watkins’s work with his own, although a footnote in his book shows that he was aware of it.  He always spoke of subterranean rivers connecting these sites, and not of straight calculated alignments: Thus the work of the two remained without an umbilical cord, although both had spoken of something mysterious and a phenomenon which hid very profound truths. 

At the same time, John Michell, in The View Over Atlantis and other works, was discussing the phenomenon of the sacred geometry, a study now quite well developed in England and France.  He indicated that the sacred sites were not only connected by straight lines but the individual sites formed great geometrical figures, triangles, vesicas etc and at the same time these forms were included in the ground plans of the sites eg. the double triangle of the Seal of Solomon in Stonehenge.And now we have in Cambridge the Institute of Geomantic Research to investigate these matters further. 

We also know that this is not new for the Chinese.  Until the advent of Mao, the geomancer, dowser and astronomer, was indispensable to the siting of houses, temples and tombs.  Recently, we saw on the BBC, a tv programme, such a geomancer carrying out his function in Hong Kong, and there exists in Taiwan an Institute of Geomancy. 

By way of hypothesis, John Michell, and Paul Screeton, in Quicksilver Heritage, suggested that not only were internal and external geometrical forms involved, along with theoretical long-distance alignments, but perhaps there really was a system of lines capturing and disseminating an energy essential for the proper practice of religious ritual.  How then was it possible to reconcile the work of these with that of Underwood, the only dowser who had entered the field up to then? 

Thus we began.  As good dowsers of water, gaspipes etc., we demonstrated to our satisfaction that Underwood was right – indeed, there were spirals and underground water in the places he indicated.  Yes, there were dowsing criteria visiting ancient sacred sites and medieval churches.  But … yes, there were, apart from the underground streams connecting these sites, straight lines of energy also running between them.  All that is necessary to find them is to work with the correct wavelength, or the suitable brain rhythm.  Why then did Underwood not find them? 

In this context operates the phenomenon of the witness.  Many dowsers when they go looking for minerals, for example, hold in their hand a sample of the mineral for which they are searching, to assist them to focus on the desired objective.  We also know that the witness can also be a firm visualization.  The artefact is not essential.  The physical presence of the sample is not necessary.  The mind is capable of distinguishing in a very precise way between the different wavelengths you can meet in the street for example, when there are cables, pipes, sewers etc.  The dowser can distinguish by visualization or desire, which is the same thing. 

Clearly, a dowser will therefore rarely encounter that which he is not looking for.  It is virtually impossible.  Underwood went looking for water and he found water.  His evidence is vital and seminal; whereas we, not by being better dowsers but by being better informed owing to the work of others, went looking for straight lines of energy {11} and we found them – because we had them in our minds. 

The first time with the rod that I found one of these lines, I had goose-pimples.  And why?  Because then for the first time in my life, I had a personal encounter with a phenomenon which indicated the existence of a profound mystery, a new and unknown energy, even perhaps a new dimension. 

Later on, after four years’ work with a group of friends in England, France, Germany, Holland, Italy, the USA, Spain and Catalonia itself, we have been able to make investigations in almost all western European countries, Egypt, Israel, Iran, the Arabian Gulf and the North American continent.  The phenomenon appears universal.  How does it manifest?  We observed that there were single lines, triples, sextuples, with 7, 14, 21, 28, 42 and 49 parallels.  Curiously, we have never found a 35-bar line, although the progression of 7 seems important.  We also noticed that in a few exceptional cases a double 49-bar line existed as, for instance, between the pyramids of Chephren and Cheops or the Dragon Line of England. 

Yes, they did go to the sites indicated by Watkins and Underwood.  A study of perhaps 50 churches in southern England revealed that, depending on the importance of the church, there are lines of various dimensions connecting it with its neighbour or other ancient sites, in the general form of a cross.  The cross is more or less in conformity with the axis of the church but there are preliminary indications that in the case of an imperfect cross, that this is due to the ‘magnetic’ effect of a more recent church which does not conform exactly with the original system.  An arab mosque of the Middle Ages betrays similar characteristics. 

The question arises as to whether this phenomenon is conscious or unconscious, if the lines owe the form of their being to an act of man or if man is following unconsciously some plan imposed from without.  However, we are left with the observation that the architecture of the church appears to recognize the phenomenon of the ley system.  The dowsable leys do not always follow the alignments of Watkins.  A medieval church which is not situated on a traditional site appears to attract the line away from its original path (cf. Bennett’s Kentish Megaliths and Alignments – ed.)

Equally, the church can exhibit more lines than the basic form of the cross.  In England at least, many churches have blocked-up doorways, the doors of today being in different places.  Both demonstrate lines.  A church with many blocked-up doors has many lines and they always connect to places within a general context of what I indicated earlier.  They do not go to trivial places.  And a convincing experiment is to go to an unfamiliar area, note lines crossing the road whilst driving, and see how, when you follow them on foot, you will always come across one of these places.  You will also find great triple-lined circles in churches – that vary in size according to the church – but the circle always passes through the font, at the west of the church.  A cathedral usually has a circle of six lines, as does for example the cathedral of Gerona. 

We began to make a map of the lines in southern England and noticed that the lines which emerge from the Downs begin in enormous excavations, called disused chalk-pits by the Ordnance Survey.  However, within them one can find terminal points ending in huge double ram’s horn spirals.  We came to call them earth temples. 

The reasons that struck us to take this view were that these so-called chalk-pits were at the top of the Downs, dominating the countryside, when the modern pits are at the bottom.  The internal geometry is very precise; a complex system of terracing and tumuli producing internal lines all focussing on the central emission.  We could not believe, dowsing evidence apart, that there had been an agreement amongst hundreds of chalk miners to mine at the top of hills, organize each excavation with a common geometry and appear not to have taken any material away, as the spoil is pushed forward to make huge projecting plateaux about the size of a football field.  The most striking are those of Wolstenbury and Melling, near Lewes, where there is a huge complex.  Of course, the dowsing explains their function anyway.  At the back are huge parabolic areas which seem to be capturing celestial energy to combine it with earth energy at the point of the ram’s horn spirals.  We believe them to be pre-megalithic. 

At the same time this study led us to a hill known as Saddlescombe at the foot of that strange cut in the Downs near Brighton called the Devil’s Dyke – a huge and perfect hemisphere apparently made with spoil from the cut, approximately 250 metres across the base, probably the largest artificial earth mound in Europe, and unknown.  A Christian cross formation of lines has the hemisphere at its centre – the central axis being some 11 km long (cf.  Leugering’s ‘raste’ and Gerlach’s Heilige Linien – ed.) {12} – each arm goes to a church – one of them a Templar church and nearby on the other arm is a Templar preceptory.  Always when you go dowsing near Templar sites you will find mysteries. 

Indeed, it was following the line system out on the South Downs, and noting how it became a triple-line system at a particular tumulus, it was at another Templar church, that of Shipley, Sussex, that we noted the triple became a six, and we feel, although we have not been able to trace it all the way on the ground, that this six-line system connects to the Heel Stone at Stonehenge where, as Underwood noted, and we confirm, the existence of a six-bar line is witnessed by six very clear notches in the stone itself.  It was at Stonehenge we encountered the first main line – of 49 parallels.  We learned more about the overall continental system from reading a book called Les Druides which recently appeared in France by Paul Bouchet, the Archdruid.  He states the existence of the ley-line system as I described earlier and how to dowse it.  He also states how the western European system develops from Mount Pamir in the extension of the Himalayas in southern Russia.  This appears to be the Mount Meru of the Buddhists from which emerge the celestial influences.  He describes how the line goes to Teheran, where there is a split, one going to western Russia, and the other to Jerusalem via Babylon, going on from there in a further split to the Pyramids and Africa, and via Cyprus, Rhodes, Santorini etc. to southern Europe. 

The principal line of the Mediterranean coast of Spain passes by the enormous Aztec-type pyramid built in the last few years at the new motorway link-up on the frontier at La Junquera – it goes to Barcelona where it passes through the great church of Santa Maria del Mar, the cathedral and the Castle on the hill of Montjuich whence it goes to the monastery of Montserrat.  There are three main lines in Spain.  The second passes via Rennes-le-Château through Bourg-Madame, Leyida, Saragossa Cathedral, the great Geronimo monastery of El Escorial to the north of Madrid, the monastery of Yuste and on via Tomar to Cintra in Portugal.  The third comes from Lourdes via the pass of Roncesvaux, where Roland fell, via Pamplona, Burgos, Leon to Santiago de Compostela in perfect conformity with the ancient pilgrim route. 

We have also observed that there are forms or symbols of a geometrical nature associated with the system that appear in certain places.  Some of these may be dowsed as it were on a neophyte’s blackboard over a large area around the Templar church and preceptory of Shipley, Sussex.  They are in groups of 49 and are based on circles, squares, ellipses and spirals.  Our findings have been checked by independent dowsers.  A similar display is around the Templar Church at Temple Claud.  The Order of the Knights Templar clearly knew all about the ley system, and always built, just as their Moslem antagonists, the octagon into their religious constructions. 

An interesting confirmation of this may be seen in a visible display picked out in stone around the windmill in La Mancha, at Campo de le Cryptana, the place where Don Quixote began his quest.  The windmill belonged to a parallel military order of Spanish religious chivalry, that of Montesa, into which the Spanish Templars went after their dissolution. 

These symbols appear in different places in the system and appear to indicate the different functions.  For example, all spas are in the system and as many are different in their curative functions, they exhibit different symbols at their functional points.  The ley system is not a static phenomenon but a dynamic one.  It has a pulse of 4 per minute.  We have noted how a mass, well-said, and there are regrettably few, can change for a period the number of parallels in the lines leaving a church and produce these geometrical forms around it. 

We had the good fortune to have the possibility of using for a month, for experiments, a 12th century romanesque church in the Pyrenees.  With sacred music, Gregorian plainchant, Handel’s Messiah and even with songs from Jesus Christ Superstar, the same phenomenon may be produced.  Equally, the act of spiritual love, of prayer in the sense of spiritual visualization, produces similar results. 

But what is it all about?  What purpose does it serve?  Where does the energy come from?  What type of energy is it? 

I can only leave you with some hypotheses, none of which is without some experimental evidence:

It is a fundamental phenomenon of existence, both conscious and unconscious, and there are many mysteries to unravel – if our work is not mistaken and we have taken many precautions against autosuggestion. 

It is not only a phenomenon of the past.  The Temple of the Holy Family of Gaudí in Barcelona is in the system.  It is not yet finished. 

One thing further.  On the 24th March 1978, it appears an important change in the system occurred.  From that day the 8 replaced the 7 in the lines and the symbols.  A main line is now 64 parallels instead of 49. 

There is, in conclusion, a romantic aspect to all this.  Those who wish to check this phenomenon and follow the lines should put on clean armour and, apart from their pendulum and rod, take their shield and lance, and mount a white horse, with a clear pennant, because they are going to find that they are not going to tilt with windmills but in common with the knights of old, on the Quest of the Holy Grail – the chalice that feeds mankind. 

Many truths are enshrined in the legends of the past and the ley-lines and the activities of the medieval knights have much in common. 

May they go with sincerity, humility and much spiritual clarity, and with their alpha and theta brain rhythms functioning well. 

Beware of the dragons, the great telluric spirals – but to kill them, impale them on the lance, and fix them in straight lines, channel their sinuosities, is to save the white maiden, the ancient mother goddess of the earth, the Mary of Christianity, the feminine principle of the Chinese Yin and Yang: it is to harmonize the telluric energy of a place and it is a work of great valour. 

The Park Güell, Gaudí’s geomantically-laid out park and abortive housing estate which was constructed according to the same principles as his masterwork: the Temple of the Sagrada Familia, which is locked into the system described here.