Origins Research
This post is also found here as a google doc.
EDIT May 7th, 2024
I have updated this document to be the only volume, and to be simply “The Origins Research”, for simplicity and because the research and it’s origins became too vast to continue- there was no end in site. So much of the “Path of Pollen” was simply adapted and stolen from other sources, it became too much to catalog in volumes. So below is a comprehensive list and a series of starting points for those who wish to learn the truth. More informatio has been added and I will update from time to time with more.
Best
Chelsy
Original Text:
This is “volume one” of the research we’ve collated about the origins of the Path of Pollen/Lyceum. It’s taking quite a bit of time to organize and some of it requires additional write-ups alongside the sources (and to be fair, some of this does too and I’m afraid you’ll need to do quite a bit of reading in some cases). Volume 2 will feature info on the Solfege, Red Ochre Woman, more on Eastern Inner Alchemical practices, a deeper dive into Yogic connections, Breathwork, Saliva, Roses, a break down of the contents of the book The Shamanic Way of the Bee (TSWOTB), as it’s full of references and winks/nods. It will feature more on the Sisterhoods and the Arthurian connections, plus more of a spotlight on Ithell Colquhoun and her works, which needs its own focus, though you’ll find an introductory amount here. As well, there will be a deeper dive into the whole story and timeline of all the events leading up to this. That info has been gathered, but it takes time to put into a coherently document. Additionally, 3 other women are sorting their offerings and those are forthcoming. Another aim is to make available as many of the books referenced here for those who aren’t in a position to buy, so many of them are linked below because the full texts can be found online in archives. Thank you for your patience. And thank you to the many women who’ve helped pitch in. If you’d like to share some findings or have questions please join us in the FB group or reach us by email at cbprovidence@gmail.com
-Chelsy & Marie
Hint: One way that simplifies navigation is to use a search bar shortcut on your computer. “Command f” for Mac and (I believe) “Control f” for PC. I should bring up a text bar you can use to search most documents (it doesn’t always work with scanned images, but does with most PDFs). For example, you could type “endocrine” or”nectar” into the text bar with a PDF of one of Grant’s books, and it will show you everywhere that word appears in the doc and bring you to it.
Lemiscatic Walk
https://siddhawalk.com/ “walk of 8”
Of note in light of the appropriated Navajo Deer Smothering Ritual (see further below for more on that)
Bees!
(Please also see the vital section on “vitamin pan” below for the important hidden Bee Symbolism found in Dion Fortune’s The Goat-Foot God)
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The Bee Master of Warrilow- Tickner Edwardes, 1907
https://www.gutenberg.org/files/63208/63208-h/63208-h.htm
Above is the full text of the book. The Beemaster of Warrilow is heavily plagiarized in TSWOTB, you can see the side by sides in the plagiarism document here:
https://sacredtrustinfo.blogspot.com/2023/10/much-more-plagiarism-and-revealed.html
But the entire book is linked above. It captures the mood and premise for Buxton’s book, a Bee Master taking a younger man around and teaching him about hives in the rural countryside of England. It also features a Bee Mistress.
____
Travers:
Link to the famously (and heavily) plagiarized book of essays by P.L. Travers; “What the Bee Knows”
https://archive.org/details/whatbeeknowsrefl0000trav
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Steiner:
Rudolph Steiner was a prolific occultist and bee expert. His work is well worth looking into and it influenced many of the people in this document from Travers to Colquhoun to Grant. His 9 lectures on bees which were plagiarized in TSWOTB are found here in whole:
https://rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA351/English/SGP1975/NinBee_index.html
While not about bees, the following lectures are referenced by Ithell Colquhoun in her works featured in “The Magical Writings of Ithell Colquhoun” by Steve Nichols. They are called Man as Symphony of the Creative World:
https://rsarchive.org/Lectures/ManSymphony/ManSym_index.html
(The Magical writings of Ithell Colquhoun and some others are linked further down under her section, which is just an intro to Ithell in preperation for the coming documents)
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Rosicrucian Bee Symbolism
In TSWOTB Simon’s vision of the universe is a copy paste of many passages of aphorisms from The Secret Doctrine of the Rosicrucians- Magus Incognito (1918).
In this link you’ll also find, spiders, Apollo, weaving, webs, the spiritual journey symbolized by the bee- and the first paragraph will be recognizable by anyone whose done any work on the POP:
http://esoteric.msu.edu/Eberly/CommentaryDR.htm
More:
https://amphitheatrum.net/2014/09/15/dat-rosa-mel-apibus/
Anne Baring on the Rose
https://www.animamundischool.org/voices-of-the-well-blog/symbol-of-the-rose-by-anne-baring
Rose of Paracelsus
https://www.filosofiaesoterica.com/the-rose-of-paracelsus/
Masonic Bee Symbolism
Secret Teachings of All Ages – Manly P. Hall
“The beehive is found in Masonry as a reminder that in diligence and labor for a common good true happiness and prosperity are found. The bee is a symbol of wisdom, for as this tiny insect collects pollen from the flowers, so men may extract wisdom from the experiences of daily life. The bee is sacred to the goddess Venus and, according to mystics, it is one of several forms of life which came to the earth from the planet Venus millions of years ago. Wheat and bananas are said to be of similar origin. This is the reason why the origin of these three forms of life cannot be traced. The fact that bees are ruled by queens is one reason why this insect is considered a sacred feminine symbol. In India the god Prana–the personification of the universal life force–is sometimes shown surrounded by a circle of bees. Because of its importance in pollenizing flowers, the bee is the accepted symbol of the generative power. At one time the bee was the emblem of the French kings. The rulers of France wore robes embroidered with bees, and the canopies of their thrones were decorated with gigantic figures of these insects.
[Manly Hall has described the Fleur De Lys as a stylized bee. His Occult Anatomy book is linked in the endocrine section]
Outer Gateways - Kenneth Grant.
“The crest which supplies the key to the Current represented by the Merovingian bloodline and the Order of Sion, comprises the symbols of the Typhonian line of descent: the two bears, eleven bees, and the fleur de lys. The motto incorporated in the crest reads Et in Arcadia ego (Ed Note: See top pic.). Arcadia=127, which is the number of the Egyptian Goddess Heqt who was typified by the ‘lower part of the back, or haunch.’ The two bears denote the Mother (Typhon) and her son (Set). The image of the bee pictorializes the buzzing or humming vibration peculiar to the Outer Ones, or their vehicles.”
“The Graal has been de- scribed as a shallow dish or saucer-shaped vessel, which suggests the shape of the mysterious vehicles associated with extra- terrestrial visitation, which nobody hitherto has been able satisfactorily to explain. They are described as, or associated with, shining or radiant phenomena, and, in some cases with a curious buzzing vibration, resembling the amplified humming of bees.
Occult Anatomy-Manly P Hall
“An ancient philosopher once said that the bee extracts honey from the pollen of the flower, while from the same source the spider extracts poison. The problem which then confronts us is: are we bees or spiders? Do we transform the experiences of life into honey, or do we change them into poison? Do they lift us, or do we eternally rebel against the pricks? Many people become soured by experience, but the wise one takes the honey and builds it into the beehive of his own spiritual nature.”
Occult Bee Symbolism
http://www.polarissite.net/symbolism-of-the-bee.html
Beehive Symbolism and Omphalos
https://www.thesquaremagazine.com/mag/article/202007the-beehive/
Obviously there is already plenty of information to be had about the Delphic Bee and those Greek connections. You’ll find that this comes up often in the work linked here and in the work of Grant, Spare, and in the other books about Lumley-Brown and the Sybils.
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Moon Magic- Dion Fortune:
It’s worth noting here that in this book there is a ritual sex magic scene that clearly inspired the one in TSWOTB. Fortune ends her scene with this:
“In the vision which they shared they hung in high space among the stars. It was as if she had mounted up on powerful wings, drawing the man with her like the nuptial flight of bees.
______
A bit on Grant’s Merovingian Mythos with more about his Bee symbolism.
https://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/merovingians/merovingios_06.htm
The Way of Mystery; Magick, Mysticism, and Self Transcendence
NEMA ( Margaret Ingalls) was a student and associate of Kenneth Grant. https://www.scribd.com/document/203458609/Nema-the-Way-of-Mystery
The book is available online and appears to be free with ads. I am linking a photo of relevant material below, page 182.
(Scroll to next page)
.
The Book of the Bee
http://www.evreninsirlari.net/dosyalar/155-156_s04_02.pdf
This is a religious Christian text from the year 1222 A.D
Page 8’s Bee analogy is interesting. I was told by someone of relevance that they believed that the idea of the “Apis Codex” was inspired by the concept of The Book of the Bee. Buxton once told Naomi’s cell that the Apis Codex was a book/collection of the work which was passed down to him (perhaps along the lines of the “stack of papers” Naomi claimed she was given by the Bee Mistress). Simon said to a colleague that he “had it on an old computer somewhere” when they asked to see it, which is unlikely if it’s a passed down document. On the zoom call, he said that neither the Apis Codex nor the “Liber Mantikos” , an alleged “oral document” of 222 “mantic proclamations” passed down from the tradition, existed at all, and waved it off as nonsense. Here is the article where he describes the Liber (https://andrewgough.co.uk/interviews_buxton/)
A piece from page 8 of the Book of the Bee:
We have called this book the 'Book of the Bee,' because we have gathered of the blossoms of the two Testaments and of the flowers of the holy Books, and have placed them therein for thy benefit. As the common bee with gauzy wings flies about, and flutters over and lights upon flowers of various colours, and upon blossoms of divers odours, selecting and gathering from all of them the materials which are useful for the construction of her handiwork; and having first of all collected the materials from the flowers, carries them upon her thighs, and bringing them to her dwelling, lays a foundation for her building with a base of wax; then gathering in her mouth some of the heavenly dew which is upon the blossoms of spring, brings it and blows it into these cells; and weaves the comb and honey for the use of men and her own nourishment: in like manner have we, the infirm, hewn the stones of corporeal words from the rocks of the Scriptures which are in the Old Testament, and have laid them down as a foundation for the edifice of the spiritual law. And as the bee carries the waxen substance upon her thighs because of its insipidity and tastelessness, and brings the honey in her mouth because of its sweetness and value; so also have we laid down the corporeal law by way of substratum and foundation, and the spiritual law for a roof and ceiling to the edifice of the spiritual tower. And as the expert gardener and orchard-keeper goes round among the gardens, and seeking out the finest sorts of fruits takes from them slips and shoots, and plants them in his own field; so also have we gone into the garden of the divine Books, and have culled therefrom branches and shoots, and have planted them in the ground of this book for thy consolation and benefit. When thou, O brother, art recreating thyself among these plants, those which appear and which thou dost consider to be insipid and tasteless, leave for thy companions, for they may be more suitable to others (than to thee); but, upon those which are sweet, and which sweeten the palate of thy understanding, do thou feed and satisfy thy hunger. If, however, owing to their fewness, they do not fill thee, seek in succession for their roots, and from thence shall thy want be satisfied. Know also, O brother, that where there is true love, there is no fear; and where there is freedom of speech, there is no dread; and we should not dare to be so rash as to enter upon these subjects, which are beyond the capacity of our simple understanding, unless we relied upon thy immaculate love; because, in the words of one of the inspired:
When thou findest honey, eat (only) so much as is sufficient for thee, lest, when thou art sated, thou vomit it;
That is to say, do not enquire (too closely) into the divine words.
(Ain't that the truth)
Pan/Vitamin Pan/Bees/Melissae
The Goat-Foot God is a novel by Dion Fortune about the Rites of Pan, with some bee-coded, hidden references.
“In her next novel, The Goat-Foot God, [Dion] Fortune had fully embraced the idea of a modern Paganism reviving the belief systems of pre-Christian Europe, referring to this as "Vitamin P" and declaring that it was needed to heal the modern world” -Wikipedia
From TSWOTB “‘...thus the bee brings this sexual power from the visible face of spirit into the hive. We know this power as vitamin P. Vitamin P is the vita- latin for life-of Pan; it is Vitamin Pan’. He spoke these two words- vitamin pan- with such force that my body momentarily shuddered in response. They were also the two words that completed the talk, and I was left reflecting on how Pan-the horned stag god of europe-could be connected to honey, pollen, bees, and sexual power.”
From The Goat Foot God: “ I have been addling my brains to discover why an invocation of Panlanded you in a monastery. It seemed the most unlikely spot one could possibly imagine. But it’s coming clear now. The same path leads to both Pan and Ambrosius…I don’t think Ambrosius was a bad lot, even by the local reckoning, I believe he was suffering actually from a deficient spiritual diet, and was trying to get some Vitamin P. into it.”
How Pan can be associated with bees and sexual power, etc is not a stretch, of course. Bees are the symbols of Nymphs, and Melissa is the name of the Nymph who discovered honey. and Melissae are, as we know, also the name of the priestesses of the Delphian Apollo, after the purity of the bee. Pan is companion to Nymphs and affiliated with sex directly, a god of fertility and spring and everything fecund. In many parts of the world (such as Egypt etc), bees and honey also symbolize fertility and abundance among other things.
The Goat-foot God features some interesting veiled references. Bees are mentioned 4 times, 3 of the references are specifically the *sound* of bees, twice alongside church bells. In Kenneth Grant’s work, he notes that the sound of the arrival of the gods comes with a sound like the humming of bees. In another scene, a bee comes into the house in search of their honey, and is described as having happiness that was the quality of inebriation.
One of the main “characters” of TGFG is a spirit of a 15th century monk called Ambrosius and his reincarnation. Interestingly, St. Ambrose, also known as Aurelius Ambrosius, is the patron saint of bees and bee-keeping. https://www.cultureoncall.com/the-patron-saint-of-bee-keepers/
In the song of Pan in Fortune’s book, “Honey of the honey-bee” is an offering to Pan and Pan is asked to bless the honey-bee, as god of all fertility. Honey is mentioned several times in the story.
Also in the story, Ambrosius (a prior) was walled up in the cellar of an old monastery that the other characters are now staying in. He had been punished for working with Pan. The living characters then find a series of cells inside the monastery, formerly Ambrosius’ meditation retreat which was then turned into a prison for recalcitrant monks. The monks were kept in their cells, sometimes walled in, never seeing the light of day again. “In darkness and solitary confinement until they awaited their end”. And where Ambrosius met his- in the darkness of a cell. Cells and Cellars and the darkness therein is a throughline in the story. On its own it isn't of much relevance, but in this context- the idea of the reincarnation of a monk with a name shared with a saint of beekeeping, dying in the darkness of a “cell” and then being reborn, feels quite relevant.
I find it also interesting that Buxton chose the quote: “O Goat-Foot God of Arcady! This modern world hath need of thee!” from Oscar Wild, under the Chapter 7 title of “Vitamin Pan” in his book. In that quote is not only the name of Fortune’s book about Pan (which features “Vitamin P”) and includes a line which nods to her documented declaration of Vitamin P being needed to “heal the modern world”. Fortune’s own “Rite of Pan” asks that we “follow him to Arcady”.
A note on the Stag/Goat merge in TSWOTB. Buxton refers to Pan as the stag god of europe. The stag of Europe is Cernunnos, Celtic god of the forest, associated with serpents and fertility. In Wicca, Pan and Cernunnos are often blended (and there are other places in this work that is drawn from Gerald Gardner, see Pythoness section) but historically Pan is part Goat and they are separate deities. I feel that making Pan a stag god in TSWOTB was primarily in order to make use of the sacred deer ritual Buxton appropriated from the Navajo Pollen Path, in which a deer is ritually run down and smothered with Pollen (see below) and then a sacred object is made from the animal.
Seidr/Spinners/Spindles/Distaffs/Oracles
Directly below, a fascinating paper on the use of cultic distaffs in Norse spirituality. Distaffs are used in oracular trance work, and spindles were ridden like broomsticks, etc- and there are many references to weaving (fate) and threads. As well, the Norns are very much the Fates. You’ll find pieces about projecting thoughts like threads (similar to the Pollen Method), as well as seership and sexual energy.
https://eldar-heide.net/Publikasjonar%20til%20heimesida/Spinning%20seidr,%20Lund%20conf%20Heide.pdf
Incredible resource from Mirjam Mencej on the symbolic and supernatural meaning of spinning/threads in (real) Slavic and European folk traditions.
https://www.folklore.ee/folklore/vol48/mencej.pdf
Seidways- Jan Fries, full text. Links to Kenneth Grant as well.
https://ia801008.us.archive.org/5/items/JanFriesSeidways/Jan-Fries-Seidways-.pdf
Two places Michael Harner and Scandinavian spirituality intersect, which I find relevant to our research. Also more on the oracular aspects.
https://www.shamanism.dk/about-scss
Max Dashu
Recommended by N herself, Dashu is an extraordinary resource.
https://www.suppressedhistories.net/
Deer Smothering Ritual/Pollen Path (see also Lemniscatic Walk section)
Seeing With a Native Eye; Essays on Native American Religion- Walter Capps
https://www.amazon.com/Seeing-Native-Eye-American-Religion/dp/0060613122
Read here:
https://sacredtrustinfo.blogspot.com/2023/08/the-pollen-path-indigenous-appropriation.html
Endocrine Part 1: Special Note: Kenneth Grant and The Typhonian Order
“The exudation and imbibition of magical kalas inherent in human fluids is the main subject of this ancient science, known in India as the Sri Vidya” ~Magical Revival, Kenneth Grant
Kenneth Grant’s work following Dion Fortune and Austin Osman Spare (both listed here in their own sections) is worth diving into. The Magical Revival (as well as the rest of the Typhonian Trilogies) can be found online, usually by searching the name of the book you’re looking for, followed by “pdf”- but I’ve included all of them here for convenience. The Magical Revival is linked here several times and in this section I’m including some notes as well as links to crucial texts which will open the door for you and help you with next steps in your own research, beyond “Typhonian Tantra”, Tantra, itself meaning “to weave” (as does a spider in its web), if you so choose. Grant was also aware of Ithell Colquhoun as she is referenced briefly in Typhonian Trilogies. Typhon is a recurring entity in POP, as well as Python and “The Black Widows”.
Beyond the Mauve Zone (full text)
https://archive.org/stream/KennethGrant/KennethGrant-BeyondMauveZone_djvu.txt
With color plates: http://b-oto.org/books/mauve_zone.pdf
The Magical Revival-Kenneth Grant
https://cdn.preterhuman.net/texts/religion.occult.new_age/Magick/Magical%20Revival.pdf
Also in Grant’s work you’ll find lots of info on the Six-rayed star, which is the magical triangles, one pointing up, and one down, that are merged to create the Star. This is the same practice we did with the black widows.
“The threefold seed is represented geometrically by the triangle or pyramid, the symbol of Horus and of the unwedded Mother. When the apex is uppermost, Horus is indicated; when it is inverted, or southward pointing, Set is implied. In the tantras the Sri Yantra appears with the central triangle upward or downward pointing according as to whether the ritual is of the Right-Hand Path or the Left-Hand Path. The fusion of these two triangles of Nuit and Hadit, North and South, Female and Male, forms the six-pointed Star of Spirit symbolic of Transcendental Consciousness. This Star is the symbol of the IXo, O.T.O.”
-Magical Revival
There are 9 books in the Typhonian Trilogies (linked in no particular order). While you’ll find these volumes quite dense and intensely magical, you’ll also find many of our totems and work around the nectars (particularly the sexual nectars/Kalas, urine, and glands/secretions/pineal/pituitary body, etc). You’ll find quite a lot about spiders/weaving/webs (regarding the cosmos and dreaming), the void, Trance, Oracle, Serpents ,Pythonesses, Upper/Lower mouths-and more. I’m including them all, even the really “out there” ones. All of value.
The Ninth Arch
https://archive.org/stream/KennethGrant/Ninth-Arch-KennethGrant_djvu.txt
Outer Gateways
https://cl-pdx.com/static/outer_gateways.pdf
Hecate’s Fountain
https://s3.us-west-1.wasabisys.com/luminist/EB/G/Grant%20-%20Hecate%27s%20Fountain.pdf
Outside Circles of Time
https://s3.us-west-1.wasabisys.com/luminist/EB/G/Grant%20-%20Outside%20the%20Circles%20of%20Time.pdf
Nightside of Eden
https://s3.us-west-1.wasabisys.com/luminist/EB/G/Grant%20-%20Nightside%20of%20Eden.pdf
Cults of Shadow
https://logoilibrary.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/Grant-Cults-of-the-Shadow.pdf
Aleister Crowley and the Hidden God
https://ia600701.us.archive.org/5/items/KennethGrant/KennethGrant-AleisterCrowleyHiddenGod.pdf
Endocrine Part 2:
More Nectars, Inner Stars/”Impersonal Use” of Sexual energy/”Circuit of Force”
Samuel Aun Weor
There is simply too much to link here, regarding SAW. He has written volumes on occult endocrinology.
Sexology: The Basis of Endocrinology and Criminology: The Surprising Connections Between Hormones, Imagination, Clairvoyance, and Crime
Endocrinology and Criminology (which isn’t exactly what it sounds like)
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/69287438
Here are his books on the Internet Archive
A collection of his books in PDF
https://samaelaunweor.ro/1%20download_eng.html
Kabbalah/Tree of life
This is critical to Western Esoteric Tradition. You’ll quickly find the connection between the 10 nectars/glands to the ten Sephirot in the Tree of Life. I put some simplified links below but the other referenced material has advanced Tree of Life content. Please see Manly P Hall’s Occult Anatomy (in the image you can see some of the sephirot) Or Dion Fortune’s book on the subject, both linked below.
The Mystical Qabalah- Dion Fortune
https://www.awakening-intuition.com/FortuneDion-TheMysticalQabbalah.pdf
Occult Anatomy (again)
Intro Articles
https://medium.com/hermetic-academy/kabbalah-introduction-to-the-tree-of-life-d87d32a793ba
https://www.kabbalah.com/en/articles/what-is-the-tree-of-life/
The terms ``Circuit of Force '' and “Vitamin Pan '' (and, in fact, much of the “Pan '' aspects in TSWOTB) are found in the work of Dion Fortune. Her work centered around polarity and magnetism, non-personal use of sex force, and the endocrine system/chakra system. Please see the section on Vitamin Pan and The Goat Foot God for more on this and bee references.
Fortune’s books on the subject:
Circuit of Force - Dion Fortune
Principles of Esoteric Healing - Dion Fortune
The Problem of Purity; Use of Sex Force- Dion Fortune
Moon Magic - Dion Fortune
“Dion Fortune, in her turn, evolved a system for creating the Magical Personality from the debris of everyday life. Her work involved the use of lunar Magic. She used the energies manifesting through sexual polarity. Her novel, Moon Magic (posthumously published in 1956), explains the mystique, if not the actual mechanism of the process. She stressed the close relationship between the endocrine system and the chakras, the centres of magical power in the human organism.” - The Magical Revival- K. Grant
Melchizedek and the Mystery of Fire-Manly P Hall
From the above: “When seen clairvoyantly, all of these [sacred] centers resemble flowers or electric sparks. Each one of the seven main plexuses has six of lesser importance surrounding it, thus forming six-pointed stars diagrammatically, although the centers are not arranged in starlike order in the body.”
Both Manly’s books cover ductless glands, the stars and centers, and more.
Rosicrucian Mentions of the Secretions/Glands (Lesson 2)
Paracelsus and the Inner Astrum
“From Paracelsus, writing in the 17th century: The imagination of a pregnant woman is so strong that it can influence the seed and change the fruit in her womb in many directions. Her INNER STARS act powerfully and vigorously upon the fruit, so that its nature is thereby deeply and solidly shaped and formed. For the child in the mother’s womb is exposed to the mother’s influence, and is as though entrusted to the hand and will of its mother, as the clay is entrusted to the hand of the potter, who creates and forms out of it what he wants and what he pleases . . . “
“As Jung (1941/1966) explained in his second essay on Paracelsus, “Paracelsus the Physician,” also published in The Spirit in Man, Art, and Literature (CW15), according to Paracelsus the astrum is the star or stars in the body (p. 16 [para. 23) and Paracelsus gave many names to this idea that are found throughout his writings, such as “firmament,” “Astrum,” “Sydus” (p. 16 [para. 23]), and “corpus sydereum” (p. 20 [para. 29)], “Corpora Microcosmi Astrali,” “Corpora Astrali,” and “corpus astrale.” These are interior bodily stars that Paracelsus understood to be connected to the stars in the sky (p. 23 [para. 32]) through a “correspondence between heaven and earth” (Willard, 2021, p. 27), a relationship enhanced using imagination (p. 25). Jung described this astral body as an “endosomatic heaven” (p. 16 [para. 23]) which means an inner heaven, an inner soma or an inner body. Here in the 21st century we call this the astral body, the aura, or the subtle body. This star body, by whatever name Paracelsus referred to it, appeared to be the source of the lumen naturae (p. 20 [para. 29]; pp. 114-115 [para. 148]).”
Paracelsus- Selected Writings by Carl Jung (Pretty sure, garbled my notes on this one)
Firesipping
The “Simon” mentioned here is Buxton, confirmed with the author.
https://uazu.net/notes/merilyn.html
While Simon claimed (in the zoom) that Merrilyn had no material of her own and that he gave her material and assistance, it’s safe to say that’s likely also untrue..
The Golden Dawn
“The Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn (Latin: Ordo Hermeticus Aurorae Aureae), more commonly the Golden Dawn (Aurora Aurea), was a Secret Society devoted to the study and practice of occult hermeticism and metaphysics during the late 19th and early 20th centuries.” -Wiki
Members include Dion Fortune, William Butler Yeats (who wrote the autobiographical “The Trembling of the Veil”), Moina Mathers, Aleister Crowley, Arthur Machen (Author of “The Great God Pan”), and while Ithell Colquhoun was not accepted as a member, she wrote the following book about its history and members:
Sword of Wisdom- Ithell Colquhoun
https://archive.org/details/IthellColquhoun-SwordOfWisdom-MathersMacGregrorAndTheGoldenDawn
Buxton thanks Ithell for her “Sword of Wisdom” at the beginning of TSWOB. Sword of Wisdom is an in depth look at the founder of the Golden Dawn, Samuel Liddell MacGregor Mathers. It’s extremely detailed and covers the individuals involved and there’s sections on magic, alchemy, tantra and enochia.
A great article about the use of costume and dress up in Golden Dawn ritual. Costume and becoming characters was an important part of Arte’ and part of Pythoness.
“Knowledge Lecture” is a term created by the Golden Dawn
https://www.hermetics.org/gd/GD-1.html
More on Dion Fortune
Fortune’s work is immense, but, as mentioned- the concepts of magnetism, polarity, and sex force (and more) are reflected in the POP. I’m including some interesting articles I’ve found, just for fun (?)
https://eprints.bournemouth.ac.uk/27759/1/24.pdf
https://ore.exeter.ac.uk/repository/bitstream/handle/10036/41936/SelbyJ.pdf?sequence=1
Here are many of her books available online for free
https://archive.org/details/DionFortune
Chants
Helios Chant from “The Demon Lover” -Dion Fortune
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i9jcXn5hb4k
The Wind and the Fire Chant -Dion Fortune
(can be found in whole in “Dion Fortune and the Inner Light” -Garreth Knight
http://garethknight.blogspot.com/2015/09/dion-fortune-in-bristol-and-somerset.html
Austin Osman Spare + POP Language/Concepts
“Spare often supplemented the process by a sexual formula which endowed it with added efficacy. He derived most of his sex-magical formulae from a Delphic Pythoness who communed with him during sessions of automatic writing.”
Spare’s work was not only popular with Grant and others mentioned here, in this article he (Grant) brings us full circle (as you’ll begin to see) to surrealism. Spare is an inspiration because of his work regarding the “inbetweenness”, the”neither neither”, the Void, flower/flow-er, being fully expressed, and using will and imagination (themes of breath, will, and imagination are not uncommon in this grouping of people). His work is directly about ecstasy and New Sexuality. The Osman Spare rabbit hole is deep and not for the faint of heart.
https://hermetic.com/spare/sorceries
https://hermetic.com/spare/aos-zkc
Spare writes about ritual orgies with elements of sado-masochism, one “elaborate ceremony which is an extensive hypnotic to overwhelm all psychological resistances”, which conjures up images of the practices we did in pantomime in the empty room. (If you did not do this practice, I’m happy to discuss it privately).
I’m giving here the doorway for those who want to open it.
The Pythoness (And Connections)
Priestesses, Pythonesses, and Sibyls
https://www.amazon.com/Priestesses-Pythonesses-Sibyls-collection-possession-ebook/dp/B0095B9E34
The above book is where I found a near exact description of one of our ceremonies, in which women were standing in a circle and a veiled seeress performed an oracle while sitting on a throne-like chair in the center.
The book is a selection of accounts from several women and in it you’ll find references to Grant, Gardner, and Margaret Lumley Brown- who held the title of Pythoness, herself, and others who will direct you to answers. It will help lead you to the Gerald Gardner connections and the obvious parallels to our ceremonial work.
Margaret Lumley Brown
Brown worked closely with Dion Fortune and was her successor. It should be noted that Gareth Knight was also close with Brown and Fortune, writing several books about and with Fortune. He wrote the above book about Brown. Gareth Knight wrote an endorsement of Simon’s book in the inside cover, and would not have missed Dion’s work within it, which remains baffling to me.
Brown is credited with bringing Oracular work back to a sitting position.
Surrealism: Dream Coag/Theatre of Ambiguity /Fumage/Mirroring, and more
Dreams, Practices, and the influence of Ithell Colquhoun,
(see below for more about her)
Diving into the philosophy of Surrealism, we find many connections to our own work in the realms of free expression and exercises like “Theatre of Ambiguity”. As you can read in the intro below, this is a very deep and rather inherently occult movement, though those involved chastised people like Colquhoun for being too dedicated to occultism, going so far as to kick her out of the surrealist group.
Surrealist Games
Please read the introduction by Mel Gooding
This isn’t really a book of “games”, but one describing practices used by surrealists. Ithell (and I’m sure others) incorporated some of this in their occult work. One that was used in the “Path of Pollen” (in Melissae Lyceum Lectorum or MLL) is Fumage.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fumage
Ithell with mention of Fumage
https://www.artsy.net/article/artsy-editorial-artist-embraced-occult-defied-surrealists
Dreaming, “Oneiric Material”, and the Subconscious are integral to surrealism.
Surrealism and the Dream
http://www.inmaterial.com/jjimenez/surrealismo3en.htm
MOMA article on surrealism and dreams
Practices that may also seem familiar to you:
“Parallel Stories” requires the blending of stories from two different people into a new text, using marker words from each other’s writings. Very similar to Dream Coagulation.
In another practice, you imagine yourself into a state of insanity and create from that place.
In “Waking Dream” seances and automatism, group members put themselves into a trance state. In that state they would speak aloud visions and poetic dream-like passages, not unlike Dream Mirroring or even Oracular work. As well, in this practice “it allowed members to do and say things unburdened by societal expectations' This, like many other of these practices, has our dreamwork, oracular work, full expression, and theater of ambiguity rolled up neatly into one.
Above Paraphrased from this article: https://www.khanacademy.org/humanities/art-1010/dada-and-surrealism/xdc974a79:surrealism/a/surrealism-an-introduction#:~:text=Surrealist%20practices%20included%20%E2%80%9Cwaking%20dream,immediacy%20that%20denied%20any%20fakery.
Ithell Colquhoun
This section is a small introduction into the work and importance of Ithell Colquhoun, her place in all this will be expanded upon as much as we can in subsequent documents and writings. Her work was plagiarized in the TSWOTB but it is more than only copy/pasting her writing. The character “Bridge” was alleged to be buried on Penwith Peninsula, a place central to Ithell’s life and a key feature of one of the books he plagiarized, The Living Stones. And there is more to be discussed about this, and since the last plagiarism was posted, there’s been more discovered.
http://www.ithellcolquhoun.co.uk/living_stones.htm
Ithell’s letters were loaned to Richard Shillitoe by Buxton as referenced in Shillitoe’s books on Ithell and, as said previously, Buxton thanks her in his own book (for a book she wrote about the members of the Golden Dawn). More on Ithell’s letters and writings soon. Ithell Colquhoun was a wellspring of knowledge and a prolific writer and artist that would have been a source of inspiration and of material for anyone close to her. She died in 1988 in Cornwall, UK, at the age of 81.
http://www.ithellcolquhoun.co.uk
Amy Hale
https://www.amyhale.me/writings
http://strangeattractor.co.uk/shoppe/ithell-colquhoun/
Amy Hale has a book about Ithell’s sex magic about to come out, along with one about her magical writings. We anxiously await them.
Hale believes Colquhoun was working on a curriculum of Sex Magic and some of the writings are missing.
Sword of Wisdom (again)
Ithell Colquhoun, Surrealism and The occult
A book on Alchemy that Ithell studied
https://alchemystudy.com/download/Secret_Fire_in_Alchemy-Garstin.pdf
The Magical Writings of Ithell Colquhoun
https://epdf.pub/the-magical-writings-of-ithell-colquhoun.html
The Link looks spammy, but it’s legit. While this is a technical manual, not many of her books are available online so I’m linking it here.
Tesseracts
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tesseract
https://www.amyhale.me/news/2020/7/9/writings-and-musings-on-colquhoun-during-the-pandemic
Propolis
Here is a research paper from 1997 about the burning of Propolis. In TSWOTB Buxton says very little about propolis, except that it’s antibacterial resin and that there’s little written about it being used as a resin for burning. And, that is true! But there is this research paper from the 90’s that does talk about it. I find it noteworthy because it speaks about its beneficial properties as an incense and also how it’s burned with Olibanum (frankincense), which is a Substitute for the nektar/vapour of breath/The Door. Not saying this is the source, but the timing is right, and at this point, I wouldn’t put much past ‘em.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1GgC8aK5xI48pIZnWyXoaUWGqci6xR9w2/view?usp=sharing
Red Ochre Woman
ROW, her aspects and info, was channeled by one of the original sisters 6. Her connection came from one of the handful Ancient female bodies that have been discovered in different parts of the world, painted with ochre pigment.
https://oumnh.ox.ac.uk/learn-red-lady-of-paviland-0
Also, there is some inspiration taken from the Australian sacred use of Ochre.
Also Of Interest
Gerald Massey
Samuel Liddell Macgregor Mathers and Moina Mathers
Garreth Knight
http://garethknight.blogspot.com/?m=1
RJ Stewart
Simon’s bookshop and imprint, Arcania, published RJ’s book “Celebrating the Male Mysteries” (linked below). Just an interesting look at Simon’s beginnings. I’ve linked some of RJ’s other work and his site.
RJ Stewart and Simon/Andrew Ward
http://innerconvocation.com/intro.html
Celebrating the Male Mysteries
https://health.aeonbooks.co.uk/Preview/9781801520096_PDF.pdf
Underworld Initiation
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The Celtic Shaman
https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/1397493
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Emma Wilby
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Important Arthur/Merlin Connection of value to Simon Buxton
https://www.marlboroughcollege.org/explore/our-history/the-marlborough-mound/
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Robert Cochran Serpent Power
https://www.patheos.com/blogs/bythepalemoonlight/2018/03/robert-cochrane-middle-pillar/
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Gurdieff/Travers (Buxton claims Gurdieff as an Inspiration)
https://www.gurdjieff.org/travers.htm
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Travers spending time with the Navajo
https://www.theparisreview.org/interviews/3099/the-art-of-fiction-no-63-p-l-travers
Lower/Upper mouths (can also be found in the Typhonian Trilogies)
From an article Anne Carson (images below)
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