{"id":7059,"date":"2015-02-15T16:03:03","date_gmt":"2015-02-15T23:03:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=7059"},"modified":"2015-02-16T12:25:26","modified_gmt":"2015-02-16T19:25:26","slug":"magic-lines-of-earth-1-discovering-ley-lines","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=7059","title":{"rendered":"Magic Earth Lines 1: &#8220;Discovering&#8221; Ley Lines"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>At <em>Bad Archaeology<\/em>, a skeptical look at Alfred Watkins and the &#8220;discovery&#8221; of ley lines:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>According to a later account, all this [discovery of a hidden web of straight lines in the English countryside] came to him \u201c<em>in a flash<\/em>\u201d on 21 June 1921 during a visit to Blackwardine; according to his son Allen, this happened while poring over a map. A variation on the \u2018origin myth\u2019 quoted by John Michell holds that the revelation happened whilst out riding in the hills near Bredwardine in 1920, observing the Herefordshire landscape he loved. It is unclear why there are two different versions of the story; Tom Williamson and Liz Bellamy note wryly in their excellent <em>Ley Lines in Question<\/em> (Tadworth: World\u2019s Work, 1983) that John Michell\u2019s version reflects how \u201c<em>ley hunters would like to think it happened<\/em>\u201d.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Speculations about &#8220;trackways&#8221; and astronomical alignments go back well into the nineteenth century, before even Watkins&#8217; time.<\/p>\n<p>A critique of the Wikipedia entry for ley lines is included.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/badarchaeology.wordpress.com\/2014\/11\/01\/who-discovered-ley-lines\/\">Read the rest.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>At Bad Archaeology, a skeptical look at Alfred Watkins and the &#8220;discovery&#8221; of ley lines: According to a later account, all this [discovery of a hidden web of straight lines in the English countryside] came to him \u201cin a flash\u201d on 21 June 1921 during a visit to Blackwardine; according to his son Allen, this [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[20,88,21],"class_list":["post-7059","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-archaeology","tag-britain","tag-england"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6xQTg-1PR","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":12332,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=12332","url_meta":{"origin":7059,"position":0},"title":"Old Issues of &#8220;The Ley Hunter&#8221; Available as Digital PDFs","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"July 21, 2021","format":false,"excerpt":"The Ley Hunter was a British zine devoted to \"earth mysteries\" (which could include such things as Fairy encounters as well as ley lines, etc.) published from 1965\u20131998. As Isaac Koi describes it, Its website described it as \"the longest running journal to cover the 'earth mysteries' complex of study\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"archaeology\"","block_context":{"text":"archaeology","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=archaeology"},"img":{"alt_text":"cover image, The Ley Hunter no. 66, 1975","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/ley-hunter-cover-214x300.png?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":6205,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=6205","url_meta":{"origin":7059,"position":1},"title":"UK Druids Restore Damaged Ley Lines","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"December 31, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"A major effort is underway: The council of British Druids have been working through the night to restore ley lines which have been damaged by recent storms. Many households have been without spiritual energy throughout the Yuletide holiday which has affected psychic connections in many parts of the country. A\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"Druidry\"","block_context":{"text":"Druidry","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=druidry"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":909,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=909","url_meta":{"origin":7059,"position":2},"title":"&quot;Dowsing for the Dead&quot;","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"July 21, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"I cannot improve on the headline that Dallas religion journalist Rod Dreher put on his own blog post.But if you hang around dowsers, you will not hear the world \"occult\" much. The old ones, at least, were a practical bunch, although a newer generation got all wrapped up in \"earth\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"dowsing\"","block_context":{"text":"dowsing","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=dowsing"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":7063,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=7063","url_meta":{"origin":7059,"position":3},"title":"Magic Earth Lines 2: The 37th Parallel","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"February 16, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"The ranch was owned by a man named Howard Munsell (now deceased). Unlike a lot of Southern Plains ranchers who are, shall we say, standoffish toward strange visitors, he had previously run a trail-ride business, and so he was able to handle several dozen campers on his land, providing water\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"archaeology\"","block_context":{"text":"archaeology","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=archaeology"},"img":{"alt_text":"snake blaksless","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/02\/snake-blaksless.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/02\/snake-blaksless.jpg?resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/02\/snake-blaksless.jpg?resize=525%2C300 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":13338,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=13338","url_meta":{"origin":7059,"position":4},"title":"An Online Presentation on the Wilderness Vision of Feraferia","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"April 14, 2023","format":false,"excerpt":"The Pagan group Feraferia had a fairly large (by Pagan standards of the time) following, chiefly\u00a0 in Southern California, starting in the late 1960s. It was largely the creation of one man, the visonary artist Fred Adams, and was a unique creation, with some inspiration from the ancient Minoan civilization\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"American religion\"","block_context":{"text":"American religion","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=american-religion"},"img":{"alt_text":"Maiden Savioress Spirit Guiding the Age of Aquarius,Fred Adams, 1977.","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/feraferia.org\/images\/stories\/maiden%20savioress%20by%20fred%20adams%20cpy4.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":6110,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=6110","url_meta":{"origin":7059,"position":5},"title":"Excavating Witches","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"November 17, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"It was the obligatory Halloween content over at Bones Don't Lie, but I had too much else on my plate to link to it then. The question is, how can you tell if a buried ancient skeleton was that of a witch (in the anthropological sense)? Does the mouth full\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"archaeology\"","block_context":{"text":"archaeology","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=archaeology"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7059","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7059"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7059\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7078,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7059\/revisions\/7078"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7059"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7059"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7059"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}