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Pictish symbols

the Golspie stoneIs it because the next holiday will be Scotland or some other reason, but I recently find myself fascinated by the so-called “Pictish stones”. The first time I saw the strange Pictisch symbols was about a decade ago in the fascinating book “Noord-Europese Mysterieën En Hun Sporen Tot Heden” (‘North-European mysteries and their traces to the precent’) (1970) by the Dutch author Frans Eduard Farwerck (1889-1969). He displays several stones, but the Golspie stone is the most fascinating. It not only contains (virtually) every Pictish symbol that we know, but also supports Farwerck’s theory about the symbolism. A theory that I have not found on the world wide web yet, so I figured my scribblings might add something to the information about the Pictish stones that is already available on the web, which is not little to begin with.

A little bit of history
When the meanings of the symbols are disputed, even the history of the Picts is! It looks like the Picts were the original inhabitants of Scotland. They must have been around in the first or at least second century CE, because when the Romans invaded the British isle in the third century, the Picts were already a force to take into account. They were not such a large society, but this came later. From about 600 to 800 some people speak about a “Pictish nation”. After that the Picts were troubled by the Viking invasions and overrun (or perhaps they just merged with) the neighbouring Gaelic tribes. After 800 there seem to have been no more Picts.Read More »Pictish symbols

Traditionalism vs Traditionalism

This text was first published in “Aristokratia” volume 1 2013, edited by K. Deva and published in 2013 by Manticore Press (isbn 098715818X) under the pen-name Roy Orlogstru. As of June 2013 I make my text available in PDF and Epub format. These files can be copied and spread freely unaltered, but not be republished without my permission. If you have questions or wish to comment on the text, please do so in the comment field below this announcement. Should you write a reaction in or at another medium, please let me know. TraditionalismvsTraditionalism.pdf

The primal law

This text was first published in “Mímir – Journal Of North European Traditions“, edited by Gwendolyn Taunton and published in July 2012 by Numen Books (isbn 0987158147) under the pen-name Roy Orlogstru.

René Guénon (1886-1951) wrote about a Source of all. This Source can have many names ranging from God to Ginnungagap. The expression of that Source in the world that we live in, can be described as the “primal law”, the order of things. That “primal law” can, again, have different names. Tradition (with a capital T), sophia perennis, religio perennis or a term that Guénon often used, Sanatana Dharma. All terms refer to some kind of primal ‘knowledge’, or in the latter case, a primal law. In the Northern European traditions, there is also a term that literally translates as primal law: Örlögr. In this short article I will investigate this term (and other terms) and its usuage in different texts, old and new.

The term Örlögr is written in different ways. This is caused by different ways of how authors translate old characters with accents that we do not know anymore to something better ‘typable’. The best-looking way of writing the word, in my opinion, would be “Ørlögr”. Actually the second ‘o’ has a dot below. Neither ‘o’ can be typed easily. This is why I prefer the spelling “Örlogr”.Read More »The primal law

Traditionalistic Asatru to download

For years I have worked on this longer version of the article with the same name that I published here in september 2008. I have tried to have it published, which eventually succeeded because of the friendly help of Gwendolyn Toynton/Taunton. This text was first published in “Mímir – Journal Of North European Traditions“, edited by Gwendolyn Taunton and published in July 2012 by Numen Books (isbn 0987158147) under the pen-name Roy Orlogstru. As of March 2013 I make my text available in PDF and Epub format. I am not entirely happy with the Epub file. It contains some errors due to conversion and the image looks like crap, but it is readable and the best I manage to make at the moment. These files can be copied and spread freely unaltered, but not be republished without my permission. If you have questions or wish to comment on the text,… Read More »Traditionalistic Asatru to download

Land of the Cathars

In late summer 2012 me and my girlfriend spent our holidays in the very South of France. I had never really been to France save for Paris when I was a teenager and passing through on my way to the UK. ‘Cathar country’ had been on my wishlist for quite a while. Why? Perhaps that romantic view on the Cathars, being curious about what is left and of course the environment over there. We found a place to stay quite near to the most famous castle of the Cathars, Montségur and had found a few other things that we wanted to see. I must say, a week of visiting Cathar sites (and some other things) has put the subject into some perspective.

What I did not really expect is that the Cathars are actually the main tourist feature of the region and many, many tourists set off to southern France for that, too many! There are Cathar car-tours, every ruin has to be paid for to get in, you are never alone when you visit a site, there is some sort of Cathar passport that you can use to collect stamps when you visit a site, but this includes sites that I have not found the Cathar connection with. It is a craze actually. Visiting some sites, buying books, reading the information provided to tourists, etc. has mostly flattened my (slumbering) ideas of before. A few thoughts.Read More »Land of the Cathars

Hunting (rune)stones in Sweden

In october 2011 me and my girlfriend spend about a week and a half in Sweden. The first few days we were in Malmö and we drove around the very south of the country, then we were a week North of Stockholm. That second location was on purpose, since that region has the largest density of runestones of the Swedish continent (the island Gotland has more). So we figured to spend a week hunting runestones, picture stones, etc. This did not prove to be easy!

Most of the runic inscriptions mentioned in this book are discussed in greater detail in the volumes of Sveriges runinskrifter – the enterprise known as Runverket (a term also used of the institute responsible for it) – published by the Royal Academy of Letters, History and Antiquities (Vitterhetsakademien). The provinces so far covered are represented by these volumes: Gotlands runinskrifter I-II (1962-78); a third and final volume is expected in a couple of years [the book I quote from is translated to English in 1987]; Gästriklands runinskrifter (1981); Närkes runinskrifter (1975); Smålands runinskrifter (1935-61); Södermanslands runinskrifter (1924-36); Upplands runinskrifter (1940-58); a supplement and introductory survey are in progress); Värmlands runinskrifter (1978); Västergotlands runinskrifter (1964); Ölands runinskrifter (1900-06); and Östergotlands runinskrifter (1911-18). Work on the publication of Hälsingslands runinskrifter has begun, and Runverket has embarked on preliminary investigations into the material from the remaining provinces.

Read More »Hunting (rune)stones in Sweden

A Godless heathenry?

Last week during holidays we visited the German city of Halle where the Nebra skydisc is presented in the “Landesmuseum für Vorgeschichte” (“national prehistoric museum”) along with the other items that were found with it and much more prehistoric artifacts. We also visited the Arche Nebra visitors centre in Nebra, where the disc was found, but that was not too interesting. Nearby there is a ‘sun observatory’ (like Stonehenge) in Goseck, the two are in some ways connected. The Nebra disc is 3600 years old. It depicts what appear to be a sun and a moon and stars. Later the strips on both sides were added (and the left one again lost) and the bow at the botton of the disc. There is a lot to say about the disc, things that you can probably find elsewhere on the world wide web. The crescent would be a ‘third phase’ crescent and when this phase appears together with the Pleiades in the morning sky at the summer solstice, this means that the current year is a leap year (every third year is one) and a month has to be added in order to have the moon-months and sun-years correct again. The arcs on both sides refer to the solstices and the arc on the bottom could be a bark floating between both solstices. This is not what I wanted to write about though.Read More »A Godless heathenry?

Asatru in the Low Countries

There seems to be a tendency among scholars to investigate temporary paganism. There are people who say that paganism is the world’s fastest growing religion. I am currently reading Michael Strmiska’s Modern Paganism In World Cultures with essays about Romuva (Lithuanian heathenry), pagans in the US military, Irish modern druids and Asatru in Northern America and Iceland (among other essays). I also know of books about current German paganism (but not like Strmiska’s book) and I know about an anthropology student who investigated the Flemish group that I am involved in (but I never saw the result). Since there seems to be nothing (but information of antifa groups) available about Dutch and Belgium Asatru, I thought to write a little introduction for investigators who may be unfamiliar with nowadays heathenry in the Dutch-speaking part of Northern Europe.Read More »Asatru in the Low Countries

Democrazy in Tibet?

I was unpleasently surprised when I heard the news yesterday. Tenzin Gyatso, the 14th Dalai Lama (since 1940), announced that he will lay down a part of his function in favour of a chosen successor. A few things went through my head. I had the (Theosophistic mistaken?) assumption that Tibet was ruled by a pair of Lamas, the Dalai Lama who is the worldly leader and the Panchen Lama (also Pänchen, Teshu or Tashi Lama), the spiritual leader. According to the Dutch news, the Dalai Lama was both the spiritual and worldly leader of the Tibetans and from now on, he will only be the spiritual leader. The current Panchen Lama (Gedhun Choekyi Nyima, the 11th Panchen Lama since 1995) was born in 1989 and he disappeared. According the Chinese occupier the 11th Panchen Lama is Qoigyijabu (Gyancain Norbu), but even the Tibetans themselves do not agree on who is the actual 11th Panchen Lama. Perhaps because all of this controversy, the Dalai Lama took both tasks, but when you read (Western) information about the Lamas, it looks like the Panchen Lama has always been on the second plane.Read More »Democrazy in Tibet?

from “The New Antaios” : Frans Eduard Farwerck

This text was written for The New Antaios online journal in 2010 or so. The website has been taken down since, so I decided to publish it here for ‘archival reasons’.
Go here for much more information about Farwerck.

Some 8 years ago I met my girl­friend. We were both involved in a short-lived Dutch ‘spir­i­tual mag­a­zine’ that liked to treat con­tro­ver­sial sub­jects. Through the edi­tor of the mag­a­zine my girl­friend got acquinted with a Flem­ish ‘Asatru’ group and later so did I. At the time my inter­est still mainly laid at Renais­sance eso­teri­cism, Medieval magic, etc. This was already a bit closer to home, since before I had an inter­est in more exotic, East­ern sub­jects. In any case, meet­ing Asatru excelled my shift towards even more domes­tic inter­ests, the old reli­gion of North­ern Europe. While becom­ing active in the group I ini­tially sticked to my inter­ests, but I heard a lot of inter­est­ing new paths.Read More »from “The New Antaios” : Frans Eduard Farwerck