Uffington Chalk Horse: August 20th 2009
This is the second of three parts of a modern-day fairy-tale of George and the Dragon. In the first part I was meditating at Wayland’s Smithy and heard an instruction to “go for a ride”. I was in little doubt that this advice referred to the nearby ‘White Horse’ etched out in the chalk hills above Uffington village, and so I made my way there in the glorious August afternoon sun to see if I could work out where exactly I should be, and to see what would happen if I found the right place.
As I arrived at the top of the formation I couldn’t work out where I was relative to anything so I walked straight down the hill arriving almost immediately at two protruding straight lines. Odd! Looked like a mouth or something, so I plucked out the crab apple I had been carrying and placed it neatly between the “jaws”. I smiled – it looked like it was eating the little apple – a huge horse with a tiny apple. I could see other chalk paths now, but was careful not to tread on them. I moved further down the hill and to the right, realising I was near the head. I was looking for the shoulder and flank, so I headed right and down.
Oddly, I didn’t use my dowsing rods to locate the spot. Instead I reasoned that a good spot to ride any animal might be the junction of the head with the back of the figure, and that’s where I went – straight to it. Conveniently there was a small man-sized hollow at just that point, and I made myself comfortable, lazing in the afternoon sunshine, welcoming the break from work and enjoying the view down the hill. From my vantage point three elements became apparent to me:
1. The ‘horse’ had a forked tongue
2. The plainly man-made folds of the hill below me spread out like a wing…a dragon’s wing.
3. The small flat-topped hill that was enclosed by this ‘wing’ I remembered was called “Dragon’s Hill”
Then it dawned on me – this was no horse. Only from this particular spot could all of the three unusual aspects of this figure be seen from the right perspective to make this apparent on the ground. Faint memories of other people having said the same thing floated through my mind. From that moment of revelation onwards I could no longer see this unique feature as a horse again! Sure, there were other chalk horses in the area, but they looked like horses – in their proportions and their features. This elongated chalk figure was nothing like those carvings at all. It was uniquely different. For me this will now be The Uffington White Dragon.
I meditated on this and tuned into the landscape, dissolving my sense of self into the sunlight, the winds and the view. Before long I felt the familiar surge of some inner notion and felt it connecting, becoming aware of the movement of nature, its interactions, and at the same time its one-ness. Such metaphysics never comes across well in print. When it is felt, however, experienced – then its beauty can be appreciated. A semi-blissful state of mind, body and spirit – some days fleeting, others seemingly forever.
In this moment I was focusing on Dragon’s Hill without purpose. It just fell into view. I saw the mound in motion – the twin dragons of male and female, the red and the white, intertwining, writhing. A curling column of energy launched from them upwards into the Oxfordshire air and fell towards me. I could see an egg shaped object inside its mouth as it fell into me in a sudden plunge and I felt the egg land in my chest. I could see it spinning in me – white, then gold, next time I looked it was white again, then gold when I blinked. What was this thing, I mused to myself? “The dragon egg – the golden heart.” I answered myself.
After the shock and the bliss state had worn off I seemed remarkably unperturbed by the whole event. I felt a little proud and excited at this. What could this be? By its tenuous link with perception it was clear to me that it was an invention of my mind, yet it felt incredibly physical too – like I was wearing it inside my chest. I practised not noticing it – yes, I could still operate in the rational world – no-one was staring at my white then gold chest, I wasn’t glowing or anything, and I still had my wits about me.
I started to get up, and as I did so I saw a negative image of the Dragon’s Hill in my eyes – it looked like a stone circle. It flashed momentarily then there was only a faint after-image. Too long in the sun! I told myself. Where were my sunglasses when I needed them?
A stone circle. A stone circle. Circle. Another kindly signpost. Would that be where I could hatch this “egg” – the golden egg? It felt like an episode of The Goodies! The Christmas Special episode of the late 1970s where everybody’s running is speeded up as they’re chased through various old children’s stories like Jack and the Beanstalk and the Goose That Laid The Golden Egg.
I went back to the car to check the maps. Stone circles in the area…stone circ…Avebury! Of course. It was late afternoon now. I would be there just as the light was beginning to sink to the horizon. Perfect timing, by coincidence. What an over-used word.
Gwas
Sliding down the scales of The Dragon
Really? *eyes widen* someone else has picked up that story too??! Wow – I really am gobsmacked! Sometimes gifts like the egg come into their own at times we don’t expect, maybe the time hasn’t come yet for you to know its real secrets:-) While I think of it, I was going to ask if you’d red Paul Deveraux’s book about Faery lines? If not its an absolute MUST for any dowser. He was the one who initiated the idea about the sound and megalithic sites for me, I’m a great fan of Julian Cope’s books too, me and my partner went to a book signing for Megalithic Europe and Cope was an absolute charmer resplendent in long coat and ten gallon hat! He even gave me a kiss and called me ‘babe’ *swoons*!!lol Yes, funky gibbon, how we used to sing that in the playground back in the day, along with ‘Kung-fu fighting’ remember that?!
Wow! I see what you mean Gwas about the similarity in feelings about Dragon Hill! It’s always so exciting to get verification from another that you’re on the right track with something, especially things of this nature that so often, you can be tempted to feel are the by-product of an over active imagination! Our ancestors I don’t think, had such doubts, not being as right-brained as we are today:-) I love your account of riding the serpent, and Her wings spreading out as the hills, it makes perfect sense in the photograph and I didn’t notice that when I was there, but I certainly felt a very arial sense of the place, like it was a sort of shamanic runway! It might sound weird, but while I was lost in my vision at the Horse, I was given a story, the tale of the foundation of the tribe. It involved a Shaman who fell in love with a chiefs daughter, the old man wouldn’t relinquish her to the Shaman, so in revenge he turned the woman into a dragon-horse – their children were the tribe that lived there all those millenia ago. I wrote an account of it on my own yahoo 360 blog at the time, as a narrative, but sadly I didn’t record it to paper (like a fool!) and I can’t remember much else about it now. I do remember though, that the dragon Herself felt like a Shaman’s ‘horse’ the psychopomp that carried the seeker to the vision in the way of the Siberian shamans. The dragon’s egg is such a beautiful medicine to take back from the site, it shows the land enjoyed your company too, I felt likewise blessed with what I took away:-)
Lol – at the ‘Goodies’! Only people of a certain age will remember watching them as a kid – do you remember Funky gibbon?!
Nice to read more of your thoughts Gwas, I’m very much enjoying you and Kal’s blogs and I’m glad you find my comments interesting. Thank you:-)
Blessings, Liz
Ah – the Funky Gibbon! I’ll have that in my head all day now! 😉 Goodie, goodie yum yum.
Your story about the shaman and the chief’s daughter, and the transformation into the dragon/horse – the wonderful gifts we get given. I read a book from a lady called Grace Cooke ‘The Light in Britain’ It contains a chapter where she relates her visionary experiences at Uffington, and her description of the scene involving the tribe and its rituals is so close to yours that it would make you jump out of your skin! I highly recommend it to you.
I never did do anything with the Dragon’s Egg, except that it helped me recognise a stone on the side of Gastonbury Tor as being such an egg made physical. So many trails off this spiritual path that it’s difficult to follow them all!
Gwas.