The Ancient Legacy of the Ring and the Grail

From the earliest of Sumerian and Scythian times, over 5,000 years ago, the abiding symbol of wholeness, unity and eternity was the Ring. In those days, the kings-of-kings were also styled Ring Lords by virtue of their Rings of office which symbolised divinely inspired justice. They were golden circlets which, as time progressed, were often worn as head-bands - ultimately to become crowns.

Realm of the Ring Lords - Lecture

As depicted in numerous reliefs, the Ring was a primary device of the Anunnaki gods, who were recorded as having descended into ancient Sumer and were responsible for the establishment of municipal government and kingly practice. In view of this, it is of particular relevance that, when the author J.R.R. Tolkien was asked, in the 1960s, about the Middle-earth environment of his book trilogy The Lord of the Rings, he said that he perceived its setting to relate to about 4000 BC.

Tolkien was an Oxford professor of Anglo-Saxon language and, in this regard, the root of his popular tale was extracted directly from Saxon folklore. Indeed, the early Saxon god Wotan (Odin) was said to have ruled the Nine Worlds of the Rings - having the ninth (the One Ring) to govern eight others.

As the generations passed from those ancient times, the ideal of dynastic kingship spread through the Mediterranean lands into the Balkans, the Black Sea regions and Europe. But, in the course of this, the crucial essence of the old wisdom was diluted and this gave rise to dynasties that were not of the original kingly race. Instead, many were unrelated warrior chiefs who gained their thrones by might of the sword.

The oldest complete version of the Ring Cycle comes from the Norse mythology of the Volsunga Saga. Compiled from more than forty separate legends, this Icelandic tale relates to the god Odin, to the kingdom of the Nine Worlds and to a dark forest called Mirkwood - a name later repeated by Tolkien in The Lord of the Rings. It tells of how Prince Sigmund of the Volsung dynasty is the only warrior able to pull the great sword of Odin from a tree in which the god had driven it to its hilt - as replicated in the Arthurian story of the sword and the stone. Additionally, we learn of the water-dwarf Andarvi, whose magical One Ring of red-gold could weave great wealth and power for its master - precisely as depicted in all related Ring legends.

Contemporary with the Volsunga Saga was a similar tale which appeared in and around Burgundy in the 1200s: a German epic called The Nibelungenlied. In this account, which follows a similar path, the hero is called Siegfried and the tale is given a knightly gloss of the Gothic era, while unfortunately losing some of the pagan enchantment of the Northern legend.

In ancient Sumer, the Anunnaki were said to have governed by way of a Grand Assembly of nine Councillors who sat at Nippur. The nine consisted of eight members (seven males and a female), who held the Rings of divine justice, along with their president, Anu, who held the One Ring to bind them all. This conforms precisely with the nine kingdoms of the Volsunga Saga, which cites Odin as the ultimate presidential Ring Lord.

In recent times there have been some astonishing archaeological discoveries which now prove that Sumerian was not the first written language as is commonly portrayed. Also that the Sumerian culture (generally held to be the earliest cradle of civilization) had an older origin in the Balkans, specifically in Transylvania and the Carpathian regions.

The earliest type of Mesopotamian writing, which preceded the strictly wedge-shaped Sumerian cuneiform, is known to be a little over 5,500 years old. It was found at Uruk in Sumer and at Jemdat Nasr, between Baghdad and Babylon, where the Oxford Assyriologist, Stephen Langdon, made numerous important discoveries in 1925. But, around thirty years ago a more significant find was subsequently made beneath the ancient village of Tartaria in Romania. Here were found clay tablets inscribed with a form of script which Carbon-14 dating and strata positioning have revealed to be more than 1,000 years older than the earliest Sumerian writings.

That was not the only surprise, however, for the Tartarian symbols were practically identical to those which emerged later in Mesopotamia. - and it was discovered that the very name of Ur (the capital of Sumer) came from the Scythian word Ur, meaning Lord. Not only that, but the name of Enki is clearly defined on one tablet in an identical form to that subsequently used in Sumer. Hence, it became very apparent that the Anunnaki culture was far more widespread than had previously been thought.

Another significant discovery was made high in the Altai Mountains between Siberia and Mongolia. There, preserved by the severe cold since the distant BC years, was found a Scythian burial mound, where the bodies of ancient chieftains, together with their horses, clothing and possessions had all been remarkably preserved from decay.

These were the people who, in the Black Sea steppe lands, first domesticated the horse in about 4000 BC. Consequently, the extent of their travels through the centuries and their influence on the various indigenous cultures is most impressive. It ranges geographically from Hungary and Romania, north into the Russian steppes and Siberia, eastwards across the Ukraine and Anatolia (modern Turkey), south into Syria and Mesopotamia, and still further east into Mongolia, Tibet and the Chinese border country.

Digging first commenced at the Altai site in 1927, but it was not until 1947 that the richest mound containing six separate tombs was discovered and the various bodies found. They were preserved not only by the extreme cold of the region, but also by skilled embalming. There was hair on their heads, but their brains had been removed, along with other internal organs (just as in Egyptian mummification).

Some way south of the Altai site, in the northern foothills of the Himalayas, are the centres of Hami, Loulan and Churchen. It was close to these places, nestling in the Tarim Basin below Mongolia, to the north of Tibet, that a number of similar discoveries were made as recently as 1994. Unlike the intensely cold climate of the Altai Mountains, this lower region of the Central Asian desert is quite different, as a result of which the bodies were preserved in the perfectly dry air, coupled with moisture-absorbing salt beds and, again, expert mummification.

Dated at around 4,000 years old, these interred men, women and children have undermined all the established history teaching of the area, which previously stated that no one of their type arrived there until about 120 BC. But there they were from 2,000 years earlier at the time of Abraham, when Egyptian pharaohs such as Tutankhamun and Ramesses the Great were more than 500 years into the future. These mummies, although contemporary with the mummies of ancient Egypt, are actually far better preserved.

Like their Romanian counterparts, the Himalayan mummies are of impressive stock, with light skin, auburn hair and pale eyes. The leather and woollen clad men stood at least 6-feet, 6-inches and upwards, while even the women were over 6-feet tall. Undoubtedly, these forebears of the Gaelic High Kings were among the most formidable warriors of their time, and their use of finely woven tartan cloth serves as identifiable proof of the plaid designs which they eventually brought into Ireland and Scotland.

From the 1st century, the Ring Lord culture fell into decline when various Roman emperors decreed that the Messianic heirs (the descendants of Jesus and his family) should be hunted down and put to the sword. This fact was recorded by eminent chroniclers such as Hegesippus, Africanus and Eusebius. Then, once the Roman Church was operative from the 4th century, the sacred dynasty was forever damned by the bishops.

It was this formal damnation which led to such events as the Albigensian Crusade in 1209 and the subsequent Catholic Inquisitions - for these brutal assaults by the papal machine were specifically directed against the upholders and champions of the original concept of Grail kingship, as against the style of pseudo-monarchy which had been implemented by the Bishops of Rome.

In practical terms, Church kingship has prevailed from the 8th century and has continued, through the ages, to the present day. But the fact is that, under strict terms of sovereign practice, all such monarchies and their affiliated governments have been invalid.

Church kingship is precisely that with which we have become so familiar. It applies to all monarchs who achieve their regnal positions by way of Church coronation by the Pope or other Christian leader (in Britain, by the Archbishop of Canterbury). Previously, in terms of true kingship, there was no necessity for coronation because kingly and queenly inheritance were always regarded as being 'in the blood'.

The change was made possible by way of a text called the Donation of Constantine - a document which led to just about every social injustice that has since been experienced in the Christian world. When the Donation made its first appearance in 751, it was alleged to have been written by Emperor Constantine some 400 years earlier, although strangely never produced in the interim. It was even dated and carried his supposed signature. What the document proclaimed was that the Emperor's appointed Pope was Christ's personally elected representative on Earth. He had the power to 'create' kings as his subordinates since his palace ranked above all the palaces in the world.

The provisions of the Donation were enacted by the Vatican, whereupon the Merovingian Kings of the Grail bloodline in Gaul were deposed and a whole new puppet-dynasty was supplemented by way of a family of hitherto mayors. They were dubbed Carolingians and their only king of any significance was the legendary Charlemagne. By way of this strategy, the whole nature of monarchy changed from being an office of community guardianship to one of absolute rule and, by virtue of this monumental change, the long-standing code of princely service was forsaken as European kings became servants of the Church instead of being servants of the people.

The fact is, however, that over 500 years ago in the Renaissance era, proof emerged that the Donation was an outright forgery. Its New Testament references relate to the Latin Vulgate Bible - an edition translated and compiled by St. Jerome, who was not born until AD 340, some 26 years after Constantine supposedly signed the document! Apart from that, the language of the Donation, with its numerous anachronisms in form and content, is that of the 8th century and bears no relation to the writing style of Constantine's day. But the truly ridiculous aspect is that the Donation's overwhelming dictate, which cemented the Pope as the supreme spiritual and temporal head of Christendom, has prevailed regardless.

Victimized prior to the formal Church Inquisition in the Middle Ages were the Cathars of the Languedoc region in the South of France. The Cathars were fully conversant with the Ring Lord culture and, in accordance with tradition, referred to the Messianic bloodline as the Elven Race, venerating them as the Shining Ones.

In the language of old Provence, a female elf was an 'albi', and Albi was the name given to the main Cathar centre in Languedoc. This was in deference to the matrilinear heritage of the Grail dynasty, for the Cathars were supporters of the Albi-gens - the elven bloodline which had descended through the Grail queens such as Lilith, Miriam, Bathsheba and Mary Magdalene. It was for this reason that, when Simon de Montfort and the armies of Pope Innocent III decimated the region from 1209, it was called the Albigensian Crusade.

The concept of calling the original princely race the Shining Ones, while also defining them as 'elves', dates well back into ancient Bible times and can be traced into Mesopotamia and Palestine. The ancient word El, which was used to identify a god or lofty-one (as in El Elyon and El Shaddai) actually meant Shining in old Mesopotamian Sumer. To the north in Babylonia, the derivative Ellu meant Shining One, while in Saxony and Britain it became Elf.

The concept of fairies was born directly from the Ring Lord culture and, deriving from the Greek word 'phare', the term related to a Great House, from which also stemmed the designation 'pharaoh'. In the Gaelic world, certain royal families were said to carry the fairy blood - that is to say, the fate or destiny of the Grail bloodline and of humankind at large. Meanwhile, the elf-maidens of the Albi-gens were the designated guardians of the earth, starlight and forest. It is for these reasons that fairies and elves have so often been portrayed as shoemakers and lamplighters, for the fairy cobblers made the shoes which measured the steps of life, while the Shining Ones of the elven race were there to light the way.

In national terms (although fairies present a widespread image), they are particularly associated with Ireland, where they are epitomized by the ancient people of the Tuatha Dé Danann. This formidable king tribe was, nevertheless, mythologized by the Christian monks, who rewrote the majority of Irish history to suit their own Church's vested interest in Ireland.

From a base of the monastic texts, which arose onwards from medieval times, it is generally stated that the Tuatha Dé Danann were the supernatural tribe of the agricultural goddess Danaë of Argos, but their true name (rendered in its older form) was Tuadhe d'Anu - the people (or tribe) of Anu, the great sky god of the Anunnaki.

Onwards from the year 751, the Church sought all possible measures to diminish the status of any royal strain emanating from the original Ring Lords so that the fraudulent Donation of Constantine could be brought into play. Henceforth, only the subjugative Church could determine who was a king, while the elves and fairies of the Albi-gens were manoeuvred from the forefront of history into a realm of apparent fantasy and legend.

Settling in Ireland from about 800 BC, the noble Tuadhe d'Anu hailed from the Central European lands of Scythia, which stretched from the Carpathian mountains and Transylvanian Alps, across to the Russian River Don. They were strictly known as the Royal Scyths and they were said to be the masters of a transcendent intellect called the Sidhé, which was known to the druids as the Web of the Wise.

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