Chronos Apollonios' "Home On Olympus"

Another idiosyncratic scene of Aztec human sacrifice to come out of the New World, at left, has interesting features. Those who are versed in such knowledge can easily make the connection between the three jars curiously sitting atop this Aztec temple and the famed oracular vases of the alchemist Artephius, in which the past, present and future are individually displayed, from his eighteenth-century "L’Arte magique d’ Artephius et de Mihinius (Bibloitheque de l’Arsenal, manuscript Nos. 3009 and 2344). The image of Artephius’ jars, at right, and text can also be found in Emile Grillot de Givry, "Illustrated Anthology of Sorcery, Magic and Alchemy" (fig. 291, pg. 308).

Givry notes that "The procedure known as the ‘three vases of Artephius’ is a divinatory method related to the magic mirror, hydromancy, and oinomancy, and summarizes them all." Indeed, not only may such information be yet another solid blow against the tower of propaganda against the ancient Mesoamericans, who may in fact be Artephius’ benefactors here, and whose oracular efforts are usually described fabulously as outlandish, superstitious, or otherwise unsavory, in addition to the apparently fabricated accounts of human sacrifice and other misdeeds, but it may also provide even more clues and creative suggestions to the workings of magic mirrors.

Additional historical accounts of magic mirrors are numerous (Donald Tyson's book, "How to Make and Use a Magic Mirror" published by Llewellyn is an invaluable reference) and again include the kind of medical "divination" that is one of the definitions of Catopromancy; the book by Pauwels/ Bergier, "The Eternal Man", has some good material on magic mirrors also: (pgs. 182-183):

"Other properties are associated to these mirrors. If they are set up in pairs, they transmit images, like television"

In "Lost Cities of the Ancients", Warren Smith writes: "Before you laugh and head for the door, let's check the record. One of the standard works on Pre-Columbian Mayas is 'Incidents of Travel in Central America, Chiapas, and Yucatan' published more than a hundred years ago...The author was John L. Stephens...whose book is still a reference on that region.

Stephens tells of how he found a 'small round building about six feet in height' on a hill above a Mayan city. Inside, 'a pedestal formed of a substance resembling glass, but the precise nature of which has not been ascertained' was found.

Mayan priests gathered in the building when they needed to make a decision. When they were unable to agree, the wisemen consulted an image that appeared on the surface of a 'black, transparent stone!'...

When we travel south to Peru, we find evidence of similar TV-like apparatus. When the Spaniards took the Incan emperor prisoner...the queen consulted the oracles for some glimpse of the future. After a ritual had been completed, the queen was allowed to look on the temple's black mirror...Sir R.F. Burton...mentioned legends of 'black mirrors' in his works.

...when we consult the works of Abbe Brasseur de Bourbourg, the famed old historian of Central America '... a native historian informed me that their ancestors had brought the gift of the visible stone'...'this was done at the time his people were instructed in the arts of civilization.' "

In "We Are Not The First", pgs. 130-131, Andrew Tomas writes, " Down through the centuries folklore and ancient writers mention another marvel of antiquity-"magic mirrors". The Book of Enoch says that Azaziel taught men to make magic mirrors, and according to this belief, distant scenes and people could clearly be seen in them.

Although "Vera Historia" of Lucian is considered to be a fiction (in spite of its name), his description of a magic mirror is interesting..."It was a looking glass of enormous proportions, lying over a well not very deep. Whoever goes down into this well, hears everything that is said upon the earth. And whoever looks in the mirror, sees in it all the cities and nations of the world"...

Maxim Gorky, the celebrated Russian writer, related an amazing experience which is all the more convincing because he was a materialist. Early in this century Gorky met a Hindu yogi in the Caucasus who asked the Russian author if he wanted to see something in his album. Maxim Gorky said he wished to see a picture of India. The Hindu put the album on the writer's knees and asked him to turn the pages. These polished copper sheets depicted beautiful cities, temples, and landscapes of India which Maxim Gorky thoroughly enjoyed. When he finished looking at the pictures, Gorky returned the album to the Hindu. The yogi blew on it and smilingly said: 'Now will you have another look?'

This is how Gorky himself related the end of the story: 'I opened the album and found nothing but blank copper pages without a trace of any pictures!'...

Perhaps even more astonishing were the time-viewing devices in antiquity. Franciscus Piscus in the 'Book of the Six Sciences' outlined the construction of the 'Al Mucheff mirror' according to the laws of perspective and under proper astronomical configurations. It is said that in this mirror one could see a panorama of time."

There is a high degree of association of magic mirrors with birds (Celtic, Aztec) which in general may be a universal magnetic symbol of the past as well.

They may have also been included to affiliate the counter magnetic technology with materialization, in a fashion similar to that of the Gundestrup Cauldron and its markings, which may comically use the theme of flatulence (methane) to communicate that a cauldron or other object capable of materialization optimally targets smaller molecules of waste matter for its matter feed, such as methane and ammonia.

The cauldron indeed does feature a vignette with a fish, the preferred symbol for nitrogenous material such as ammonia, and in a rather peculiar manner suggestive of the artworks of ancient Crete, where their details of dolphins resemble modern diagrams of earth flux coupling and uncoupling, or "zipping" and "unzipping". Such diagrams may reveal a particular manner in which matter is magnetically encouraged to assemble and form a particular object, representing the "intelligent" and "helpful" particles as the dolphins of the same character.

The subject of magic mirrors also caught the attention of Louis Pauwels and Jacques Bergier in "The Eternal Man", which followed their classic, "Morning of the Magicians". In a section on the wonders of ancient Chinese science, they write (pg. 182-183):

"All of the descriptions of scientific development in the first millennium B.C. refer to magic mirrors. Some of these mirrors are supposed to exist in private collections. We do not understand how they were made or what they were used for. They are mirrors which have extremely complicated high reliefs on the back of the looking-glass. When direct sunlight falls on the mirror, the high reliefs, which are separated from the surface by a reflecting glass, become visible. This does not happen in artificial light. The phenomena is scientifically inexplicable.

Other properties are attributed to these magick mirrors. If they are set up in pairs, they transmit images, like television. To the best of our knowledge, no experiment checking this has been made. The UNESCO specialists explain that the properties of these mirrors are de to 'small differences in the curvature' (?) and are rather reticent about their other properties. If it were possible to prove that these mirrors contained printed circuits and formed a method of communication, the existence of advanced technology in ancient China would be proved."

Pauwels and Bergier at the time of the writing are apparently unaware of counter magnetic and unpaired pole technology, but one also cannot rule out various highly advanced microscopic detail in the mirrors contributing to their properties as well without rigorous examination of the particular objects.

In the same work, they also observe (pg. 222) that "The beauties of Catal Huyuk had obsidian mirrors to check their appearance in. The sharp edges of the mirrors were covered with plaster so they would not cut themselves."

Well, okay. But the Romans were known to have pools of water to check their appearance in, and anyone going to the trouble to fashion working mirrors of obsidian shouldn't have any trouble making the edges safe! These crude mirrors may have had sharp edges under the plaster because sharp edges help move and dissipate electrical charges.

Extend the theory in Lust's "The Herb Book" that Charlemagne commanded his subjects to plant houseleeks on rooftops to ward off lighting because the sharp, pointed leaves of the plants acted as lighting arresters, by dissipating electrical charges, to the pagan preoccupation with weapons as ritual tools, and add these sharp edged mirrors to the lot next.

The plaster, too, is eligible to have peculiar properties under the right circumstance. The page on this site, The Magick of Calcium, details but a few of the occult relevancies of calcium, including some occurrences of non-linear or space and time-bending properties, and is not really surprising to find as an inclusion in a mirror that may well be as magickal as any.

In addition to such an obvious example as this from a Mesoamerican Codex, at left, of Moctezuma looking in his magick mirror, whose magnetic properties seem to be symbolized by it's stylization as a head of a bird, between accounts of ominous meteors and Incan tradition which has magic mirrors falling from the sky into the possession of rulers, the meteor which presented "Montezuma" with an omen of ill fortune may be little more than an indicator that his true indicator of omens, a magic mirror, may have been made of a "meteoric" material, likely having iron in its chemistry and magnetic potentials, like so many surviving relics of ancient Middle America.

The same theme is repeated at right, where a meteor is zoomorphocized as a bird, which, by way of thousands of ancient examples, seems to be the universal symbol for magnetism.

The general sense is that the ancients were aware of these things-ancient magical formula call for a magic stone in the skull of a bird obtained by reducing the remains to ashes-quite likely the iron based magnetotactic crystal, which in conjunction with other biological magnets encourages the southward migration of birds- and had mastered the use of what the modern design from Active Research and Development (of Coeur d' Alene, Idaho) in Rex Research's Time infolio, calls "Counter Magnetic Amplification" for communications utilities.

Like birds, magick books also describe toads as potential donors for a "talismanic stone", which in the case of birds we can have good confidence is a magnetotactic crystal. The caption for this woodcut in Grillot de Givry's book in fact reads, "Method of obtaining the talismanic stone from a toads' head. Joahnnes de Cuba, 'Hortis Sanitatis' (Paris, about 1498)."

Such a deed is likely to be largely travesty, since sooner or later one quickly comes to the realization of the nature of the "talismanic stones" as magnets, but such knowledge does serve for survival- if one is hopelessly lost without any other way of accessing a compass, for example.

Depending on the extent of the frog's reputation in this context, the frog may have also served in places as a symbol of magnetism. Any ancient who succeeded in visualizing magnetic flux, as our modern electron holography does for us, might have noted also the resemblance between particles of magnetic flux and the appendages of this creature. Ancient animal symbols for physical forces can be extremely well chosen.

Inevitably classified under "evil spirits", here is a Native American reference which seems to include knowledge of human magnetotactic material of microscopic scale, its chemical composition and its role as an etiological factor in illness:

Memoirs of the American Anthropolical Association #50 1938 "Navaho Classification of Their Song Ceremonials" Leland C. Wyman and Clyde Kluckhohn pg. 3-38 footnote one, pg. 3: "...We also have had the benefit of consulting the Navaho text of the Shooting Chant recorded by Farther Bernard Haile from Blue Eyes of Lukachukai and retranslated by Miss Reichard. (This will be referred to as "Blue Eyes" since the manuscript is unpublished.)...

pg 14-15 "Evil Spirits..." (footnote 32)... footnote 32: "First Man and First Woman are said to cause illness, especially colds, coughs, epidemics, contagious disease. "Well, my grandson, the entire magic of the Thunder People is in your stomach, as is the magic of the Water People. Therefore your appetite is poor. The magic of the Wind and Crystal people and of the Mirage People is in your heat. Consequently sight and hearing are affected. The Snake People cover your body with the magic of fool’s golddust and you are weak..." ("Blue Eyes").

"First Man and First Woman"- People of the most distant past, and "Fool's golddust"... in other words, pyrite or magnetite, the stuff of magic mirrors.