I love mystery. There’s magic in it. Our history as a human race is full of mystery and wonder when you examine history outside the lens of the conventional school text book. The Nazca lines, Teotihuacan, and Easter Island are all mystery locations on my bucket list. I’ve been to Stonehenge a handful of times. I believe nothing is quite as deliciously shrouded in mystery as some of the stone circles dotting Britain’s countryside. These are beautiful reminders in this age of logic and reason and false left-brained superiority that magic is still very much alive and there is still so much we don’t know and understand about our own history. So much room for magic and possibility.
Frank Randall says to Claire in Outlander, “There’s no place on earth with more magic and more superstition mixed into its daily life than the Scottish Highlands.” That’s exactly why I wanted to go. Something was calling to my soul. With an equal mix of Outlander fan obsession, subconscious past life pull and regular wanderlust and curiosity, my family and I headed to the Highlands of Scotland last month. While there, I got the opportunity to visit Clava Cairn with Andy and Diane Nicholson, who run the marvelous tour company, Outlander: The Past Lives Experience. (It was a phenomenal tour, by the way. I’ll tell you all about it in the next few blogs. One just isn’t going to cut it.) As a huge Outlander fan, it was a dream to visit the real Craigh na Dun. About a mile and a half from Culloden Moor, if there were a stone circle that Claire ran to before the Battle of Culloden to go through the stones and return to the twentieth century, this would have been it.
Clava Cairn
When we visited Clava Cairn, it definitely had an aura of mystery surrounding it. It’s a bronze age, pre-historic burial and ceremonial site dating back around 4,000 years. The position of the cairns themselves is in itself quite mysterious. Two stone burial formations align perfectly with the sun during the winter months. Some of the cairns are in position to line up with major astronomical events like the equinox. Symbols relating to the sun and moon are depicted on the stones.
When we went, Diane warned us about the curse of the cairns, bestowed upon anyone who takes any stones from the grounds. There are stories about travelers who post their stolen stones back to the Inverness tourist office with letters detailing their bad luck since taking the stones. I am not one to mess with ancient sacred sites. They’re sacred sites for a reason. And these stories of curses were very familiar, as were many stories in the Highlands. These stories reminded me of Pele’s Curse, bad luck bestowed upon anyone who takes volcanic rocks from Hawaii’s volcanoes by the fire goddess Pele. At one time, the visitor center at Volcano National Park was full of cursed tourist rocks mailed back to the Big Island with letters of the misery and curses incurred by the volcanic rock thief.
Jei attempting to go through the stones
A nerd to the core, I researched the standing stones after our visit to learn that they are the subject of countless conspiracy theories and mysteries. Locals have suggested theories about aliens. One wildly fascinating theory is that Clava Cairn is a time portal to another dimension. Not too much of a stretch to see how Claire fell through a portal back to the eighteenth century in Outlander.
If the stones are a portal to another time or space, tonight of all nights would be the night it is most open – the night the veil is the thinnest. Samhain. This is the night the ghosts of the dead and spirits from the otherworld were thought to return to the earth realm. It’s also the night Claire fell through the stones in the Outlander TV series.
Samhain is considered by many to be the most important day of the Celtic Year – it’s the Celtic New Year. The Celtic year was divided into two halves – light and dark. Samhain is the fire festival that marks the beginning of the dark half of the year. It’s situated between the autumn equinox and the winter solstice. It marks the end of the harvest and is the symbol of change and death. Predictions for the coming year would be made on this night, as it was believed that the veil between worlds was thin.
If you’re enjoying the Halloween festivities, you’re following the legacy of the ancient Celts with the festival of Samhain. Samhain became the Halloween we’re familiar with when Christian missionaries changed the religious practices of the Celtic people. Dressing up in costume, playing pranks and handing out offerings all have their roots in Samhain.
Split stone at Clava Cairn
Happy Halloween / Samhain! If you’re venturing near stone circles, be careful tonight.
