1961 Magazine Fall 2016

SPOTLIGHT
in Caithness. I used 18th century maps and pin-pointed
areas that he couldn’t possibly have been buried because
of flooding etc. This left me with a short list of places
where Rivach could have been buried.
Photo by Kinda Phillips
The trouble with my field is relics and antiquities are
often buried within churches, temples, mosques or holy
sites. So often we can’t get to the treasures themselves
even if we think we’re right. But like in life in general,
it’s the journey itself that’s the adventure, such was
the case with the Stone of Destiny, the ancient king
making stone of the Scots and Irish. By following a
trail of clues from location to location we eventually
found a trap door, hidden under a rug on the floor of
a church where the king making stone was once kept.
When we opened the door we found a rectangular
black stone that perfectly matched the description
of the Stone of Destiny, precisely where it had been
kept for hundreds of years.
Q: Please share with us the significance your Murdo Rivach
discoveries and the stones with natural holes.
A: Murdo Rivach was recorded as being a wizard in
13th century Scotland. He was believed to have been
sent to Caithness by Hugh Ross, of Sutherland, in an
effort to collect rent from people living on his lands.
Local people didn’t take kindly to the wizards demands
and they beheaded him. Legends say he was buried in
a circular grave somewhere at the end of Loch Watten
I followed the clues to the East end of Loch Watten
and I found a 25-meter circular impression in a field. I
went right to the centre of the circle and pulled back
a lump of grass, and there it was, as plain as day, a
stone with several holes in it. I immediately knew this
was a stele. In those times people would find stones
with holes in them that would be formed naturally,
especially if they looked like a face. They would chip
at them to enhance the faces. The more it looked like
a face the more powerful it was believed to be. These
so called Holy Stones, were believed to ward off evil
spirits or sometimes attract them. I’ve analyzed the
stone with the help of an engineer and discovered
that it actually has 2 faces. A very common practice
of witchcraft. Now it is accepted that this circle was
the exact location of his burial. The amazing thing is
that it’s located about 250 meters from my mom and
dad’s back door.
Q: What’s your take on mystic prophets and sorcerers
throughout history? They are noted as people with amazing
abilities who possessed great powers, who do you think
they were?
A: I can answer that for you very simply. Around 4000
BC farming began to take hold all over the world.
For hundreds of thousands of years, we were hunter
gathers, but farming settled people at one location all
year round. The people in ancient cultures who knew
the cycle of the sun, the moon and the stars were held
in high regard
These keepers of time controlled the ritual calendars of
the people and as such they had great power over the
masses. History books tell stories of powerful priests
who could predict lunar eclipses, but would claim that
evil forces were going to come and eat the sun, kill
their crops. Astronomy was presented as magic, since
the dawn of farming.
12
Fall 2016 1961 Magazine