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Post by taylorsman on Feb 6, 2005 19:46:52 GMT
Yes I can see the script. A group of American KTs (after all they are said to have refered to a land called "La Merica") led by Leonardo di Caprio land in Scotland to assist Robert the Bruce (played by Sean Connery) to defeat Edward II (Julian Clary) at Bannockburn. ;D
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Post by middlepillar on Feb 6, 2005 20:24:39 GMT
Where is Mel Gibson for goodness sake? ;D
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Post by whistler on Feb 6, 2005 20:51:34 GMT
These puns have got to be the worst yet ;D As Robert Burns is buried 7 miles down the road in Dumfries I wonder if we could involve him. Also Thomas Carlisle's home town is again about seven miles down the road at Eccelfechan. Leave it with me and I'll dream something up. And I thought he was buried under his statue in Dunedin
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Post by taylorsman on Feb 6, 2005 21:20:53 GMT
Hold on MP, isn't he an Aussie? ;D
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Post by billmcelligott on Feb 8, 2005 3:27:09 GMT
The following article appeared in the last edition of The Sunday Times.
THE KIRKWALL SCROLL – PRICELESS RELIC OR MASONIC ARTISTRY?
By Kath Gourlay
For Orkney freemasons, references to the Kirkwall Scroll on national television this week meant an end to the brief period of relative peace since their ancient floorcloth first hit the headlines.
“That’s put us in the spotlight for the loony brigade again” said a disgruntled Lodge member, after Thursday’s screening of the Channel 4 documentary ‘The Real Da Vinci Code,’ where pictures of the Scroll formed part of the background research being done by Tony Robinson into ‘Grail Trail’ mania.
The brothers of Kirkwall Kilwinning are fiercely protective of the 18ft-long roll of ancient sailcloth that has seen out the 18th, 19th, and 20th centuries, hanging undisturbed in their Kirkwall lodge. The Kirkwall Scroll became part of the present day media circus five years ago, through claims that it was a mediaeval treasure second in value only to the 13th Century Mappa Mundi hanging in Hereford Cathedral.
Not only that, but it was said to hold the key to unlocking ancient knowledge taken by Knights Templars from the Holy Land during the Crusades and passed on into freemasonry for safekeeping by the St Clairs of Roslin. The prime mover and shaker behind all this was Dr Andrew Sinclair from the history department of Churchill College Cambridge, who examined the Scroll, obtained threads for carbon 14-dating, and estimated its value to be in excess of £4 million.
Andrew Sinclair isn’t just a Cambridge academic. His family history is tied up with the St Clairs of Roslin, and William St Clair, the builder of Rosslyn Chapel, was also Earl of Orkney during the 15th Century. Dr Sinclair believes that the scroll was taken from the scriptorium at Rosslyn Castle to Orkney. The brethren of Lodge Kirkwall Kilwinning say ‘no way.’ They have written documentation to say it’s a floorcloth gifted to them in 1796.
An uneasy silence has descended since the initial publicity, during which time Dr Sinclair has produced a book, ‘The Secret Scroll’, confidently setting out his case, and the brothers of Kirkwall Kilwinning have stashed the scroll in a bank vault.
Now masonic historian Bob Cooper is equally confident that if his latest research on the Kirkwall Scroll results in a court case, then his head is not the one about to roll. Cooper’s views have been fuelled by his current work on what he describes as ‘the oldest masonic ritual in the world.’ It’s Scottish, he says, and insists there’s no doubt it predates the Kirkwall Scroll.
As Curator of the Museum and Library of the Grand Lodge of Scotland in Edinburgh, Cooper’s conclusion - that the artefact is not mediaeval and has no connection with the Holy Grail or even the St Clair Earls of Orkney and Roslin – will be heartily welcomed at Kirkwall Kilwinning, if not greeted with unbounded enthusiasm by the author of ‘The Secret Scroll.’<br> Lodge members are rallying behind Cooper’s findings, uniting in the belief that Sinclair cannot prove his claims, and if it came to a legal battle the Kirkwall Scroll would remain the property of the Lodge. They’re also largely confident that now his book is on the shelves, his claims of the Scroll being family property will die down.
Not so. This spring, Dr Sinclair is about to produce the third book in his Rosslyn trilogy, which will back up his theories on the Kirkwall Scroll.
For a start, he says, radio carbon dating of two fibre samples taken from the fabric has shown an 87 per cent probability the middle section dates back to the 15th Century. The carbon-14 dating done by the same Oxford laboratory that proved the Turin Shroud a fake is used worldwide to authenticate artefacts and he sees no reason to doubt their findings.
“Why?” says Cooper “it’s a well known fact that radiocarbon dating is essentially for calculating the age of things in thousands of years, not hundreds. The results translate into a very wide range.” Dr Sinclair concedes that the side panels of the Scroll include biblical depictions which he puts down to an 18th century attempt at mollifying the religious elements of the time. Overpainting was done there, he says, to hide evidence of Templar symbols because freemasonry had been taken over by the Hanoverian Kings of England.
“18th Century iconography was added down the margins, which I believe was originally a Templar strip map of the 5th and 7th crusades. I also agree it was probably used as an 18th Century floorcloth, but the depiction of the hermaphrodite Adam and Eve in the middle section, showing a gnostic scene of paradise is much older, and has not been over-painted.”<br> That is of great significance, he says.
“Underneath it are dozens of masonic and Templar emblems, and the whole artefact is unique in terms of Templar history.”<br> What has amazed Philip Clark – executive producer of Thursday’s Channel 4 programme – was what he describes as ‘the utter conviction with which people conjured up fantastic stories to fit their own hypotheses’ when it came to Grail theories.
“In so many instances there was not a shred of evidence, and there was inevitably a book involved.”<br> The Kirkwall Scroll was no exception, he adds dryly.
Cooper agrees the Scroll’s middle section is the one of masonic significance. Except, he argues, the masonic symbols on the central panel weren’t in use before the 18th century.
“That’s the trouble when academics who are not freemasons try to make historical claims without knowing what lies behind the symbols. Freemasonry, as we know it today, didn’t exist in mediaeval times. Scottish stonemasons carved symbols but they weren’t these symbols – and they’re certainly not Templar in origin.”<br> Cooper insists that exhaustive research has shown the Knights Templar branch of freemasonry only came in during the 18th century to encourage the patronage of the landed gentry who would not want to be associated with stonemasons and trade guilds.
“People like Robert Cooper are researching Hanoverian archives” argues Sinclair. “All Catholic archives were destroyed, and the evidence of the past – masonic and otherwise - with its Catholic links disappeared. It was treason to have these documents after Culloden.”<br> The library at Rosslyn was burnt four times by Protestant mobs from Edinburgh, he adds for good measure.
Another important point, he adds, is that the architects behind the early abbeys, monasteries and churches brought in craftsmen from the continent. He refers to Sir David Brewster who wrote ‘The History of Freemasonry’ and names the de Morville family - who granted lands to Templars at the time of the building of Kilwinning Abbey in the 12th Century - as paving the way for later freemasonry.
Meanwhile, the minutes of Lodge Kirkwall Kilwinning from 27th January 1786 clearly detail the presentation of a floorcloth by a local merchant, William Graeme. He was a painter by trade, and deeply into ancient masonic rites.
Which brings in Dr Robert Lomas, also a freemason and author of the best selling but often controversial ‘Hiram Key’ books. A frequent visitor to Orkney, Lomas went to see the Kirkwall Scroll for himself. His research favours the Graeme connection, but in his forthcoming offering ‘Turning the Hiram Key’ he explores the possibility of Graeme finding the floorcloth in Aberdeen (which as a merchant he would have visited.) Lomas believes the radiocarbon dating – which he claims can now be done using accurately calibrated dendrochronology techniques – to have a one in twenty chance of not being accurate when it dates the central panel as being 15th or early 16th century.
This, he reckons could tie in with a written reference in 1483 of Aberdeen ‘burgh council’ settling a dispute between ‘six masownys of the lurge’ and proves, he says, that there was a stonemasons lodge there at that time. Lomas suggests that Graeme could have overpainted areas when the cloth came in his possession later, but he also speculates that the crude style of painting on the central panel could have been done by operative masons working the teaching rituals learned during itinerant jobs…possibly during the building of places like Rosslyn Chapel?
The tale looks set to spin a while yet, but a recent visit to Lodge Kirkwall Kilwinning by an international textile expert doing research on floorcloths has proved interesting. Sarah Randel, the Vice Principal of the University of Sydney’s Sancta Sophia College, asked to see the Kirkwall Scroll during a study tour of Europe and America – and vindicated local historian David Partner, a Past Master of the Lodge.
‘This woman had no axe to grind; she just took one look at it and said, “Floorcloth. Iconography doesn’t predate the 18th Century, and material lines could indicate folds in a single piece of cloth.”
In his own research Partner said he’d uncovered some ‘cardinal errors’ in Sinclair’s knowledge of the crusades – which caused him to query other dubious points. “He warned us not to say anything in public until his ‘Secret Scroll’ book was published or he would sue us. Well the book’s published now, and we’re saying it, so he can crack on.”<br>
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Post by symbol on Feb 13, 2005 13:55:44 GMT
Thanks once again all for posts. It seems that avenue has come to an end for , for me. Every week i seem to find another door then another way to shut it.
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