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And this is more of a series of strange coincidences than any formal questing or research but it kind of has a neat symmetry about it that I like. After this I will hopefully get a chance to look back over all the recent posts and start contributing a bit more to the other threads. Thanks to Yuri, Vyxen and Supernaturalist for keeping the show going!
One Friday earlier this year, I went to drop off some graphic samples to a company that is making exhibition cabinets for us at work. They are based in High Wycombe and when I plotted the route on the AA website, it told me to come off the M40 at Junction 3 to get to these people. I did this but it brought me all the way through the eastern suburbs of Wycombe and out the other side so I decided to not go back through the town and try and hit Junction 4 of the M40 by continuing westward.
In the event I never did find Junction 4 but ended up rejoining the motorway at Junction 5. However, my new route took me through “Old Wycombe” and I noticed intriguing signs to the “Hellfire Caves”. I clocked this away and decided to look them up on the internet when I got home.
The very next day I went to Midhurst to talk to a man about a carpet. On the way back to the car my wife popped into a butcher’s shop. I stayed outside with the children. As I loitered in the butcher’s carpark a man came from the nearby wine shop and loaded a case of wine into the boot of his car. I was shocked to see that the name of the wine was “Thelema Mountain” as I associated “Thelema” with Aleister Crowley and I wouldn’t have thought that this would have been very meaningful to your average wine drinker.
Anyway, when I got home I searched for this vineyard on the internet and quickly found it along with the whole background to their name. I was interested to see that Crowley wasn’t the person who invented Thelema nor the famous dictum “Do what thou wilt…” but that he had lifted it (possibly indirectly as we shall see below) from a sixteenth century Catholic priest called Francois Rabelais.
The following Monday I was doing a major tidy of my study at home. I came across an old “magazine on CD” that I had purchased a couple of years ago called Duat Magazine. This was such a success that the first edition ws the only edition (although another is threatened “soon”). I wondered if there was any material on there that I could use for this website and scanned through the contents. Whilst looking through the magazine I found an article that I had never seen before by a lady called Robin Crookshank Hilton.
This captured my imagination sufficiently that I was moved to perform a quick search on the colourful Robin. I discovered that she was now the UK Editor-in-chief of Phenomenon Magazine (which briefly owned The Daily Grail, but that’s a whole other trail…). Her most recent article (at the time), entitled “From Hellfire to Hieros Gamos” was all about the Hellfire Caves in Wycombe and its associated “gentleman’s club” created by Sir Francis Dashwood.
Sir Francis appears to be the link in the chain between Francois Rabelais and Aleister Crowley, taking inspiration from the former and inspiring the latter.
Anyone know anything more about these Caves?
I cobbled the following from a subscription only article by Michael Howard on [url:1322weev]http://www.mysterymag.com[/url], Howard having himself culled the info from various books.
The “Hellfire Caves” are of prehistoric origin. It is alleged that there was a ‘pagan altar’ on West Wycombe Hill with ‘pagan catacombs’ below. Tradition says that in the Middle Ages an attempt was made to build a church at the bottom of the hill, but every night the building work was destroyed. Eventually the priest heard a voice telling him to build on top of the hill, which presumably he did, and all was well after that. Another local legend says that a secret tunnel leads from the caves to St Lawrence’s church (which I presume is the church on top of the hill).
Around 1750 Sir Francis Dashwood enlarged the caves to be used by the group (which he founded in 1746) that later became popularly known as the “Hellfire Club”, but was actually called variously The Friars of St Francis of Wycombe, The Monks of Medmenham, or The Order of Knights of West Wycombe. In 1751 Dashwood paid for the church to be restored, modelling it after the solar temple at Palmyra, and also donating a font with a ‘Gnostic’ design featuring a snake devouring its tail and some doves. Also in 1751 he leased Medmenham Abbey on the Thames near Marlow (originally a 12th century Cistercian Abbey, converted into a Tudor Manor house after Henry VIII’s smash and grab on the monasteries) and made it the headquarters for his Order; he placed the motto “Do as thou will” above the front door. At his own house at West Wycombe Dashwood built a Temple of Bacchus. The whole of West Wycombe is now owned by The National Trust, and presumably open for visitors.
What Dashwood and his Friars got up to is the subject of much local legend and speculation, generally along the lines of devil-worship and drunken orgies. However, it may have been the case that at least some of the members were involved in a pagan mystery cult. If I may quote Howard:
Quote:In fact it seems to have been an open secret among the members of the Establishment which Dashwood and his friends belonged to. When Sir Francis became Chancellor, one of his first actions was to tax cider. This led to the circulation of rhyme, saying: “Dashwood shall pour from a communion cup / libations to the goddess without eyes / and hot or not in cider and excise”. This was a pointed reference to the goddess Angerona.A painting was also done of Dashwood depicting him dressed in a monk’s habit and kneeling to worship a statue of Venus. One of the leading members, John Wilkes, gave the game away when he said “No profane eye has dared to penetrate the English Eleusinian Mysteries of the Chapter Room (the inner sanctum) where the monks assembled on solemn occasions .. secret rites performed and libations to the Bona Dea”. The latter was, of course, the title of the Great Mother Goddess in the classical Mysteries.
Dashwood appears to have been an interesting character, aside from holding a number of important government posts (including Chancellor of the Exchequer). Like many young gentry he had done the Grand Tour, during which he had met Prince Charles Edward Stuart and got involved with the Jacobites. The Prince is believed to have had a number of Rosicrucian or Masonic connections, and Dashwood was himself initiated into a Masonic lodge in Florence. Back in England he had joined (before or after Howard doesn’t say) the Society of Gentlemen of Spalding, whose members included Chief Druid, Dr Rev William Stukeley. Dashwood also joined the Mount Haemus grove of druids, which claimed descent from a 13th century druidic grove established in Oxford, which itself claimed connections with the Mysteries of Ceridwen, allegedly still practised at that time in the Snowdonia region of North Wales.
Howard’s references are:
‘The Hellfire Club’ Donald McCormack (Jarrolds 1958)
‘The Hellfire club’ P. Mannix (Four Square 1961)
‘Sword of Wisdom’ Ithell Colquoun (Neville Spearman 1970)
‘Dashwood: The Man and the Myth’ Eric Towers (Crucible 1986)All looks well worth following up!
Simon wrote:I was shocked to see that the name of the wine was “Thelema Mountain” as I associated “Thelema” with Aleister Crowley and I wouldn’t have thought that this would have been very meaningful to your average wine drinker.Hi Simon
Just to tangent on this, Thelema Mountain Vineyards is local to me in South Africa, and they are Thelemic in the Rabelais tradition of that word…
It’s also very nice wine!
See here
Hi Adamastor, that link was interesting. I didn’t realise that Crowley lifted the idea for his own Abbey of Thelema directly from Rabelais’ story. That’s what it looks like anyway.
Does anyone know what happened to the site of Crowley’s Abbey?
On a completely personal note, I think South African wines are gorgeous. I never remember the labels, but you can always trust them.
Adamastor, why don’t you say a few things about yourself and what you’re interested in and/or what you’re up to in the ‘Let me introduce myself’ section of the forums.
Thanks for the feedback, guys. Adamastor, the Thelema Wine is pretty expensive over here so if you kow a cheap way of shipping some over I’d be very interested
. I had a bottle of their white which was excellent but I haven’t managed to get my hands on a red yet. You could probably make quaffing a bottle a nice part of a Questing sketch – maybe drink a bottle or two in the Hellfire Caves and see what happens. 
Re Supernaturalist’s question on what happened to Crowley’s abbey. As far as i know it still stands on the hillside just on the outskirts of Cefalu. I saw a film about Crowley just a few years back in which a researcher went there. There were still traces of Crowley’s infamous murals, although not as much left as when Kenneth Anger made his film of the abbey many years earlier. The place is in a much delapidated state and i’ve heard that the landowner is not particularly keen on visitors there.
supernaturalist wrote:On a completely personal note, I think South African wines are gorgeous. I never remember the labels, but you can always trust them.Adamastor, why don’t you say a few things about yourself and what you’re interested in and/or what you’re up to in the ‘Let me introduce myself’ section of the forums.
Always good to know our wines are appreciated! Unfortunately due to the prohibitive cost of import I dont get to have much else.
Will do, though I am not currently questing per se.
Cheers!
Simon, the merlot is luverly! I steeped some lemon balm in the white to make Wine of Melissa, it was delicious. Hehe drinking a bottle or two in the caves would certainly be getting into the spirit of things.
Some pics of the Abbey of Thelema here:
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Parthen … bbey2.html
Thanks Adamastor, nice pics. It looks nothing like I imagined; as though one expects to find a church to be a building with a tower and so-on, and discovering it’s just a converted hall.
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