An Expose of Geomantic Alignments in Dublin City
St. Audeon's church is the only medieval parish left in Dublin City and is situated behind the old city walls. As you might expect, there are a number of old legends and superstitions –some wholesome and some not so – concerning this most ancient part of Dublin. One tradition stated that the first person through the city gates on New Years Day, which was usually a woman, would also be the first to be married that year. A much darker tradition was carried out in front of a great stone portal, which lies just inside the main gate, known as one of the 5 Gateways to the Underworld. In days gone by, women would carry their unwanted or unbaptised babies down into this passageway and leave them there for the chruch to deal with. The doorway was eventually bricked up, many hundreds of years ago, because of this practice. But the legends still remain.
I wondered where the other gateways to the Underworld might be located, and assuming that they must all be located around Dublin City proper, I went in search of information about them. I am well aware that there are numerous underground walkways and waterways about the city, some of which were used to transport goods and alcohol to the various taverns, but I could not find anymore information about where these entrances might be located, and more importantly, which of them lead to the realms of the dead.
I have already discussed the occult significance of the counties of Ireland and how they relate to the Lesser Banishing Ritual of the Pentagram (LBRP) in Magical Traditions. So, it seemed likely to me that if these other gateways did indeed exist they too might be arranged in the form of a pentagram. Armed with this I set about making lines across maps of the city and discovered something interesting. These are my findings;
To begin with we need to understand a little about the meaning of the pentagram, its use in ritual and its related alchemical symbolism. The five points of the pentagram each represent a different classical elements. These are; earth, air, fire, water and spirit. The pentagram in LBRP is used by initiates to banish unwanted or demonic forces. To do this the initiate, either using their finger or the blade of a dagger, would draw the pentagram symbol in the air. They would start at the bottom left hand corner, carry their way on up to the top point and then down and around in a clockwise manner. Each point on the pentagram also has an associated symbolic meaning such that;
Earth = Truth
Spirit = Power
Fire = Knowledge
Air = Love
Water = Wisdom
Assuming that important landmarks are going to appear at each of the 5 points of our star, we can see that Trinity College lies on the same latitude as St. Audeon's and would therefore correspond to Fire. This is acceptable because Trinity College is obviously a place of learning, and therefore knowledge. St. Audeon's corresponds to the characteristic of Truth (Earth) presumably because of the religious Truth implicit in Christ the Saviour.
So far so good.
However, when we try to connect these two points together at the apex of Spirit, things take an unexpected turn. For here we find the Mater hospital. The Mater Hospital is an important hospital in Dublin with a large mortuary. It is easy to see why it should be thought of as the 2nd gateway to the Underworld, as it is through these doors that many Dubliners have passed through after death. Like any hospital it is also services by a large network of tunnels, which might very well extend under the city.

'Mater' is of course Latin for Mother, i.e. Mother of God the Virgin Mary, but it can also be interpreted to mean simply 'matter', as in the base material world. The symbol for Spirit is a circle, whereas the symbol for base matter (or salt) is a circle with a line through it. This seems to suggest that matter is the negation of Spirit. Does this mean that the creators of the geomantic pentagram, whoever they may be, are trying to replace Spirit with Matter? And if so, why?
The loss of Spirit from the zenith is a common theme in Judeo-Christian belief systems, showing the fall of man into the material realms. William Blake also made diagrams showing how Urizen (reason) fell from the zenith to the nadir and was replaced by Urthoma (matter, opacity). The famous Irish poet William Butler Yeats wrote extensively about these diagrams, which he assumed to be under some kind of eternal, or infernal, rotation. What William Blake is really describing is the fall of Lucifer from heaven and the creation of Heaven and Hell, Good and Evil.
Having already touched on Trinity College and the Fire/Knowledge element we can go directly to the fourth element: Air. And this is where things get really weird. The left hand point of the pentagram aligns with the corner of the Richmond District Lunatic Asylum. Also known as the lower house or the female house, the now derelict building is located at the end of the curved and lonely Morning Star Avenue. The Morning Star is associated with Venus, the Goddess of Beauty, as well as Lucifer, and is depicted by the pentagram. 'Air' and 'love' are both light and feminine in their attributes, but they are also associated with insanity. This is how we come upon terms like 'airy fairy' or 'madly in love'.
From here we head east towards the water element, but when we get there we find nothing of interest, just a block of generic flats. It is true that the sea lies in this direction but it is some ways off. In order to fit this piece of the puzzle in, we must conspire to use our wisdom.
If we offset the line so that it runs through the site of Dublin's most famous and obvious land mark, the Spire, we arrive at one of its most important centres of power the Irish Houses of Parliament. Again there are tunnels linking the Houses of Parliament to Trinity College and the rest of the City. There is even a tunnel that runs underneath the Spire to facilitate workers in maintaining the lights atop of it. I think it is clear that the element water has less to do with 'wisdom', in this case, than it does with power.
So far the pentagram has been aligned to true North. If we rotate our pentagram in an anti-clockwise manner to conform with our offset line, the pentagram now aligns with a good approximation of where we might expect magnetic North to be.
If we then superimpose both pentagrams we get a very interesting and powerful looking sigil overlaid across Dublin City, which to my mind looks very similar to the Sigil of Lucifer, or perhaps to the Gateway symbol of Lovecraft's supposedly fictional Necronomicon.
The inner vertices also show some interesting correspondences. The vertex marked 'A' rests on the Kings Inn Law Society. Interestingly, the line heading off towards the Richmond Asylum exits through the main gates of this building complex, the main gates are constructed in the form of a temple and appears to be dedicated to the Greek God Dionysus.
Point 'B' rests atop another hospital, this time the Rotunda. Point 'E' appears to correspond to the corner of the GPO, or possible Henry Street. Points 'D' and 'F' appear to have no significant correspondences, although perhaps they did in times gone by. The two lines that leave point 'F' convene with the South Side quays at precisely the same point that two main bridges; the Ha'penny Bridge and the Ormond Quay bridge connect back to the land.
The length of the lines between each point on the pentagram is around 1.01 miles, that is around 1776 yards. 1776 was the year of the United States Declaration of Independence was signed in Philadelphia.
1776 is 888 plus 888. Triplets such as these are deemed important when dealing with astral beings such as angels and demons. Other measurements in the pentagram include; 717, 375, and 342 yds.
In 1776 the notorious Hellfire Club were still active in Dublin. From their vantage point on Montpellier Hill they would have been able to easily trace the form of this pentagram out on the landscape of the city. The Hellfire Club were obsessed with black magic and Satanism, they would meet regularly on the hill to 'taste the pleasures of Hell'. However, neither the Richmond Lunatic Asylum, nor the Mater Hospital existed at this time. So unless one of their number was involved in the planning and building of these establishments their involvement in the matter seems unlikely, if not impossible.
Now I am not saying that anyone intentionally constructed this shape as a form of geomancy. It is very likely that this is all coincidence. But coincidence is synonymous with correspondence. The occult is based on such correspondences, and so we can say that this is still a legitimate piece of occult research.
So what did we learn?
Well we learnt that Urthoma (matter) still holds the zenith position in the LPBR. We also learnt that Water has taken up the mantel of Power, in the seeming absence of Spirit. We learnt that Air is associated with the Divine Feminine and Madness. And that this house is referred to as the Female House. The right hand side must therefore be the Male house, the Earth and Fire Houses below. Because the Legion of Mary is located on Morning Star Avenue, we can assume that Mary, in some way evokes, the planet Venus.
Furthermore, if Ireland is meant to be the basis for Frank Baum's Land of Oz, then Trinity College, i.e. College Green, is the gateway to the Emerald City. And the Emerald Tablet?
Why that would be the Book of Kells, of course...
St. Audeon's church is the only medieval parish left in Dublin City and is situated behind the old city walls. As you might expect, there are a number of old legends and superstitions –some wholesome and some not so – concerning this most ancient part of Dublin. One tradition stated that the first person through the city gates on New Years Day, which was usually a woman, would also be the first to be married that year. A much darker tradition was carried out in front of a great stone portal, which lies just inside the main gate, known as one of the 5 Gateways to the Underworld. In days gone by, women would carry their unwanted or unbaptised babies down into this passageway and leave them there for the chruch to deal with. The doorway was eventually bricked up, many hundreds of years ago, because of this practice. But the legends still remain.
I have already discussed the occult significance of the counties of Ireland and how they relate to the Lesser Banishing Ritual of the Pentagram (LBRP) in Magical Traditions. So, it seemed likely to me that if these other gateways did indeed exist they too might be arranged in the form of a pentagram. Armed with this I set about making lines across maps of the city and discovered something interesting. These are my findings;
To begin with we need to understand a little about the meaning of the pentagram, its use in ritual and its related alchemical symbolism. The five points of the pentagram each represent a different classical elements. These are; earth, air, fire, water and spirit. The pentagram in LBRP is used by initiates to banish unwanted or demonic forces. To do this the initiate, either using their finger or the blade of a dagger, would draw the pentagram symbol in the air. They would start at the bottom left hand corner, carry their way on up to the top point and then down and around in a clockwise manner. Each point on the pentagram also has an associated symbolic meaning such that;
Earth = Truth
Spirit = Power
Fire = Knowledge
Air = Love
Water = Wisdom
Assuming that important landmarks are going to appear at each of the 5 points of our star, we can see that Trinity College lies on the same latitude as St. Audeon's and would therefore correspond to Fire. This is acceptable because Trinity College is obviously a place of learning, and therefore knowledge. St. Audeon's corresponds to the characteristic of Truth (Earth) presumably because of the religious Truth implicit in Christ the Saviour.
So far so good.
However, when we try to connect these two points together at the apex of Spirit, things take an unexpected turn. For here we find the Mater hospital. The Mater Hospital is an important hospital in Dublin with a large mortuary. It is easy to see why it should be thought of as the 2nd gateway to the Underworld, as it is through these doors that many Dubliners have passed through after death. Like any hospital it is also services by a large network of tunnels, which might very well extend under the city.

The loss of Spirit from the zenith is a common theme in Judeo-Christian belief systems, showing the fall of man into the material realms. William Blake also made diagrams showing how Urizen (reason) fell from the zenith to the nadir and was replaced by Urthoma (matter, opacity). The famous Irish poet William Butler Yeats wrote extensively about these diagrams, which he assumed to be under some kind of eternal, or infernal, rotation. What William Blake is really describing is the fall of Lucifer from heaven and the creation of Heaven and Hell, Good and Evil.
Having already touched on Trinity College and the Fire/Knowledge element we can go directly to the fourth element: Air. And this is where things get really weird. The left hand point of the pentagram aligns with the corner of the Richmond District Lunatic Asylum. Also known as the lower house or the female house, the now derelict building is located at the end of the curved and lonely Morning Star Avenue. The Morning Star is associated with Venus, the Goddess of Beauty, as well as Lucifer, and is depicted by the pentagram. 'Air' and 'love' are both light and feminine in their attributes, but they are also associated with insanity. This is how we come upon terms like 'airy fairy' or 'madly in love'.
From here we head east towards the water element, but when we get there we find nothing of interest, just a block of generic flats. It is true that the sea lies in this direction but it is some ways off. In order to fit this piece of the puzzle in, we must conspire to use our wisdom.
If we offset the line so that it runs through the site of Dublin's most famous and obvious land mark, the Spire, we arrive at one of its most important centres of power the Irish Houses of Parliament. Again there are tunnels linking the Houses of Parliament to Trinity College and the rest of the City. There is even a tunnel that runs underneath the Spire to facilitate workers in maintaining the lights atop of it. I think it is clear that the element water has less to do with 'wisdom', in this case, than it does with power.
The wisdom to rule? The House of Commons and the water.
So far the pentagram has been aligned to true North. If we rotate our pentagram in an anti-clockwise manner to conform with our offset line, the pentagram now aligns with a good approximation of where we might expect magnetic North to be.
The inner vertices also show some interesting correspondences. The vertex marked 'A' rests on the Kings Inn Law Society. Interestingly, the line heading off towards the Richmond Asylum exits through the main gates of this building complex, the main gates are constructed in the form of a temple and appears to be dedicated to the Greek God Dionysus.
Point 'B' rests atop another hospital, this time the Rotunda. Point 'E' appears to correspond to the corner of the GPO, or possible Henry Street. Points 'D' and 'F' appear to have no significant correspondences, although perhaps they did in times gone by. The two lines that leave point 'F' convene with the South Side quays at precisely the same point that two main bridges; the Ha'penny Bridge and the Ormond Quay bridge connect back to the land.
Eight of the signatories are Irish American, three (Matthew Thornton, George Taylor and James Smith) having been born in Ireland. (Wiki)Perhaps the most well known of the secret geomantic pentagrams is the one that points to the White House in Washington DC. Does this mean that the layout of Dublin somehow foreshadowed the creation of the American Republic, and did the pentagram makers take their trade to America with them?
1776 is 888 plus 888. Triplets such as these are deemed important when dealing with astral beings such as angels and demons. Other measurements in the pentagram include; 717, 375, and 342 yds.
In 1776 the notorious Hellfire Club were still active in Dublin. From their vantage point on Montpellier Hill they would have been able to easily trace the form of this pentagram out on the landscape of the city. The Hellfire Club were obsessed with black magic and Satanism, they would meet regularly on the hill to 'taste the pleasures of Hell'. However, neither the Richmond Lunatic Asylum, nor the Mater Hospital existed at this time. So unless one of their number was involved in the planning and building of these establishments their involvement in the matter seems unlikely, if not impossible.
Now I am not saying that anyone intentionally constructed this shape as a form of geomancy. It is very likely that this is all coincidence. But coincidence is synonymous with correspondence. The occult is based on such correspondences, and so we can say that this is still a legitimate piece of occult research.
So what did we learn?
Well we learnt that Urthoma (matter) still holds the zenith position in the LPBR. We also learnt that Water has taken up the mantel of Power, in the seeming absence of Spirit. We learnt that Air is associated with the Divine Feminine and Madness. And that this house is referred to as the Female House. The right hand side must therefore be the Male house, the Earth and Fire Houses below. Because the Legion of Mary is located on Morning Star Avenue, we can assume that Mary, in some way evokes, the planet Venus.
Furthermore, if Ireland is meant to be the basis for Frank Baum's Land of Oz, then Trinity College, i.e. College Green, is the gateway to the Emerald City. And the Emerald Tablet?
Why that would be the Book of Kells, of course...
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