Sacred Herbology · the esoteric school
A working circle on the high ridge of a forested range, above the islands and the bay. It is being built in a virtual world, apart from everything else there, and only initiates will be let in.
In preparation · not yet openAgrippa sorted his herbs by the planets that ruled them. The Key of Solomon bound vervain, hyssop and basil into a sprinkler for the holy water. Plutarch has the priests of Egypt burning resin at dawn, myrrh at noon and kyphi at nightfall. In the Grove a student burns them at those hours, in a circle laid out the way the books describe.
On the ridge
The Grove sits on the highest ground of the range, above the rainforest. There’s no track up and no sign. From the circle the ground drops away to the coast, the strait and the island across it. The sun rises over the water and sets behind the range.
The circle
Twelve standing stones ring a circle of worked gravel. The four quarter stones carry the fixed signs as the Golden Dawn gave them to the elements: Aquarius for Air in the east, Leo for Fire in the south, Scorpio for Water in the west, Taurus for Earth in the north. The altar stands at the centre with the censer, the cup and the lamp. The rites are the published ones: the Lesser Ritual of the Pentagram, and purification by water and by fire.
The planetary beds
Seven beds, one for each classical planet, planted from the lists in the first book of Agrippa’s Three Books of Occult Philosophy. Bay and vervain for the Sun, rosemary and hyssop for the Moon, rue and cumin for Saturn, and four more beds for Mercury, Venus, Mars and Jupiter. The plants are there for ritual and study. None of it is offered as a remedy.
Who keeps it
Sacred Herbology, and the Grove with it, is kept by two fratres, Frater Leo Viridis and Frater Phyton Ambrosius, who designed the Grove’s ritual together.
Where things stand. The Grove is being moved up to the ridge now, and the pictures here show it as it’s being laid out. It isn’t open to students yet, and entry will be for initiates only.