THE SPOOKY SIDE TO SCOTLAND

THE BLACK DOGS OF ROSSLYN

 ANDREW HENNESSEY

Isaiah 13:22  And the wild beasts of the islands shall cry in their desolate houses, and dragons in their pleasant palaces: and her time is near to come, and her days shall not be prolonged.

Speaking of wild beasts and desolate houses, I came across two references in the Transactions of the Society of Antiquaries, Scotland from the 1930's that mention the discovery of two very repugnant dark underground dens lined with stone, whose cultural purpose and function was unknown. One in the vicinity of Gorebridge near Borthwick castle and one further downriver above the river Esk at Dalkeith.

It was stated that they had been filled in.

Between Borthwick castle and Gorebridge is a place the locals call 'dinosaur valley' because of all the large gnawed bones lying about.

One man on a walk in that vicinity recently had come across another 'den'  in the hillside with some bones in it.

Recently reported in the local news early 2007, a deer mutilation at Newtongrange where the big beast had been draped, hanging from a tree.

A local, ‘George’ did actually camp out in ‘Dinosaur valley’ a few years ago and had found a cave entrance but his night time peace and quiet kept getting disturbed by weird and strange animal cries. 

To the west of Gorebridge and Borthwick along the valley lies Rosslyn Glen, which has its own legend of the 'black dog' with glowing red eyes.

A local policeman who had patrolled that area out of Loanhead in the 1970's had been a serviceman and former jungle fighter in Asia and for some reason would not go out alone on that beat without his Alsatian dog.

Just down the valley from Rosslyn at Loanhead and the Dryden tower in the mid 1990's according to researcher Garry Woods, three painter and decorators entered the warehouse district of Loanhead on a Sunday night to go to a paint warehouse to stock up for a job on the Monday morning.

The streets of the small town were empty at that time of night.

It was a clear night and there was a full moon.

They unpadlocked the wire gate and swung it in, and were heading into the yard when one of the painters spotted a man on the roof of the warehouse.

Thinking that it was a night watchman up there for some reason, they stopped the car and one of the men got out and went forward to attract his attention.

He might have been up there repairing a plastic seal in the drainage system or unblocking the guttering.

When the night watchman came into focus the painter was looking at a feral, hairy, toothy werewolf on top of the warehouse.

Things weren’t looking like a practical joke when the man in the furry and toothy mask leapt off the warehouse roof to land on his hairy feet in the courtyard below.

The painter was looking at a being with a very unusual undercoat.

He ran for the estate car and dived in, thankful that the guys had left the motor running.

They got the picture pretty quickly as the wolf man was coming in at pace to supply some close ups. The guys reversed out the yard and through the gates at high speed and drove off as fast as their vehicle would go.

They were all to become severely disturbed by their encounter.

This story puts a different gloss on things at Rosslyn.

Without doubt that geographic area is full of scientific and magical activities related to the blood and to the moon and combined with; tunnels to Hawthornden castle, and the famous Cloning Institute where Sir Ian Wilmut cloned Dolly the sheep at Rosslyn and then also allegedly became a director of the famous bloodline Rosslyn Chapel trust it does suggest that there are serious issues surrounding the next King of Scotland..

There is also Rosslyn Lee mental hospital, and not that far away the ongoing  worship of a Reptilian Bronze Age stone head in the woods of Rosslyn Glen, itself linked in with the lunar cycles at the ancient spirit rock.

Over the years, the locals have seen their fair share of weird people in capes conducting rituals in the woods.

Now the same ‘wierdos’ they used to chase out the village at night are part of an ongoing local industry that involves Hollywood, the Da Vinci Code and Dan Brown plus a veritable library of new and revisionist literature that places Rosslyn at the centre of some sort of Stargate and the business end of big tour parties.

Local and famous Edinburgh author JK Rowling [Harry Potter ] also adds another reason for being a tourist at Rosslyn where the chapel itself is a Gnostic and Masonic Guild encyclopaedia carved in stone.

There are strong indications that the boundaries of reality are somewhat blurred at Rosslyn.  

Folks are never sure if Robert the Bruce is being cloned secretly in some bubbling vat at the lab that is only a quarter of a mile from the Chapel.

If orchestras play the recently decoded glyphs and the ruby Templar Matthew laser, lights up the mystery keystone, will there be a howling in the local woods.

The real issue of the day though is the fact that the said Black Dog of Rosslyn Glen has been thriving in this area for centuries.

Known to campers and historians, and with an appetite for local Deer, its no wonder he was at the paint warehouse in Loanhead if those dark stonelined chambers are still his interior decor.

They are so … 1600’s

The reality therefore is that there has to be a breeding family or tribe of them in the area.

There being plenty of underground accommodation in the 500 square miles in and around the capital city.

Clearly the big mutilated Deer hanging in the tree might be a warning to locals to keep their distance.

Some of the B Movie stuff surrounding this scenario isn’t really very funny.

There are one or two local clues as to the secretive nature of the Celtic tradition and the old ways locally. e.g. Gowkshill at the back of the haunted Crichton castle and Gowksmoss roundabout at the Rosslyn junction. The Gowk tending to be a fool, or a strange man, perhaps a man of the woods.

With the power of nature bursting through their human visage, the 180 + carved green men at Rosslyn chapel seem to illustrate a tradition of shapeshifting that is driven by natural forces.

The black dog of Rosslyn glen appears to be one of many otherworld beings and creatures regularly seen in this area that thrives upon the magnetic tidal forces of the moon.