Secret Places, Hidden
Sanctuaries:
Uncovering Mysterious Sites, Symbols, and
Societies
By Stephen Klimczuk
and Gerald Warner of Craigenmaddie
(Sterling Books, 272 pages, $19.95)
Dan Brown’s latest fairy tale (def., a fictional story that may
feature folkloric
characters) audaciously claims, “That the true Ancient
Mystery is in fact the realization that people are not
God’s subjects, but possess the capability to be gods themselves.
Once they realize this fact, they will open the gateway to a
magnificent future.”
Compare and contrast that sentiment with the informed and humble
analysis of the brilliant new tome, Secret Places, Hidden
Sanctuaries. It forthrightly and in careful candor
traces the origin of basic human instincts to hide away in
obscurity, to seek privacy, to experience sanctuary with
things divine, and to congregate in exclusive
conclaves from which others are “excluded.” There is no pretense,
no fiction here. This book instead debunks myths like Brown’s,
and is based on historical fact, rather than inflated lies made
up to sell extravagant novels or Hollywood blockbuster movie
rights.
Never before have readers been taken, literally taken by the
hand, on a guided tour (Führung, in German) of
such behavior, past and present. Rarely, has such light been cast
on such an astonishing variety of places and instances of
worship, conspiracy, defense, and in the case of Nazi atrocity —
shocking mass murders.
The book is quite eclectic, with a wide range of subjects ranging
from the (in)famous Knights Templar of crusading fame to
California’s modern Esalen Institute debaucheries. From the
gothic nightmare of Himmler’s Wewelsburg Nazi SS castle to
numerous jeweled islands of mystery and various holies of holies.
It details the (very) private banks as well as various university
secret societies, with fondness for Yale’s Skull and
Bones, that gets, well most of it, right.
The book ends with one of my own favorite subjects: “clubbable”
jolly good fellowships — London’s gentlemen’s clubs (but no lap
dancing please) and other such sanctuaries of tradition. The best
American and European private clubs are described and even rated
in scrutinized detail. The authors have a flair for good fable
retelling and venerable (local) custom.
If you like intrigue, hidden gems and historical treatments about
all things “off limits” this book will fascinate
you (e.g., Area 51). If you are an intellectual tourist you will
doubtless have other places you could add to the authors’ already
well-traveled list. Besides Bilderberg, why not, Davos, Mt.
Pelerin, the Bohemian Grove, Ravenna festival in Italy or new
libertarian Burning Man events in the Nevada desert? You will
come away with a hunger for yet more (a sequel, perhaps arranged
by continent or even other worlds).
Surely, as this book rightly concludes, secret rites and
exclusive places or fascinating, exotic get always
have been and likely will be a feature of every
civilization — since history has been recorded (thank you,
Saint Bede, our first real historian). Human nature itself
perhaps predicts, if anything can be forecast, that these
curiosities and behaviors will endure as long as the species
does, or who knows, far longer, heaven being what it has been
described in the biblical Book of Revelation
and other shrouded religious texts.
