The original form of dowsing involved the use of a "divining rod" to find underground water resources that were pure and thought to cure disease and illness. The rod is usually a "Y" shaped stick and the technique often referred to involves holding the two branches of the rod with its stem pointing towards the sky and away from the body. This is done while the dowser walks across an area of ground under "investigation." When the stem dips to the ground it is thought that the item or resource sought is to be found at this spot.
The practice of dowsing has been traced to 16th Century Europe. Our understanding of groundwater and development of technologies to find and extract water likely led to dowsing's decrease in popularity. Today, dowsing is used as a term to describe the search for anything hidden but still employs divining rods and pendulums to find those hidden objects. Treasure, natural resources, murder victims, lost objects and more have been searched for through dowsing. It's success rate is very low although the phenomena of remembering the odd hit and forgetting the many misses may help explain its continued support by members of the paranormal community.
- Carl Blythe (Programmer) |
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