Realm of the Ring Lords: The Myth and Magic of the Grail Quest

by Laurence Gardner

The magical history of the Ring Lords, alluded to in J.R.R. Tolkein’s Th e Lord of the Rings , has been largely consigned to legend and half-remembered battles between good and evil. Shrouded in supernatural enigma, its legacy lives on in fascinating tales of fairies, elves, witches, and vampires.

The most popular Grail stories relate to Arthurian tales of Guinevere’s golden Ring and the great iron-clad Ring of Camelot—the Knights of the Round Table. When this Ring was broken, the land fell into chaos and the forces of darkness reigned over the earth, starlight, and forest.

Why do we sense deeper truths behind the mysteries of the Ring and the Grail? Why have their common enhancements been distorted and hidden?

The ancient guardians of our culture have never featured positively in academic teachings, for they were the Shining the real progenitors of our heritage. Instead, their reality was quashed from the earliest days of Inquisitional suppression and the literal diminution of their figures caused a parallel diminishing of their history. In truth, however, the sovereign legacy of our culture comes from a place and time that might just as well be called Middle-earth as by any other name. It lingers beyond the twilight portal in the long distant realm of the Ring Lords.

Genres: Nonfiction, History, Philosophy

432 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2000

About the author

Laurence Gardner was a prominent author and speaker in the alternative history genre of research and writing.
--from the author's website

Reviews

[Steve Cran · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read into this book hoping to delve further into the mytho's of JRR Tolkien's Legenderium. The book sort of did that and yet it also opened up several other doorways for further exploration. The book also covered some ground with the grail mythos. If you are looking for something entirely new on Tolkien you will find yourself surprised with some new revelations. The Grail mysteries go further back as well, they go back all the way to the Middle East.

The book covers a lot of territory. First let us address the Ringlords. All the way back in Sumeria carrying a ring or a torque was a sign of sovereignty. Some symbols of sovereignty included the snake and the dragon, both of which were called serpents. The snake represented wisdom in ancient times and the circle represented wholeness. The Sumerian Gods had a council of 9 deities with Anu being the most senior. Each of them had a ring, totally nine rings with one to rule them all. Anu held the master ring.One ring to rule them all. Sound familiar? Let us look at Odin who ruled from Asgard. He controlled 9 realms and he also had a magic ring. There was also a sword stuck in tree for a hero to pull out, the Norse had a strong influence on the King Arthur story. Actually Odin got his ring from Andvari, a dwarf, in time he lost it and a fish swallowed it. Later on it was found by Sigurd the son of an ousted sovereign. He battle a dragon called fafnir to redeem treasure. One of the things he takes is a ring, a magic ring. He ends up giving it to a Valkyrie that he awakens.But the ring is cursed and in time he forget his vow to the Valkyrie and marries a princess. Later through treachery Sigurd is slain and the Valkyrie joins him on the funeral pyre. The princess gets the ring but end up drowning herself with it in her possession. The ring returns to it's source. For Tolkien fan's this will definitely ring a bell.

Magic swords seems to carry the day as King Arthur has Exacalibur. There was a magic sword in Lord of the Rings but it must be put back together. Now the grail also figures well in the Aurthur mythos. We have heard it before in Dan Brown's book. It refers to the womb of Mary Magdalene, Jesus's wife. She gave birth to her child in France. This book continues with that theory and goes back even further. Apparently sovereignty was determined by the mother. The children from their womb was holy. Mary or the Sumerian Mary referred to these ladies and their was a priesthood of ladies who were connected to the water. Hence the legends of nymphs and mermaid or merry maids. Priestess line and princess line. Brothers made sure in Ancient Egypt to marry their sisters or half sisters to keep the bloodline going. Who were these women descended from why of course Tiamat the dragon queen ruler of the depth. Goddesses like Kalimath and Lilith came after her. These people were part of a royal family that had thrones in France,Ireland, Sumeria, Egypt and ancient Israel. They were called the Dragon Kings and according to this book they were anointed with the fat of Komodo dragons.

This family of enlightened monarchy would eventually fall. The Roman Empire never liked them much as they stood in the way of their world domination. The Catholic Church their successor retained this hatred. To get rid of the Dragon Kings the Catholic Church manipulated things behind the scenes and came up with a brilliant forgery called "The Donation of Constantine" Where in the Church was given powers to anoint leader. It was a fake and was used to knock down sovereignty of the Dragon kings. In this book you will learn about the Stewarts of Scotland,Merovingians of Southern France, the line of David and how the Church manipulated things to get them out of power.

Where did these dragon kings come from? Sumerian sources say from the North or from the Heaven. Could be aliens or a more advanced civilization. Scientist always knew the Sumerians came from somewhere else and moved into what we call today Iraq. It seems readily apparent that they came from somewhere in Central Europe near Transylvania. They wore armor that looked like Dragon scale. From them came the Kassites,Fir Bolgs and the Tuatha D dannan.Sumerians style writing that predates Sumeria by thousands of years was found their. Mummies were found in Central Europe that resembled those of Ancient Egypt. Some were also found in Monglolia and the bodies well preserved looked Central European. The people who came out of Transylvania were called the Yallanu or Woodland Lords. Their influence would stretch across the known world.

The Merovingian hold out in Southern France was were the line continued to live as did the ideology. The people their called the Cathars held the feminine divine to the highest belief. In fact the Catholic Church had the Albigensian crusade their and killed off the Cathars. Albi actually refers to elf. These dragon kings were also called the elf kings or the shining ones. Elfs were not tiny people in fairy tales they were real people. Fairy tales were written to both conceal the truth from the uninitiated and spread the truth to those who knew how to read them. The druid were the priests and they represented the wisdom of the snake.

The book is an amazing read. You will learn the back stories to King Aurthur,Robin Hood, Stewarts Scotland, and the Merovingian of Europe . I found it enjoyable. May details were left out as the review was getting long. I would say that good sections of the book can be verified through independent research. Some of if I take with a grain of salt as the sources used may not be all that scholarly. Now the theory that some advanced human society came out of some part of the world and was responsible for all these royal families may sound far fetched, but do the research there are just too many parallels in different societies that are spread apart for their not to be. Do the research.

[Maria Morrison · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very informative book with some brilliant theories. Who doesn't love the Knights Templar and the Lord of the Rings. Combine the two with awesome historical finds, great lore and wonderful reviewing skills and you have a must have for any one seeking to understand the past that was stripped from us long ago by the victors of the Christian Wars.

[Andrine Morse · Rating 4 out of 5]

Finally ... the beginning of the threads so we can unwind the skein of false hoods. Although too much space is spent in the confusion of patriarchal inheritence instead of matrilineal descent, especially after having clearly established in this and other works the importance of Tanist descent, all in all I use so often as references, it is in tatters.

[Shehroze Ameen · Rating 3 out of 5]

To be frank with everyone, I just read it because this work has food for thought in its rather... paranoic and delusional approach to the subject matter. The writer is (or rather was), and I quote:

a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland [...] the Chevalier de St. Germain, he is attached to the European Council of Princes as the Jacobite Historiographer Royal [...] Conservation Counsultant to the Fine Art Trade Guild [...] A Knight Templar of St. Anthony and Prior of the Sacred Kindred of St. Columba.

talk about paranoia, this guy beat Stephan Hawking, and in the first page no less. Wow. Respect indeed.

So anyway, what's the whole book about? Some douchemonkey historian, decided on talking about the Grail and the Ring... you know:



Ring. and



Grail.

So anyway, this work... I like it, because of the ideas it uses to try and get the point through about these two belonging to some tribe called the Annunaki (good grief), among other things.

Although I sound like a prick right now, what with the obvious GIFs and the way I'm bashing the author, I commend him for a few things:

1) the research he actually did do to justify his idea. It does allow him to keep his "conspiracy theorist" card.

2) His interesting take on pop culture characters from fairytales like Count Dracula, the Pixies, the Werewolves, and others. Although for what its worth, his Dracula depiction is fairly decent - its believable to say the least.

3) Its a decent read for those who love Norse legends, such as the Ring of the Nebulung.

My personal favourite portion in the whole book:

What is equally surprising, if not discourteous, is the fact that one so often finds copies of Tolkien's works on bookshop shelves containing childish pulp fiction. In reality, however, The Lord of the Rings constitutes a modern rendering of the world's greatest mythological tradition and should rightly be placed with the classics of the genre, from Homer to Malory. The fact that the late J.R.R. Tolkein was a writer of our modern time does not detract form the issue that classic mythology is, in any event, timeless. the fact that his work is far form wholly unique does not detract from its value. On the contrary, it has an enhanced value because it is based upon qualified of the most ancient kind - preserving it for future generations within a modern market arena which has, for the most part, forsaken the more archaic root material because it is not necessarily conducive to everyday reading

._.

so basically:



.... true. I do agree with him.

So basically, you'll have a crazy person, but with an interesting approach towards books, nursery rhymes, the origins of some things, and an obvious bashing of the church (rolls eyes, growls) God...

So yeah... happy reading.

[Timothy Williams · Rating 3 out of 5]

So do you want to know the secret history of the world, uncover a long buried line of kingship that makes you use European folklore like a jigsaw puzzle, and discover the psycho-sexual kinks that made women goddesses? Then look no further than this book.

I'll admit I got this from my local Half Price Books because I like a bit of conspiracy from time to time. I think of books like this as brain candy and maybe useful for story ideas of I ever get around to writing the next great fantasy series. I didn't expect the scholarly approach to everything. You can call this guy crazy, he is, but you can't say he isn't well read. The bibliography at the end is going to cost me a fortune.

This would have been a perfect book except for the stuff about women. It's not all women, just those from this very large extended family, but they are so important they are remembered as goddesses. This in and of itself isn't a problem. It's the reason. Apparently consumption of certain bodily exceptions from these women turn men into philosopher-kings. This is the secret behind the Annunaki (and you thought they were aliens) kings of Egypt, Kings David and Solomon, Jesus and King Arthur. I just don't know what to do with that. I mean is it empowering to women or just another form of male dominance? I do know it sounds unhygenic.

So yeah, three stars. Take the fun conspiracy and the actual folklore stories, leave behind the gross stuff.

[Jennifer · Rating 3 out of 5]

Meteen in de eerste 5 paginas kom ik tot de conclusie dat het boek meer informatie-dens is dan dat het een leesboek is, wat opzich niet verkeerd is, maar waar ik me even aan moet aanpassen.

Na het lezen van 2 hoofdstukken tolde mijn hoofd. Als je dit boek wilt lezen, is enige (en liefst veel) kennis van de christelijke geschiedenis een aanrader. Enkele namen komen me bekend voor, maar ik ben al volledig kwijt wie bij welke bloedlijn hoort. Wel weet ik dat de schrijver aangeeft dat de kerk niet zuiver is en dat de pausen en hun aandraging berust op een illegaal en vals geschrift, namelijk "de schenking van constantijn" die nooit door Constantijn gemaakt of ondertekent kan zijn, aldus de schrijver. > "Het was het middel waarmee de Kerk van Rome de politieke macht terugwon na het instorten van het West- Romeinse rijk, zodat de bisschoppen het nieuwe Heilige Roomse Rijk onder controle van de paus konden invoeren."

Het boek leest soms een beetje als het oplezen of terug onderzoeken van een stamboom. Het is interessant om te lezen waar bepaalde legendes vandaan komen, maar tegelijk voelt dit boek als een manuscript van een hystoricus die alleen academisch kan spreken, en niet goed weet hoe hij zijn interesse en bevindingen voor 'de normale mens' op papier moet zetten.

[Dan Zarfati · Rating 3 out of 5]

The book is well written but it is a sort of propaganda for the royal houses of Europe, the author insists that the kings and queens are descendent of the Anunnaki and that is why they are important, he also focuses on the fairy tales but fails to perceive that the fairy tales have the same structures of the abduction tales, meaning, the manipulation of human DNA could be an ongoing project, and not something that had its root in the past and stopped, no, that is not the case.

[Jönathan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Knows nothing about Scythians and seems to be rather counting on the probability of the reader knowing nothing about them either. A good book for some inventive past and modern folklore but not so much for historical facts.

[Terri Ruhl · Rating 1 out of 5]

I didn’t finish this. I couldn’t drag myself through it. Not worth the headache

[Arthur Stock · Rating 5 out of 5]

Amazing read, this is not a story book but a reference of myths and legends

[Nicola · Rating 2 out of 5]

lots of interesting information but so badly presented I couldn't keep in mind what the whole thing was about.

[Terry Monk · Rating 4 out of 5]

There is a lot of history covered in this book. If you fell asleep in history class, this book is not for you.