Turning The Hiram Key by Robert Lomas

Author:Robert Lomas [Lomas, Robert]
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Tags: Spiritual & Religion
Publisher: QCS eBooks
Published: 2011-10-03T16:00:00+00:00

Acting Out the Truth

When spring arrives in the Pennines, a strange ritual is carried out on the moors above my house. If I go for a walk in the early morning, when the dew is still on the grass, I am sometimes lucky enough to see mad March hares boxing in the mist. Two males will face each other, rear up on their hind legs and box with their front paws. They only carry out this strange ritual fighting dance in the spring, and it forms part of their mating behaviour.

For many years now, animal rituals have been a source of scientific study. Our television sets show us much more exotic examples than my local hares boxing. They bring into our living rooms images of bower birds building ornate decorated temples to procreation; the strutting of male peacocks, with their preposterous tails; the ritual mating flights of butterflies; or just the submission ritual of dogs seeking pack status. Ritual seems to have a biological basis in many animals, and this includes the human animal.

Much animal ritual is related to sex and mating. Pioneering evolutionary biologist Dr Michael Bastock first described the mating ritual of the silver-washed fritillary, a species of butterfly with brownish wings marked with black and silver. It is not noted for having a large brain or extensive memory skill, yet, for all its neurological limitations, this little creature carries out a complex courting ritual. When an amorous male spies a possible female consort he moves towards her in a purposeful manner. The coy female, if she is indeed another silver-washed fritillary, immediately takes to the air to move away from the male. The male then flies around her, performing a series of aerobatic looping circles to impress his intended lady love. He will fly so close that his wings almost brush her body. If she approves of the male she will continue in a steady, straight-line flight path while he displays his aerial skills around her. When she lands the two butterflies face each other in a rigid, unnatural posture before sniffing each other’s scent glands; only then will this fussy female allow her suitor to couple with her. Bastock points out that before the male can mate he must carry out seven ritual acts, and the female must make the correct ritual response to each move for a successful courtship.[Bastock (1967), p. 68.]

A decade before he published his detailed study of animal courtship rituals Bastock had suggested that such complex behaviour in simple creatures might have a genetic cause.[Bastock.(1956).] And he has been proved right by recent evolutionary studies on the survival advantage of female coyness in mating rituals.[Wachtmeister & Enquist (1999).] He spotted that the ritual worked for butterflies because it enabled two individuals, ‘without any previous knowledge of each other, to identify a suitable mate by means of a neurological conversation’. He explained this as ‘a biological resonance which was set up between the two insects caused by the repetitive rhythms causing their respective nervous systems to vibrate in harmony’.

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