Tracing Red Jasper - Water Witching and Spirit Stones

 Known for its deep red hue, red jasper has been a stone praised and revered by many cultures across the centuries.

Red Jasper was a common stone used by the American Indians for various ceremonial purposes. It was used as an offering during rain-making rituals and was thought to offer the wearer guidance when dowsing for water. Some Native American tribes thought Red Jasper increased one’s sensitivity to the Earth.They believed that red jasper was the blood of Mother Earth, and would use it for facilitate rebirth and aid them in calling of the rain.

There are many secret, hidden places within deserts that are evidence of magic. Stones and crystals  have medicinal or healing properties and the lands they come from are seen as the source of these powers. Sometimes there is no scientific explanation for the remedies and remarkable bewitching magic that these places produce. Plants, animals and people can be guided to find unseen water where there is only sand. It is the unexplained, mysterious, mystical nature of silent, remote isolated desert lands that I am interested in to increase my own sensitivity to the earth. Often it is the most seemingly empty land that is the most powerful and mysterious, appearing as something but simultaneously also the opposite. Hidden icons, totems, symbols in the land disrupt and subvert meaning according to ones personal identity. Meanings held within the land reveal themselves according to the experiences and knowledge of the viewer. Deserts are covered in human stone carvings, petroglyphs, signs and stories. Rain making rituals, guidance markers, totems , emblems, spirit beings, mythical animals. Humans are compelled to disclose these important stories, song lines, symbols and icons but then often overpaint or hide them so that only the initiated can see.