All is quiet from the White Dragon's liar and has been for sometime.
The magazine has not gone out since Samhain 2009 and now the website
whitedragon.org.uk has been disabled all is obviously not well and it appears yet another Earth Mysteries magazine has bitten the dust.
White Dragon was an independent quarterly pagan magazine regularly producing quality articles on a range of topics including witchcraft, northern traditions, the occult and earth mysteries from the ancient kingdom of Mercia in the English Midlands. It has been published at each of the fire festivals since Samhain 1993.
White Dragon was edited by Rowan somewhere in darkest Worcestershire and, quote, “actively discriminated towards authors currently living and working within Mercia or with Mercian connections.” However, occasionally articles by non-Mercians were published on subjects of which they possessed special knowledge and concentrated on virtually any pagan, occult and magickal themes, ranging from tree lore and herbalism, myth and shamanism, to runes and druidry, cabbala and chaos magick, earth mysteries, the sacred landscape and sacred sites ….... but consciously avoided "new age" matters such as crystal worship, chakras, dolphins or Atlantis.......
and no bloody spells!
The Mercian Connection
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| Mercia by David Taylor |
The magazine
Mercian Mysteries started life in 1990 with the objective to disseminate 'earth mysteries' and related information on the Midlands - including reports on organised field trips. Paul Nix took on the role of editor and produced the first five issues after which, Bob Trubshaw took over. 'Mercian' is taken from the name for the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of Mercia, which originated in the Midlands, to its peak under King Offa controlling much of England. The 'Mysteries' was derived from 'earth mysteries' but, intentionally, was left vague.
The magazine contents steadily evolved and became less-and-less involved specifically with the Midlands and what had started life as a photocopied A5 magazine had developed into a 40+ page A4 journal. In 1995 Trubshaw was planning the transition from the outgrown
Mercian Mysteries to a new multi-disciplined journal to be named
At the Edge. Sadly
At The Edge only ran to 10 issues before it amalgamated in late 1998 with
3rd Stone, formerly
Gloucestershire Earth Mysteries.
The
Mercian Mysteries element was incorporated into White Dragon, a Midlands based magazine published since 1993.
The website hosted a huge collection of past articles in the Dragon's Hoard, access now sadly lost as the site has been disabled. The White Dragon website included book reviews, local site information in the gazetteer, as well as a shop to order a copy or back issues and take out a subscription.
I was once a subscriber, but sadly I let my subscription lapse, and it is probably people like me that have contributed to the magazine's demise.
Let's hope White Dragon emerges from the ashes or at least maintains the Dragon's Hoard as an important online archive of quality articles.
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