The Source Field Investigations (20 page)

I understand that some people might consider this entire interpretation of Great Pyramid prophecy to be numerology, and therefore lacking in any scientific credibility. However, no one can deny that this same symbolic message of a returning capstone was forever enshrined on the reverse side of the Great Seal of the United States. The strange symbol of a single eye inside a gleaming-white triangle, descending onto a thirteen-course pyramid, has appeared on every U.S. dollar bill in circulation since the 1930s. The Great Seal was first proposed on the very day the Declaration of Independence was signed—July 4, 1776. Thomas Jefferson commissioned a French West Indian portrait painter named Eugene Pierre du Simitiere to create the original design, which was then approved by Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin and John Adams.

Even in these earliest versions, the “Eye of Providence”—a single eye, gleaming with light—appears over the pyramid. The original phrase that was written around the pyramid was “Deo Favente Perennis.”
Deo
means “God,” as well as “the open sky” and something that is “charged with the brightness of day.” The word
favente
means “favor, befriend, support and back up,” and
perennis
means “continual, everlasting, perpetual, perennial and eternal.” So, a loose translation would be “God Supports [us] Eternally.” In Latin, the word
perennial
means “yearly,” something that repeats every year—so this could be another reference to the Great Year of precession: “God Supports the Great Year.” Some of the earliest American currency featured the unfinished pyramid as the main symbol on the front—although in this case the Eye of Providence did not appear at the top. As we now know, the pyramid is also a baetyl—the symbol of the pineal gland in many ancient cultures. Perhaps the founding fathers felt the inclusion of this obviously Masonic symbol—the awakened pineal gland, or third eye, inside a triangle—would be too controversial for the early American colonists. In this case, the word
perennis
was written overhead, by itself.

By 1782, later revisions of the Great Seal changed the wording to what we now see—with “Annuit Coeptis” on the top and “Novus Ordo Seclorum” on the bottom. These phrases make the message even clearer. The word
annuit
means “to favor or smile on,” often by nodding approval—and the word
coeptis
means “undertaking,” as well as “beginning, starting and commencing.” When we include the Eye of Providence as a symbol of God, the phrase thus translates as “God has favored our beginnings.” However, there’s deeper symbolism in this phrase as well. The word
annuit
is related to other Latin words that mean “yearly”—and this is where we get the word
annual
from. One translation of the Latin word
annui
is a “yearly payment.” So,
Annuit Coeptis
can also mean “The [Great] Year Begins.” The payment we are expected to get from the Great Year appears to be written into the symbol itself—namely, the transformation of the earth, where the precessional cycle begins again.

United States $50 bill from 1778 with 13-course pyramid and the word
Perennis
—likely symbolizing the Great Year, or precession of the equinoxes.

This message is made much clearer when we delve into the mysterious roots of the phrase “Novus Ordo Seclorum,” which was incorporated into the Great Seal of the United States in 1782 by Charles Thomson. The official record openly states that Thomson was inspired by line five of Virgil’s Fourth Eclogue, which we will discuss shortly. The original Latin reads
Magnus ab integro seclorum nascitur ordo
, and it is interpreted to mean “and the majestic roll of circling centuries begins anew.” This sounds very much like a description of the Great Cycle of precession—describing the “majestic roll of circling centuries” that now “begins anew,” creating a Golden Age in the process.

In my early years of intensive research, circa 1994, I found a direct quote from C. A. L. Totten, a 1st Lieutenant in the 4th artillery of the U.S. Army, who explained the deeper meaning of the Great Seal. This was published as a letter he wrote to Charles J. Folger, the secretary of the Treasury, on February 10, 1882:

Totten goes on to give the exact quote, which is stunning—but first, let’s explore the “mystic Sibylline records” in greater detail, so we understand the context. In the early days of the formation of Rome, the name “sibyl” was derived from the Greek word
sibulla
, which meant a woman who gives prophecies—also known as an oracle. The Oracle at Delphi hosted the mysterious omphalos stone, a symbol of the pineal gland that was also believed to be a direct telepathic conduit to the god Apollo. There were ten famous sibyls throughout the ancient world, including Persia, Libya, Delphi, Samos, Cimmeria, Erythraea, Tibur, Marpessus, and Phrygia—but the most highly revered was the Sibyl of Cumae, who lived in a cave near Naples.
³⁹
Cumae was the first Greek colony founded in Italy, in a volcanic region near Mount Vesuvius.
⁴⁰
In 1932, the Sibyl of Cumae’s cave was discovered, dispelling rumors that she was only a myth—and it had a 60-foot-high ceiling and a 375-foot-long passage leading into it.
⁴¹
The Sibyl wrote her prophecies on oak leaves, which she then left outside the cave, at any one of a hundred different entrances. If no one came to pick them up when they arrived, they simply blew away in the wind.

A 2001
National Geographic
article suggested that the oracles’ mystical abilities may have been the result of hallucinogenic gases such as ethylene that naturally appear in the caves. Spring water near the site of the Temple at Delphi tested positive for ethylene, which has a sweet smell and creates a narcotic effect.
⁴²
Apparently the Cumaean Sibyl would sit on top of a tripod that was built directly over a grotto within the cave that volcanic gases would rise through.
⁴³
She also swallowed a few drops of bay laurel juice before entering into the trance state where she received the prophecies.
⁴⁴
Virgil gave an intense description of the Sibyl of Cumae at work in the
Aeneid.
Her behavior definitely suggests a powerful hypnotic influence had taken hold of her.

During the time of the fiftieth annual Olympic Games and the founding of the city of Rome, the Sibyl of Cumae approached King Tarquin with nine books of her prophecies, claiming they contained the entire future history of Rome.
⁴⁶
Tarquin ruled from 534 to 510 B.C. This wizened old woman asked the king for nine bags of gold as payment, and he refused her exorbitant price. Right in front of King Tarquin she burned the first three of the nine books, which at the time he didn’t think was a big deal. However, her fame and reputation as a prophetess quickly grew, and when she later returned, she offered Tarquin the remaining six books for the same price. Again he refused—and again she burned the next three books right in front of him, making her seem all the more crazy. Nonetheless, by the time she returned with the final three books, she had become truly legendary for her accuracy. The king’s advisors urged him to accept her offer even though she still asked him for nine bags of gold—and he finally accepted.

Regardless of what any skeptics may think in modern times about the art of prophecy, the Sibylline Leaves were soon considered to be the greatest treasure in all of Rome—precious beyond any and all other government assets. They were renowned for their stunning accuracy, which apparently included a prediction of the invasion of Hannibal and his eventual defeat seven hundred years before it happened, as well as a prediction of Constantine by name, eight hundred years before he was born.
⁴⁷
They were consulted in times of great national emergency, such as earthquakes, floods, hurricanes, diseases and hardship.
⁴⁸
Michelangelo even included a depiction of the Sibyl of Cumae in his famous painting of the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel.
⁴⁹

As the Sibyl of Cumae originally described to Tarquin, these books apparently did contain the future history of Rome—but the problem was that the prophecies were worded in cryptic language that was not always clear. In many cases, when Roman emperors attempted to use the mystery texts to avoid a major catastrophe, they ended up actually fulfilling the prophecy they had hoped to prevent. For this reason the books were considered to be potentially dangerous; by trying to use them to stop a disaster from happening, you might actually create the disaster. They were thus kept under high security in vaults within subterranean chambers in the Temple of Jupiter on the Capitoline Hill in Rome—accessible only to the high priests. The chambers and the temple were completed as of 500 B.C., specifically to store this treasure—which was only to be consulted in the most severe emergencies.

The Roman Senate considered the texts so valuable that ultimately an entire College of Priests was tasked to either track down or reenvision the first six lost volumes. They never succeeded in recovering the original words of the Sibyl. When Marcus Atilius authorized someone to copy the original three books, going against the official secrecy, he was punished by death—sewn into a sack and thrown into the Tiber River.
⁵⁰
Virgil was finally allowed to copy some of the texts into his Eclogues as of A.D. 82,
⁵¹
and the temple of Jupiter then burned in A.D. 83, destroying most, if not all of the originals. General Flavius Stilicho burned the remaining copies in A.D. 405, believing them to be pagan and evil. Five years later, when Rome was invaded by the Visigoths, some felt this was Rome’s punishment for having destroyed the prophetic texts.

Virgil’s Fourth Eclogue is thus believed to be one of the last remaining transcripts of the original Sibylline texts. The fact that “Novus Ordo Seclorum” was directly adopted from these mystery texts, and was combined with the Great Pyramid in the design of the Great Seal of the United States as of 1782, makes the story of the founding fathers much more interesting. Peter Tompkins wrote about this in
Secrets of the Great Pyramid.

It is fascinating to consider that the United States was founded for a secret purpose from the very beginning—which appears to be directly related to the end of the Great Year and the prophecies of a coming Golden Age. Based on the evidence we surveyed in chapter 3, the Great Seal now appears to be only the most recent version of this ancient symbol—which was featured prominently on Greek and Roman coins. The “secret and august body existing in Europe” appears to have originated in Sumer, Babylon and Egypt, and has hidden techniques that help awaken the pineal gland.

Let’s return to Lieutenant Totten’s letter, which described the exact content of the Sibylline text that “Novus Ordo Seclorum” comes from. When I first read this in 1994 I was shocked—and even more surprised that hardly anyone seemed to know about it. The Sibyl of Cumae broke up history into a series of “ages,” and in this passage she refers to the coming of the last age in her story—which is referred to as the “Cumaean song.” Here’s the exact translation of the Sibylline mystery text as Totten wrote in 1882—and don’t forget these are the exact words quoted, in shorthand, on the back of the U.S. dollar.