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The Fourth and Final book in the Wihtwara Trilogy.


Jan and Wihtflaed at Woden's sancturary
book 4 cover
The new Wihtwara

This final narrative builds a wonderful love story between King Arwald and Queen Wihtflǣd of Wihtland. Both physical and deeply spiritual, they mirror the Pagan people of the island. Peaceful and very aware of their enduring relationship to the Gods and Goddesses, always nurturing Nerthus, the Earth Mother.
Yet, the power of the Roman Catholic church is focused on destroying Paganism at all costs. In 686 C.E., Wessex invaders led by Cædwalla and supported by Bishop Wilfrid, took the island by force, and point of the sword, killing nearly 1,200 Wihtwara, including the royal family. They died holding their faith true to their heart and soul.
Bede (the monk with a pen) writes: Cædwalla came with an army, and he took the Isle of Wight, destroying nearly all the inhabitants thereof, and to place in their stead, twelve hundred Christian families from his own province. There is no doubt, Bede wrote with a great religious bias. Much of the pagan beliefs have been subsumed by religious over-thought and biased rantings.
The pagan god Wōden, was named Mercurius by the Romans for his skills in debate and negotiations. He was a living god. There are over seventy places in England citing Wōden. Yet so many have been subsumed into the prefix ‘devil’.
We have two on the inland, the devil’s punchbowl in Brading. It is an Ancestor burial mound. And most uniquely, the re-discovered Wōden’s ‘golden-eye’ Sanctuary in Ventnor, subsumed into the name ‘the devil’s chimney’. Here we can see his face clearly within the rockface and multiple ‘golden eyes’ in faces around.
I have spent over seven years researching this forgotten and subsumed history of this race of people who migrated to our shores at a much earlier time than the ‘monks with pens’ would have us believe. In fact, new archaeological DNA profiling, has sent much of this biased rhetoric into the ‘long grass’ where it belongs. The Suevii, (their true name) came to farm and not fight. Very recent archaeological finds near Sutton Hoo has gifted us amazing knowledge of a cultured, sophisticated, and wealthy race of people. The word penned by the monks calling them all ‘barbarians’ is a slur and a downright lie!
The archaeological finds on the island mirror that wealth too, giving the Wihtwara a high-status race of people.
This DNA profiling has also shown a mixed-race component of immigration to Engla-londe, with far-reaching melding of cultural and linguistic characteristics. Frieslanders hold a higher proportion of inhabitants within Suevii numbers, than first thought. And I have expanded the narrative to respect this.

And, I give my respect to Tacitus, who gives us an honest, unbiased chronicle that we can trust.

When I put my hand to the ancient standing stone we have on the island, I was shown the terrible day of that massacre. It was horrific. Truly alarming. And it took a few years in fact for me to face it, research it and find the wonderful peoples of the Wihtwara, the Meonwara and the Cantwara. And they are truly my ancestors as I found by birth name in ancient Suevii is Wahl, meaning guardian of the stones. I am a Pagan, and this trilogy is a Pagan narrative, which is exactly as it should be!
This book ends with the massacre but has a message of hope for us all.
Genocide never truly succeeds. The 2021 Census shows for the first time in 1,300 years, the Isle of Wight no longer has a Christian majority.

Bletsunga Beorhte
Bright Blessings
Jan Harper Whale (Wahl)

The Wihtwara Emporium ™ at Etsy

emporium tradingpost
emporium logo

Nerthus ... The Earth Mother

In 686 A.D the Christian led invasion of Wihtland (Isle of Wight) killed the Pagan islanders, the Wihtwara, because they would not give up their worship to Nature and their Goddess Nerthus.
Dagrun Wahl of the Warini is guardian of the stones. She discovers through the Last Telling, the truth about her people, the Wihtwara.
They are the true Royal bloodline to Woden.
And they were killed for it.

Nerthus

It has taken years of painstaking research to rediscover with verifiable evidence the true Ancestors of our Isle, after centuries of suppression. The Wihtwara were a spiritual, peaceable race of people who were massacred for their beliefs. It is my passion, my aim, to honour and respect them again, for without them we would not be here. 
It has been given to me loud and clear:-
"We only truly die when we are forgotten!"
Bletsunga Beorhte
Bright Blessings 
Jan Harper Whale



Ancient DNA research: The Truth

Now, after several years research on my part for the Wihtwara Trilogy series, the ground-breaking documentary, broadcast on the BBC in 2018, led by Professor Alice Roberts and who heads a team of eminent archaeologists, historians, DNA profile experts and scientists, prove the Anglo-Saxon Dark Age invasion never happened. This is science over myth at its very best. Myth busting. It gives fresh humanist evidence to a quieter, steadier migration of our ancestors. The Anglo Saxons, that I name Suevii, did not rampage with bloodthirsty cries intent on killing. They came to be farmers!
I would like to offer a commentary to the stills of this marvelous documentary, which can be viewed in its entirety by clicking on the link.
It proved a Eureka moment for me after all the years of my research and a confirmation also. Many thanks to Professor Alice Roberts and all the team that presented such definitive evidence to the true nature and purpose of the Suevii, our ancestors. And to the exciting evidence of our ancestors in the West.

With exclusive access to a major new excavation at Tintagel,
Alice Roberts pulls together all the latest evidence to reveal what Dark Age Britain was really like.
In the fifth century, the future of Britain hung in the balance; after four centuries of straight roads and hot and cold running water the Romans upped and left, called back to support their own ailing Empire.
   Watch from the very beginning
   The Experts in order of Appearance.

  • Prof. Alice Roberts. Biological Anthropologist, Biologist, Television presenter & Author.
  • Max Adams, Author & Archaeologist.
  • Dr Miles Russell, Historian & Archaeologist at Bournemouth University.
  • Win Scutt, Curator at English Heritage.
  • Jackie Nowakowski, Principal Archaeologist at Cornwall Archaeological Unit.
  • Julian Harrison, Curator of Medieval Manuscripts at The British Library.
  • Dr Sam Lucy, Archaeologist at Newnham College - Cambridge.
  • Prof. Dominic Powlesland, Archaeologist & Director at Landscape Research Centre.
  • Christine Haughton, Archaeologist.
  • James Lyall, Archaeologist.
  • Prof. Nicky Milner, Archaeology Department at University of York.
  • Prof. Peter Donnelly, Wellcome Centre for Human Genetics at University of Oxford.
  • Dr. Maria Duggan, British Academy Postdoctoral Fellow at Newcastle University.
  • James Gossip, Excavation Director at Cornwall Archaeological Unit.


The new evidence backed by science.
Our histories are in need of a re-write!
The real evidence uncovering the truth about our ancestors, the Wihtwara.
(1 st century C.E. -686 C.E.)



  After a many months that turned into years of research uncovering the smothered truth about our hidden race of peaceful pagan people, the Wihtwara on Wihtland (Isle of wight), I came to the extraordinary conclusion that the histories, (our only reference to that time) had been written by monks with a religious or political bias, some coming across as sheer polemic. It is myth and dramatised legend accepted as fact, taught to generations of our children, and is most certainly false. What possible facts are there are subsumed by romantic dramas fit for fiction but certainly not historical fact.
  I therefore turned to science. The first evidence I collected was an incredible accumulation of archaeological, linguistic, DNA profiling by the research scientist Stephen Oppenheimer.
  His book: The Origins of the British.
ISBN 978-1-84529-482-3 Cover

  British pre-history will have to be radically re-thought” Sir Barry Cunliffe


  The evidence is very compelling. Migrations from the Cimbric Peninsula occurred at a much earlier time and consistently over time to create a diverse population in early Britain. Human beings are innate travellers and explorers. Added to the evidence presented by Stephen Oppenheimer, is DNA profiling. And that evidence is clear. In a letter I wrote to a commenter on my books, admonishing the new evidence I wrote in reply:-

  Thank you very much for your point of view of our ancient his-story. It is appreciated as it encouraged me to research deeper into the vast reference material I have amassed over the course of three years study.

  With respect I would like to draw your attention to the finding made by the DNA study of our Ancestor’s lineage in Britain, published in 2015 in the New Scientist. 2,039 Caucasians took part with the proviso that four of their grandparents were born within 80 miles of each other, thereby fixing a date approx. to 1885 before immigration occurred.

  The team found that the genetic profiles of the participants formed 17 distinct clusters. When they mapped this information based on where the participants lived they were surprised to see the clusters mapped almost exactly to geographical location.
  The largest cluster accounted for half the participants and occupies almost the whole of eastern and southern England and most of the Midlands. This turned out to be the genetic legacy of the Anglo-Saxon invasions. Even so, at least 60 per cent of the DNA in the cluster had survived from earlier migrants ( Nature DOI: 10.1038/nature14230 ).
  In fact, all 17 clusters are dominated by DNA from settlers that arrived prior to the Anglo-Saxons. By comparing the clusters with genomes from modern-day continental Europe, the team was able to piece together the general migration pattern that took place.
  The first wave of arrivals crossed by land bridges, when sea levels were so low that Britain was attached to what is now northern Germany. This wave was dominated by people with genomes most like modern-day inhabitants of northern Germany and Belgium. In parallel, migrants from the west coast of France were arriving by boat. Traces of the combined DNA from all these three pioneer settlers forms the basis for the genetic-make up of all white Britons.”

  This undoubtedly supports the growing evidence that gradual migration to Britain’s shores occurred over a prolonged period. Before the now disputed ‘mass invasion’ of warring Saxons.

  And it is a to the Roman chronicler Tacitus that I would like to refer you to. He was of the time, beyond the biased writings of Bede who was deeply Christian, and his account created centuries afterwards. Tacitus traveled to Germania, his father-in-law Agricola was a governor of Britannia. Tacitus wrote as a reporter and his narrative is descriptive and enlightening.

  It is his accuracy in naming the tribes he encountered, to paint a diverse picture of the people that are our ancestors.

  "They celebrate the Tuisto sprung from the earth, and his son Mannus, as the fathers and founder of the race. To Mannus they ascribe three sons, from whose names the people bordering on the ocean are called Ingaevones: the rest, Istaevones. Some, however, assuming the license of antiquity, affirm that there were more descendants of the god, from whom more appellations were derived: as those of the Marsi, Gambrivii, Suevi, and Vandali: and that these are the genuine and original names.
  That of Germany, on the other hand, they assert to be a modern addition: for that the people who first crossed the Rhine, and expelled the Gauls, and are now called Tungri, were then named Germans: which appellation of a particular tribe, not of a whole people, gradually prevailed: so that the title of Germans, first assumed by the victors, to excite terror, was afterwards adopted by the nation in general.”

  I would like to draw your attention to the confederacy of seven tribes: the Suevi. Just as the rich tapestry of many tribal societies became euphemised as ‘German,’ so the inhabitants of and very migratory people in the Cimbric Peninsular, became euphemised as “Jutlanders” or Jutes, an over simplified version of their lives has been painted.

  Within the Suevi, there were: Eudose, Anglii (Anglo), Aviones Reudigni, Warini, Suarini and Nuitones, a confederacy of seven tribes who unite to worship Nerthus, (Hertha) the Earth Mother, in equal standing to the male gods Woden, Tiw, Thor.
  They unite in the worship of Hertha, Mother Earth: and suppose her to interfere in the affairs of men, and to visit the different nations. In an island of the ocean stands a sacred and unviolated grove, in which is a consecrated chariot, covered with a veil, which the priest alone is permitted to touch. He becomes conscious of the entrance of the goddess into this secret recess, and with profound veneration attends the vehicle, which is drawn by yoked cows. At this season all is joy: and every place the goddess deigns to visit is a scene of festivity. No wars are undertaken arms are untouched: and every hostile weapon is shut up. Peace abroad and at home are then only known then only loved: until at length the same priest reconducts the goddess back to her temple.”

  May I recommend you read The Wihtwara, a fictional story based on years of this research. And you will find that nearly 50% of the story is devoted to Woden and the patriarchal gods.


WALKING WITH OUR ANCESTORS



Our new podcast for 2022:
Enjoy a meditative and poetic journey around our sacred Isle,
walking with our Ancestors the Wihtwara. Illustrating the creation of the Snowdrop essence
for Imbolc. And visiting our sacred places.
Bletsunga Beorhte
Bright Blessings Jan & Mitch xx


The Wihtwara ™. The rediscovered people of the Isle of Wight. Jan Harper-Whale



With the Positive Living group meeting at Ryde Library.
Takes us to the Nerthus Oak Tree near Brighstone on the Island.
Visiting The Longstone, on Mottistone down.



Prophecies from the Ancestors 1
From The Wihtwara ™.

The Sacred standing stone high up on Mottistone down is so ancient, it has crystal formations within, which act as a recorder, transmitter and transducer.
Our Ancestors, the Wihtwara knew of its power. Visions as prophecies were laid within the beautiful tall stone. Time is of little consequence. The recordings remain.
When I discovered that, as a Wahl, I am directly related by blood to these Ancestors and when I was shown through visions from the Longstone of their last traumatic days here on Wihtland, at the hands of the invading army of Christian fundamentalists, Cædwalla and bishop Wilfred,
I knew beyond a doubt, that I had to record in book form the lives and times of these beautiful spiritual pagan people.
Their Ancestors told them through the stones. The prophecy at the Nerthus Oak in the 1st book, The Wihtwara warned of times to come.


Prophecies of the Ancestors
From the Wihtwara Dynasty™ book 3

The Roman Catholic missionaries renamed many pagan sites to insult and degrade. We have several on this sacred Isle.
The devil's punchbowl on Brading down, which is an ancestral burial ground.
The devil's chimney lays hidden along the undercliff near Ventnor.
This stunning and beautiful gift from Nerthus is a sanctuary, a healing place that also holds, drȳcræft magic. The faces of Wōden lay within the stone edifice. The sacred stone gives a prophecy of the invasion to the island of the one god religion that will demand forsaking the ages old gods of Nature embedded for centuries within the soul of every pagan.
Our Ancestors held fast, held true and did not recant. In 686 C.E. swords were unsheathed, and a religious genocide began of a peaceful pagan people.
The Wihtwara ™.

Greetings friends and guardians of our sacred Isle.
We invite you to join us , Wight Druids and Wake the Wight, celebrating Spring Equinox 2021.
We have expanded this time to create two videos, each offering a different perspective.
Wight druids celebrates Alban Eiler with stunning videos.
Wake the Wight focuses on the Wihtwara with two readings from the Trilogy on "Our Ancestors Prophecies."
They are to remind us that April 22nd, King Arwald's day is near, and we hold dear their memory.


Imbolc snowdrops flowers Hello Friends and Caretakers of our island home.
Wight Druids and Wake the Wight invite you join us in the celebration of Imbolc
brought to you as a podcast. We are focusing on hope, symbolised in the first flower Snowdrop.
And sending out Hope to all those in need and looking forward to a time
when we will once again join in circle at the Longstone.
In the mean time we hope you will enjoy this virtual journey. You can find images of the making of the snowdrop essence in the video, above.



The Wihtwara on Sound-Cloud

On 24 Oct 2017, Caroline & Mo Talk To Jan Harper-Whale with Dana Molecki, at Vectis Radio.