Key to the Sacred Pattern: The Untold Story of Rennes-le-Château

Henry Lincoln

Aug 2015 · Grave Distractions Publications

About this ebook

Ten years before the publication of Holy Blood, Holy Grail, Henry Lincoln began his odyssey into the mysteries of an insignificant village in the French Pyrenees. In the 1890s, Bérenger Saunière, the penniless priest of Rennes-le-Château became spectacularly wealthy after finding coded parchments hidden in his church. His largesse transformed the village. His Magdala Tower and his mysterious renovation of his church still stand as silent testament to the enduring mysteries of Rennes-le-Château.

Fifty years after Saunière’s death, Henry Lincoln picked up the trail to discover the truth behind the priest’s unexplained wealth. Lincoln’s dogged and methodical research culminated in three BBC television documentaries and the world-wide best-sellers Holy Blood, Holy Grail and The Messianic Legacy, which put forward the hypothesis that perhaps the priest had stumbled upon facts known only to a secret society, the Priory of Sion. Is it possible that Jesus was married? Did he father a blood-line which still survives? Was the Priory of Sion behind the Knights Templar? Did Saunière find some – or all – of their fabled treasure? 

Clue after clue was uncovered by Lincoln and, in Key to the Sacred Pattern, lays down the history of Lincoln’s quest. It is largely due to Lincoln’s dogged and methodical research into Berenger Sauniere, Rennes-le-Chateau, the Knights Templar, and the Priory of Sion that the world has seen a glimpse into one of history’s most compelling mysteries. Certainly Lincoln’s work has been generously built on by both fiction and non-fiction authors and the resulting cultural phenomena centering around Berenger Sauniere, Rennes-le-Chateau, the Knights Templar, and the Prior of Sion.

But to say that Key to the Sacred Pattern is the chronicle of a hunt for lost Templar gold or chasing a shadowy secret society would be a mistake. The true gem of Key to the Sacred Pattern is Lincoln’s presentation of the unarguable and astonishing facts behind this strange and gripping mystery. Far older than Jesus, it stretches back into an undreamt past. Is there a geometric pattern to the placement of holy places throughout Europe? Discover the true Rennes-le-Château and the reality which lies beyond the mountaintop village. This second edition of Key to the Sacred Pattern contains additional material as well as new and updated images.

Ratings and reviews

Gripping

About the author

Henry Lincoln has had a long and distinguished career as author, television presenter, scriptwriter and actor. Most notably, he was co-author of the controversial 1982 New York Times bestseller, Holy Blood, Holy Grail, which introduced most of the world to the shadowy Priory of Sion, the secret society behind the treasure hunt in the French village of Rennes-le-Château and the idea that Jesus was married to Mary Magdalene… which was the basis for Dan Brown’s 2003 fictional bestseller, The Da Vinci Code.

In the years since Holy Blood, Holy Grail, Lincoln has continued dissecting the real mystery in Key to the Sacred Pattern; as well as The Holy Place and The Templars’ Secret Island (with Erling Haagensen).

Lincoln also wrote and narrated the original BBC TV documentaries which, in the 1970s, first made the world outside France aware of this astonishing true-life treasure hunt.

In the years before Rennes-le-Château, Lincoln was already known for his Doctor Who serials, written for Patrick Troughton—the second Doctor—in which he also created the popular character, Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart.

Lincoln currently lives near Rennes-le-Château and is working to ensure that his detailed research material, gathered over more than forty years, will be permanently accessible and searchable on the Internet. “Too much rubbish and wishful-thinking has been draped over this mystery,” he says. “It’s time for people to have the courage—and the sense—to confront the truth.”