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Pendulum

Also Known As Dowsing bob
Divinatory Implements

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Origin 1500 to 1854

A weight on a chain, held still and read for movement, a swing one way for yes, another for no, usually calibrated by the user beforehand. It is used for questions, over maps, and in some practices over the body.

The movement is produced by the ideomotor effect, small unconscious muscular action, which has been understood since Chevreul described it in 1833 and demonstrated that the pendulum stops when the holder cannot see it. Practitioners differ on what that establishes: some take the mechanism as fatal to the claim, others as the means by which something otherwise inaccessible reaches the hand. The physics is not in dispute even where the interpretation is.

Facts
Origins
Origin Period
1500 to 1854 1
Origin Period
The pendulum as a divinatory instrument is documented in the nineteenth 1
Use
Who May Handle It
Anyone; it is offered to the public 1
Consecration
Not consecrated; an instrument, not a consecrated object 1
Attributions
Tradition
Modern divination, dowsing 1
Learn More
The Weight That Answers Yes or No

The pendulum is a weight on a chain, held still and then read for its movement, a swing one way taken for yes and another for no, and it is among the simplest of divinatory instruments.

Reading the swing

The user holds the chain so that the weight hangs still and then watches for it to swing, rotate or tremble, having usually agreed beforehand which motion means yes, which no, and which no answer, so the pendulum gives responses to questions put to it. It is used for divination, for answering questions, and in the practice of dowsing to locate water, objects or points on a map or a body, where the swing is read as marking the thing sought. The device is easy to make and to use, which accounts for its wide popular currency.

Where the movement comes from

The movements of the pendulum are, on the ordinary scientific account, produced by tiny involuntary muscular actions of the hand, the ideomotor effect, in which the expectation of the user is translated into unconscious motion, so that the pendulum reflects the mind of the holder rather than an outside source. Practitioners understand the movement variously, as guidance, as intuition made visible, or as contact with something beyond, and the object sits at the centre of that difference of interpretation. Whatever the account, its function is constant: to turn a question into a visible motion that can be read as an answer.

A Weight on a String, and Why Users Cleanse a New One

A pendulum is about as simple an object as this list contains, a weight, commonly a faceted crystal point, a brass bob or a turned wood ball, hung from a chain or a length of thread, and the simplest working version is nothing more than a ring or a key on a string, requiring no purchase or craftsmanship at all.

Who makes them, and who uses them

Crystal and metal pendulums sold for dowsing and divination come from ordinary jewelry and lapidary workshops rather than any specialist ritual maker, and there is no restriction on who may own or use one. Many practitioners nonetheless treat a new pendulum as needing to be cleansed or attuned before its first real use, commonly left in moonlight, passed through incense smoke or simply held and used slowly at first, a practice framed as calibrating the object to its user rather than as a formal consecration.

Personal ownership and replacement

Because a pendulum is considered by many users to become personally attuned over time, a lost or broken one is generally replaced rather than mourned, but some practitioners are reluctant to buy a used pendulum secondhand without cleansing it first, treating it as carrying something of its previous owner's use in a way a brand new one does not.

Cross-Tradition Connections

Associated With

Divination, Practices

A divinatory instrument: a question is put and the swing is read against a key the user sets beforehand, over a map, over the body, or over the question itself.

Source De la baguette divinatoire, du pendule dit explorateur et des tables tournantesMichel-Eugene Chevreul

Belongs to Tradition

Hermeticism, Religions
Source De la baguette divinatoire, du pendule dit explorateur et des tables tournantesMichel-Eugene Chevreul

Related To

Talking Board, Sacred Objects & Ritual Items

Both are read by watching a held or touched object move, and both are explained by the ideomotor effect, the small unconscious muscular action Chevreul described in 1833 by showing that a pendulum stops when its holder cannot see it. The physics is not in dispute even where the interpretation is.

Source De la baguette divinatoire, du pendule dit explorateur et des tables tournantesMichel-Eugene Chevreul
Sources
1. De la baguette divinatoire, du pendule dit explorateur et des tables tournantes
Michel-Eugene Chevreul, Mallet-Bachelier, Paris, 1854on the pendulum and dowsingView the Source
1. De la baguette divinatoire, du pendule dit explorateur et des tables tournantes
Michel-Eugene Chevreul, Mallet-Bachelier, Paris, 1854The letters to Ampere; the account of the screened trialsView the Source
New Age Religion and Western Culture: Esotericism in the Mirror of Secular Thought
Wouter J. Hanegraaff, Brill, 1996on divination in modern practiceView the Source
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