Forty one days of the sun beating down, the hillside's the colour of rust.
The grass in the fields is withered and brown, the countryside drowning in dust.
Well I am your man, I can find water.
Let me alone, let me walk on the land
Slowly I'll enter my dreams,
And when the hazel-wood turns, and twists in my hands,
Under your feet are the streams"(from) The Well Show of Hands
Basic Information
Dowsing is a form of divination folk magic used in locating objects or substances. The best known form of dowsing is that performed for underground water, where the dowser walks the land with either a "y" shaped rod, or two crossed rods of hazel wood and feels for a sensation of twisting or pulling in the rods that indicates that there is water below them. Other substances can be sought in the same way with different woods, whilst some dowsers claim to be able to dowse with different materials, including metal wire. Some traditions also allow dowsing to be performed with a pendulum, which may pull towards the object or material sought or begin to swing or circle when above it. Again the materials of the pendulum are likely to matter - the laws of sympathy and contagion are likely to be relevant, especially when seeking people.
The above may be considered "direct" dowsing - "indirect" dowsing may also be performed using a pendulum and a map, looking for the pendulum to act unusually over the part of the map where that which is sought is located.
Some traditions dictate that water in particular, if found by dowsing, should not be sold or otherwise traded, but that might be a function, for example, of a spirit mediated practice and the prejudices of the specific spirit. Dowsing for other substances - such as metal ores, coal and the like is not normally under such restrictions, let alone those forms of dowsing that seek specific objects or people.
Dowsing is practiced by a great many cultures and traditions, many of which differ as to whether it may, must or even can be performed by a trained practitioner, whether potentially anyone could do it or whether it is a stand-alone gift.
Sources
Game and Story Use
- As noted, this may or may not be a "spell" or even really magic - some sources might consider it psionics, others a skill anyone can learn. Some might not accept the distinction in the first place.
- Note, for example, that Harry Dresden (he of The Files) uses - and is targeted by - both direct and indirect dowsing, usually with a pendulum.
- Spirit mediated dowsing - especially for water - might well be directed by a undine or similar spirit dwelling (or imminent to dwell) in that source - and not only might expect its well not to be bartered or sold, but might expect propitiation (such as a well dressing ceremony) or the erection of a shrine).
- In a suitably animist setting, a local well spirit might gain so much power from an attentive village of worshippers that it gains extra abilities such as the ability to heal, which in turn might aid its apotheosis into a local god (and if its village grows to form the seed of an imperial metropolis … like Ancient Rome, perhaps ascension to still higher power levels).