Customer Reviews

Emerald Cup Ark of Gold: Quest of Ss Lieutenant Otto Rahn

5 star:		(0)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

An extremely speculative work about the real quest for the Grail in the late 1930's and early 1940's. He gives at least two new definitions as to what the grail is: 1) The Cup of Moses, 2) A series of enruned tablets. He details the life and mistakes made by Otto Rahn in his quest to get published under the Nazi regime. He doesn't go so far as hinting that Rahn deliberately thwarted Nazi attempts to use his knowledge to plunder Mont Segur. Rather he believes that Rahn got it wrong in his researches. Some of his theories on Otto Rahn's demise are quite intriguing, but any suggestion that he lived long enough to form a secret society are somewhat problematic. The book does contain some relatively unknown and quite entertaining history about supercommando Otto Skorzeny's last days though.

There is no possibility of giving zero stars ... so I give one star for sheer dubiousness. The whole book is filled with highly speculative stories and straight out inaccuracies. I have concentrated on the chapter on Otto Skorzeny (since I recently wrote a short biography on him) and his supposed discovery of the Ark et al. near Montségur, but very little in this chapter could be verified. Skorzeny never was near the region during that time, let alone finding any Cathar treasure. Buechners sources are also very badly chosen and I have written to the author asking for better reference some time ago. Unsurprisingly I received no answer. This book is great late night or travelling trash reading, read it like a rollercoaster science fiction novel, but don't forget, the Nazis did not discover the Grail. However, one really has to wonder, why Dr. Buechner, who supposedly was the first doctor to attend to the liberated inmates of Dachau concentration camp, had to wait 36 years to come up with this bogus story about Skorzeny and the Nazis as Grailfinders. Avoid, if you are looking for historical data.