A dowser, from an 18th-century French book about superstitions
Dowsing is a type ofdivination employed in attempts to locateground water, buried metals orores, gemstones,oil, claimed radiations (radiesthesia),[1]gravesites,[2] malign "earth vibrations"[3] and many other objects and materials without the use of ascientific apparatus. It is also known asdivining (especially inwater divining),[4]doodlebugging[5] (particularly in the United States, in searching forpetroleum ortreasure)[6] orwater finding, orwater witching (in the United States).
A Y-shaped twig or rod, or two L-shaped ones, calleddowsing rods ordivining rods are normally used, and the motion of these are said to reveal the location of the target material. The motion of such dowsing devices is generally attributed to random movement, or to theideomotor phenomenon,[7][8][9] a psychological response where a subject makes motions unconsciously.
Dowsing for metal ore, from 1556 "De re metallica libri XII" bookUse of a divining Rod observed in Great Britain in the late 18th centuryAn illustration of a divining rod
Dowsing originated in ancient times, when it was treated as a form ofdivination. TheCatholic Church banned the practice completely.[12]
Old texts about searching for water do not mention using the divining twig, and the first account of this practice was in 1568.[14][15]Sir William F. Barrett wrote in his 1911 bookPsychical Research that:
...in a recent admirable Life ofSt. Teresa of Spain, the following incident is narrated: Teresa in 1568 was offered the site for a convent to which there was only one objection, there was no water supply; happily, a Friar Antonio came up with a twig in his hand, stopped at a certain spot and appeared to be making the sign of the cross; but Teresa says, "Really I cannot be sure if it were the sign he made, at any rate he made some movement with the twig and then he said, ' Dig just here '; they dug, and lo ! a plentiful fount of water gushed forth, excellent for 'drinking, copious for washing, and it never ran dry.' " As the writer of this Life remarks: "Teresa, not having heard of dowsing, has no explanation for this event", and regarded it as a miracle. This, I believe, is the first historical reference to dowsing for water.[16][17]
In 1662, divining with rods was declared to be "superstitious, or rathersatanic" by aJesuit,Gaspar Schott, though he later noted that he was not sure that thedevil was always responsible for the movement of the rod.[18] In southern France in the 17th century, it was used to track criminals andheretics. Its abuse led to a decree of theinquisition in 1701, forbidding its employment for purposes of justice.[19]
Anepigram by Samuel Sheppard, fromEpigrams theological, philosophical, and romantick (1651) runs thus:
Some Sorcerers do boast they have a Rod, Gather'd with Vowes and Sacrifice, And (borne about) will strangely nod To hidden Treasure where it lies; Mankind is (sure) that Rod divine, For to the Wealthiest (ever) they incline.
Dowsing practices used in an attempt to locatemetals are still performed much like they were during the 16th century.[20] The 1550 edition ofSebastian Münster'sCosmographia contains awoodcut of a dowser with forked rod in hand walking over a cutaway image of a mining operation. The rod is labeled in Latin and German; "Virgula Divina–Glück-Rüt" ('Rod Divine, Luck-Rod'), but there is no text accompanying the woodcut. By 1556,Georgius Agricola's treatment of mining andsmelting ofore,De Re Metallica, included a detailed description of dowsing for metal ore.[21]
...There are many great contentions between miners concerning the forked twig, for some say that it is of the greatest use in discovering veins, and others deny it. ... All alike grasp the forks of the twig with their hands, clenching their fists, it being necessary that the clenched fingers should be held toward the sky in order that the twig should be raised at that end where the two branches meet. Then they wander hither and thither at random through mountainous regions. It is said that the moment they place their feet on a vein the twig immediately turns and twists, and so by its action discloses the vein; when they move their feet again and go away from that spot the twig becomes once more immobile. ...[22]
In the 16th century, German deep mining technology was in enormous demand all over Europe.German miners were licensed to live and work in England;[23] particularly in theStannaries (tin mines) ofDevon andCornwall and inCumbria. In other parts of England, the technique was used in the royal mines forcalamine. By 1638 German miners were recorded using the technique in silver mines in Wales.[24]
TheMiddle Low German name for a forked stick (Y-rod) wasSchlag-Ruthe[25][26] ('striking rod').[27] This was translated in the sixteenth century Cornish dialect toduschen[28][clarification needed] (duschan according to William Barrett[27]) (Middle English, 'to strike, fall'[29]). By the seventeenth century the English termdowsing was coming into common use.[30]
In the lead-mining area of theMendip Hills inSomerset, England in the 17th century the natural philosopherRobert Boyle, inspired by the writings of Agricola, watched a practitioner try to find "latent veins of metals". Boyle saw the hazel divining rod (virgula divinatoria) stoop in the hands of the diviner, who protested that he was not applying any force to the twig; Boyle accepted the man's genuine belief but himself remained unconvinced.[31] Towards the end of the century, in 1691 the philosopherJohn Locke, who was born in the EnglishWest Country, used the termdeusing-rod for theOld Latin namevirgula divina.[32] So,dowse is synonymous withstrike, hence the phrases: todowse/strike a light,[33] todowse/strike a sail.[34]
Dowsing was conducted inSouth Dakota in the late 19th and early 20th centuries to helphomesteaders, farmers and ranchers locate water wells on their property.[35]
The military have occasionally resorted to dowsing techniques. In theFirst World WarGallipoli campaign,sapper Stephen Kelly, of the 3rd Light Horse Brigade, Australian Expeditionary Force, became well known for finding water for the British troops.[36] In the late 1960s during theVietnam War, someUnited States Marines used dowsing when locating weapons and tunnels.[37] As late as in 1986, when 31 soldiers were taken by anavalanche during an operation in theNATO drill Anchor Express inVassdalen, Norway, theNorwegian army attempted to locate soldiers buried in the avalanche using dowsing as a search method.[38]
Dowsing is still used by some farmers and water engineers in Britain; however, many of the country's utilities have distanced themselves from the practice.[39][40][41][42][43]
Early attempts at an explanation of dowsing were based on the notion that the divining rod was physically affected by emanations from substances of interest. The following explanation is fromWilliam Pryce's 1778Mineralogia Cornubiensis:
The corpuscles... that rise from the Minerals, entering the rod, determine it to bow down, in order to render it parallel to the vertical lines which the effluvia describe in their rise. In effect the Mineral particles seem to be emitted from the earth; now the Virgula [rod], being of a light porous wood, gives an easy passage to these particles, which are also very fine and subtle; the effluvia then driven forwards by those that follow them, and pressed at the same time by the atmosphere incumbent on them, are forced to enter the little interstices between the fibres of the wood, and by that effort they oblige it to incline, or dip down perpendicularly, to become parallel with the little columns which those vapours form in their rise.
A study towards the end of the 19th century concluded that the phenomenon was attributed tocryptesthesia, where the practitioner makes unconscious observations of the terrain and involuntarily influences the movement of the rod.[44] Early investigations by members of theSociety for Psychical Research endorsed this view.[45]
CommittedparapsychologistG. N. M. Tyrrell also believed that the action of the rod was caused by involuntary muscular movements and debunked the theory of external influences.[46]
Dowsing over maps, prior to visiting the site, was also believed to work, hence some kind ofclairvoyance was proposed. This was believed to act on thenervous system, rather than on the muscles directly. These various mechanisms remain in contention among dowsers.[45]
In the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries, a number of dowsing-like devices were marketed for modern police and military use, primarily as explosive detectors, such as theADE 651,Sniffex, and theGT200.[47][48] In consequence of these frauds, in 1999 the United States National Institute of Justice issued advice against buying equipment based on dowsing.[49]
George Casely uses a hazel twig to search for water on the land around hisDevon farm, 1942.
Traditionally, the most common method used is the dowsing twig, a forked (Y-shaped) branch from a tree or bush. Some dowsers prefer branches from particular trees, and some prefer the branches to be freshly cut.Hazel twigs in Europe andwitch-hazel in the United States are traditionally commonly chosen, as are branches fromwillow orpeach trees. The two ends on the forked side are held one in each hand with the third (the stem of the Y) pointing straight ahead. The dowser then walks slowly over the places where the target (for example, minerals or water) may be, and the dowsing rod is expected to dip, incline or twitch when a discovery is made.[30] This method is sometimes known as "willow witching." Some dowsers would hang a golden ring on the edge of the dowsing rod, or split the tip to slide in a silver coin.[50]
Many modern dowsers use a pair of L-shaped metal rods. One rod is held in each hand, with the short arm of the L held upright, and the long arm pointing forward. The upright arm is often free to rotate inside a tube. When something is "found," the rods move in synchrony. Depending on the dowser, they may cross over or swing apart.[4] If the object is long and straight, such as a water pipe, the rods may point in opposite directions, showing its orientation. The rods may be fashioned from wire coat hangers or wire flags used for locating utilities. Glass or plastic rods have also been accepted. Straight rods are also sometimes used for the same purposes, and were common in early 19th centuryNew England.
Apendulum weight on a short cord or thread is the tool of choice for many modern dowsers.[4][obsolete source] The dowser holds the cord in one hand and allows the pendulum to swing freely. The dowser then observes how the pendulum is swinging and interprets the motion to offer insights.[51]
Dowsing studies from the early twentieth century were examined bygeologistJohn Walter Gregory in a report for theSmithsonian Institution. Gregory concluded that the results were a matter of chance or explained by observations from ground surface clues.[52][53]
Geologist W. A. MacFadyen tested three dowsers during 1943–1944 inAlgeria. The results were entirely negative.[54]
A 1948 study inNew Zealand by P. A. Ongley tested 75 dowsers' ability to detect water. None of them was more reliable than chance. According to Ongley "not one showed the slightest accuracy."[55]
In 1971, dowsing experiments were organized by British engineer R. A. Foulkes on behalf of theMinistry of Defence. The results were "no more reliable than a series of guesses".[58]
PhysicistsJohn Taylor and Eduardo Balanovski reported in 1978 a series of experiments they conducted that searched for unusualelectromagnetic fields emitted by dowsing subjects; they did not detect any.[59]
A 1979 review byEvon Z. Vogt andRay Hyman examined many controlled studies of dowsing for water, and found that none of them showed better than chance results.[10]
British academics Richard N. Bailey, Eric Cambridge, and H. Denis Briggs, carried out dowsing experiments at the grounds of various churches. They reported successful results in their bookDowsing and Church Archaeology (1988).[60] Their experiments were critically examined byarchaeologist Martijn Van Leusen who suggested they were badly designed and the authors had redefined the test parameters on what was classified as a "hit" or "miss" to obtain positive results.[60]
A 2006 study of grave dowsing in Iowa reviewed 14 published studies and determined that none of them correctly predicted the location of human burials, and simple scientific experiments demonstrated that the fundamental principles commonly used to explain grave dowsing were incorrect.[61]
A randomizeddouble-blind trial in 2012 was carried out to determine whetherhomeopaths were able to distinguish betweenBryonia andplacebo by use of a dowsing method. The results were negative.[62]
A 1990 double-blind study[63][64][65] was undertaken inKassel, Germany, under the direction of theGesellschaft zur Wissenschaftlichen Untersuchung von Parawissenschaften (Society for the Scientific Investigation of the Parasciences).James Randi offered aUS$10,000 prize to any successful dowser. The three-day test of some thirty dowsers involved plastic pipes through which water flow could be controlled and directed. The pipes were buried 50centimeters (19.7 in) under a level field, the position of each marked on the surface with a colored strip. The dowsers had to tell whether water was running through each pipe. All the dowsers signed a statement agreeing this was a fair test of their abilities and that they expected a 100% success rate. However, the results were no better than chance, and no one was awarded the prize.
In a 1987–88 study inMunich byHans-Dieter Betz and other scientists, 500 dowsers were initially tested for their skill, and the experimenters selected the best 43 among them for further tests. Water was pumped through a pipe on the ground floor of a two-story barn. Before each test, the pipe was moved in a direction perpendicular to the water flow. On the upper floor, each dowser was asked to determine the position of the pipe. Over two years, the dowsers performed 843 such tests and, of the 43 pre-selected and extensively tested candidates, at least 37 showed no dowsing ability. The results from the remaining 6 were said to be better than chance, resulting in the experimenters' conclusion that some dowsers "in particular tasks, showed an extraordinarily high rate of success, which can scarcely if at all be explained as due to chance … a real core of dowser-phenomena can be regarded as empirically proven."[66]
Five years after the Munich study was published,Jim T. Enright, a professor ofphysiology who emphasized correct data analysis procedure, contended that the study's results are merely consistent withstatistical fluctuations and not significant. He believed the experiments provided "the most convincing disproof imaginable that dowsers can do what they claim",[67] stating that the data analysis was "special, unconventional and customized". Replacing it with "more ordinary analyses",[68] he noted that thebest dowser was on average 4millimeters (0.16 in) out of 10meters (32.81 ft) closer to a mid-line guess, an advantage of 0.04%, and that the five other "good" dowsers were on average farther than a mid-line guess. Enright emphasized that the experimenters should have decided beforehand how to statistically analyze the results; if they only afterward chose the statistical analysis that showed the greatest success, then their conclusions would not be valid until replicated by another test analyzed by the same method. He further pointed out that the six "good" dowsers did not perform any better than chance in separate tests.[69] Another study published inPathophysiology hypothesized that such experiments as this one that were carried out in the twentieth century could have been interfered with by man-made radio frequency radiation, as test subjects' bodies absorbed the radio waves and unconscious hand movement reactions took place following the standing waves or intensity variations.[70]
PsychologistDavid Marks in a 1986 article inNature included dowsing in a list of "effects which until recently were claimed to beparanormal but which can now be explained from within orthodox science."[84] Specifically, dowsing could be explained in terms ofsensory cues,expectancy effects, andprobability.[84]
Science writerPeter Daempfle has noted that when dowsing is subjected to scientific testing, it fails. Daempfle has written that although some dowsers claim success, this can be attributed to the undergroundwater table being distributed relatively uniformly in certain areas.[85]
According to archaeologistKenneth Feder, "the vast majority of archaeologists don't use dowsing, because they don't believe it works."[57]
PsychologistChris French has noted that "dowsing does not work when it is tested under properly controlled conditions that rule out the use of other cues to indicate target location."[76]
Water dowsers often achieve good results because random chance has a high probability of finding water in favorable terrain.[86]
Dowsing rods have appeared in many forms of popular media, such asCoraline[87] andPokémon.[88] It is often associated with ghostly or creepy themes and stories withsuperstitious elements. Other elements of popular media that reference dowsing rods include use of a dowsing pendulum by Professor Calculus inTintin[89], appearing as a card inMagic: The Gathering[90], and appearing as a plot device multiple times inThe Smurfs (1981).[91]
^abcZusne, Leonard; Jones, Warren H. (1989).Anomalistic Psychology: A Study of Magical Thinking. Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Inc. pp. 105–110.ISBN978-0-805-80507-9
^abNovella, Steve; Deangelis, Perry. (2002).Dowsing. InMichael Shermer.The Skeptic Encyclopedia of Pseudoscience. ABC-CLIO. pp. 93–94.ISBN1-57607-654-7 "Despite widespread belief, careful investigation has demonstrated that the technique of dowsing simply does not work. No researcher has been able to prove under controlled conditions that dowsing has any genuine divining power... A more likely explanation for the movement of a dowser's focus is the ideomotor effect, which entails involuntary and unconscious motor behavior."
^Lawson, T. J; Crane, L. L. (2014).Dowsing Rods Designed to Sharpen Critical Thinking and Understanding of Ideomotor Action.Teaching of Psychology 41 (1): 52–56.
^abVogt, Evon Z.;Ray Hyman (1979).Water Witching U.S.A. (2nd ed.). Chicago: Chicago University Press.ISBN978-0-226-86297-2. viaHines, Terence (2003).Pseudoscience and the Paranormal (Second ed.). Amherst, New York: Prometheus Books. p. 420.ISBN978-1-57392-979-0.
^Barrett, William (1911).Psychical Research. New York and London: Henry Holt & Co. (N.Y.), Williams and Norgate (London). p. 171. Retrieved2 January 2018.
^Michel Eugène Chevreul,De La Baguette Divinatoire du pendule dit explorateur at des table tournants au point de vue de l'histoire, de la critique, and de la méthode expérimentale, Paris, 1854. "Le père Gaspard Schott (jés.) considère l'usage de la baguette comme superstitieux ou plutôt diabolique, mais des renseignements qui lui furent donnés plus tard par des hommes qu'il considérait comme religieux et probe, lui firent dire dans une notation à ce passage, qu'il ne voudrait pas assurer que le demon fait toujourstourner la baguette." (Physica Curiosa, 1662, lib. XII, cap. IV, pag. 1527). SeefacsimileArchived 2023-09-05 at theWayback Machine onGoogle Books
^abBarrett, William (1911).Psychical Research. New York and London: Henry Holt & Co. (N.Y.), Williams and Norgate (London). p. 170. Retrieved2 January 2018.Now, the colloquial German word for the rod was thenschlag-ruthe orstriking-rod; this, translated into the Middle English became theduschan or striking rod, and finally "deusing or dowsing rod".
^Stratmann, Francis (1891).A Middle-English Dictionary. Oxford University Press. p. 182. Retrieved15 January 2018.duschen, v., ? = M.L.G. duschen; =dweschen; strike, beat; dusched (pret.) Ar. & Mer. 5624; A. P. ii. 1538; dusched a doun ... hure fon Fer. 3068; see daschen, dusching, sb., tumbling; ... dinning and dusching of sinfulle PR. C. 7350.
^Skeat, Walter W. (2005).An Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. Mineola, NY: Dover Publications, Inc. p. 181.ISBN978-0486317656.Archived from the original on 5 September 2023. Retrieved19 January 2018.DOWSE (3), to extinguish. (E.) A cant term;dowse the glim, i.e. to extinguish the light. Probably only a particular use ofdowse (1), to strike. Possibly suggested bydout, to extinguish.
^Barrett, William (1911).Psychical Research. New York and London: Henry Holt & Co. (N.Y.), Williams and Norgate (London). p. 170. Retrieved19 January 2018.To dowse or " strike " the sail is still a common expression in Cornwall
^Grace Fairchild and Walker D. Wyman, Frontier Woman: The Life of a Woman Homesteader on the Dakota Frontier (River Falls: University of Wisconsin-River Falls Press, 1972), 50; Robert Amerson, From the Hidewood: Memories of a Dakota Neighborhood (St. Paul: Minnesota Historical Society Press, 1996), 290–298.
^MacFadyen, W. A. (1946).Some Water Divining in Algeria.Nature 157: 304–305.
^Ongley, P. (1948)."New Zealand Diviners".New Zealand Journal of Science and Technology.30:38–54. viaHines, Terence (2003).Pseudoscience and the Paranormal (Second ed.). Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books. p. 420.ISBN978-1-57392-979-0.
^Aitken, M. J. (1959).Test for Correlation Between Dowsing Response and Magnetic Disturbance. Archaeometry 2: 58–59.
^abLeusen, Martijn Van. (1998).Dowsing and Archaeology. Archaeological Prospection 5: 123–138.
^Whittaker, William E."Grave Dowsing Reconsidered". Office of the State Archaeologist, University of Iowa.Archived(PDF) from the original on 4 March 2016. Retrieved17 June 2013.
^Konig, Robert; Moll, Jurgen; Sarma, Armadeo (January 1991)."Kassel Dowsing Test - Part 1". Skeptiker.Archived from the original on 2022-04-28. Retrieved2021-05-26 – via Geotech - Technology for Treasure Hunting.
^Konig, Robert; Moll, Jurgen; Sarma, Armadeo (January 1991)."Kassel Dowsing Test - Part 2". Skeptiker.Archived from the original on 2021-05-26. Retrieved2021-05-26 – via Geotech - Technology for Treasure Hunting.
^Enright, Jim T. (January–February 1999)."The Failure of the Munich Experiments".Skeptical Inquirer. CSICOP. Archived fromthe original on 2009-11-17. Retrieved2006-11-14.The researchers themselves concluded that the outcome unquestionably demonstrated successful dowsing abilities, but a thoughtful re-examination of the data indicates that such an interpretation can only be regarded as the result of wishful thinking.
^Enright, J. T. (1995). "Water dowsing: The Scheunen experiments".Naturwissenschaften.82 (8):360–369.doi:10.1007/s001140050198 (inactive 10 July 2025).{{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: DOI inactive as of July 2025 (link)
^Bailey, Arthur (1999).Anyone Can Dowse For Better Health. The Publishing House, Bennetts Close, Cippenham, Berkshire, England: Quantum, an imprint of W Foulsham & Co Ltd. p. 46.ISBN0-572-02461-4.The angle-rods are driven in exactly the same way as the forked rod: by a muscular reaction causing a slight unconscious rotation of the forearms. If the tops of the forearms rotate towards each other, then the rods will move towards each other; the opposite rotation will cause the rods to move outwards. It is the change in balance between opposing sets of muscles in the arms (flexors and extensors) that makes the rods move.
^Carpenter, William Benjamin. (1877).Mesmerism, Spiritualism, &c. Historically & Scientifically Considered. New York: D. Appleton and Company. pp. 47–53
^Culpin, Millais. (1920).Spiritualism and the New Psychology: An Explanation of Spiritualist Phenomena and Beliefs in Terms of Modern Knowledge. London: Edward Arnold. pp. 34–43
^Hyman, Ray. (2007).Ouija, Dowsing, and Other Selections of Ideomotor Action. In. S. Della Sala.Tall Tales About the Mind & Brain: Separating Fact From Fiction. Oxford University Press. pp. 411–424
^Daempfle, Peter. (2013).Good Science, Bad Science, Pseudoscience, and Just Plain Bunk: How to Tell the Difference. Rowman & Littlefield Publishers. p. 115.ISBN978-1-4422-1728-7
^"His Rod to Find Radium"(PDF).The New York Times. January 28, 1914.Archived(PDF) from the original on 2021-07-17. Retrieved2010-07-13.Otto Edler von Graeve, who locates water and minerals with a 'divining rod,' arrived yesterday from Germany on the George Washington, ...
Thomas Fiddick (2011).Dowsing: With an Account of Some Original Experiments. Sheffield, United Kingdom: The Cornovia Press.ISBN978-1-908878-10-6.OL25114055M.
France, Henry de. (1930).The Modern Dowser pub. G.Bell and Sons Ltd. London
Randi, James. (1982).Flim-Flam!. Prometheus Books. Devotes 19 pages to double-blind tests in Italy which yielded results no better than chance.
Maby, J. Cecil and Franklin, T. Bedford.The Physics of the Divining Rod. (1939) G.Bell & Sons Ltd., London
Plattes, Gabriel. (1639),A Discovery of Subterraneal Treasure.... Modern Edition (2010)ISBN978-1171478898
Shenefelt, Philip D., "Ideomotor Signaling: From Divining Spiritual Messages to Discerning Subconscious Answers during Hypnosis and Hypnoanalysis, a Historical Perspective",American Journal of Clinical Hypnosis, Vol. 53, No. 3, (January 2011), pp. 157–167.
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