Only since the beginning of the twentieth century have scientists begun to harness the incredible power of quartz crystal. So how was it that our ‘simple’ and ‘primitive’ ancestors had known to make the skull from precisely this type of material? Was it mere coincidence or could it be that they knew something we didn’t?

      Could it be that the crystal skull really was some sort of store of information, just as the ancient legend had said? Could it really contain an important message from our ancestors? At first, this seemed very far-fetched. It was almost unbelievable that a simple lump of rock could contain the great secrets of our forefathers from way back in the mists of time. But, despite our initial scepticism, after our trip to Hewlett-Packard we began to take this idea more seriously.

      We spoke to Dr John Pohl, Mesoamerican specialist at UCLA, who explained that on his various trips to Central America he had heard that descendants of the ancient Maya today recognize the distinctive qualities of quartz crystal and ‘liken crystal to some sort of ancient radio, television or computer device, a device for communicating “between the worlds,” a sort of doorway into other dimensions, a means of communicating with the world of the spirits and the ancestors’.

      We were also struck by the words of Dr Joseph Alioto in a book he had contributed to, Holy Ice, written by crystal researcher Frank Dorland, following the Hewlett-Packard tests. Dr Alioto pointed out that, less than 100 years ago, if you had described to anyone:

       ‘…an invisible energy force that pervades all their surroundings, an energy force that would allow them to see and hear other people all over the world instantaneously, they [would have thought] you were either a great sorcerer or a great liar. Furthermore, if you were to suggest that they could capture these sounds and images through the use of a specially constructed box containing an assemblage of various pieces of metal and crystals, you would probably create quite a stir. ‘Well, of course, what has just been described is something we [now] take for granted in our daily lives – television. Yet, it was only a few short decades ago that this idea was relegated to the category of fantasy and science fiction.’ ¹

      This had been our initial reaction to the idea that the crystal skulls might contain information. But, as we had just discovered from Charles Adams and Jack Kusters at Hewlett-Packard, the heart of the modern computer, where all the information is stored, is actually a tiny silicon crystal chip. The cells of this chip, or ‘silicon integrated circuit’, are effectively the brain cells, or memory, of the computer. This tiny crystalline chip, with its incredible storage capacity, now lies at the very heart of our information age. This chip uses the unique properties of crystal to store information. So it now occurred to us that if a silicon crystal chip can store vast amounts of information inside our modern computers, then why not the natural quartz crystal inside a crystal skull?

      Indeed, as Charles Adams had informed us, in theory at least, a piece of raw quartz such as a crystal skull is perfectly capable of storing in-formation. Due to the unique properties of crystal, a natural piece of piezo-electric silicon dioxide has information storage capacities, just like a silicon crystal chip. In fact it transpired that some early experiments had been done in this area. So, after our meeting with the scientists at Hewlett-Packard the idea that a raw quartz crystal skull might be capable of storing information began to seem more plausible. The problem, as Charles put it, is that no scientist has yet been able to figure out a way of successfully inputting information and retrieving it again from a piece of raw quartz. But, as he was also quick to point out, this was not to say it could never be done.

      Indeed, there are many who believe it can already be done. Some, such as crystal researcher Frank Dorland, believe that the way to extract information from a piece of natural quartz such as the crystal skull actually lies in some form of direct communication with the human mind. Whilst this idea, too, at first struck us as rather farfetched, we discovered that some early experiments had also been done in this area, using computers.² Professor Giles Brindley of the Royal National Orthopaedic Hospital in Middlesex saw the potential for physically paralysed subjects to be able to communicate directly with a computer by means of direct electronic links to their brains. Early results indicate that it might well be possible for subjects to use the power of their thoughts alone to communicate directly with a computer. These experiments suggest that one day it may be possible to have direct communication between the human mind and the computer without the need for bulky keyboards and other electronic paraphernalia in between. Whether or not this is what the future really holds, these early experiments certainly suggest that it is possible for the human mind to communicate more directly with a silicon crystal chip than at present. So could similar possibilities exist for direct mental communication with a crystal skull?

      But if there really is information stored inside the crystal skulls, what might that information be, how might it be stored and how might we be able to retrieve it? In an attempt to find out we began to look at how information is stored inside our modern computers. What we discovered was that ‘information’ as it is spoken of today, is not a ‘thing’, but a ‘process’. It is neither solid nor static, nor literally ‘stored’ in a tangible form; it is not lying around in a filing cabinet somewhere. Whilst we may talk about information being ‘stored on a silicon chip inside a computer’, the information itself has no obvious physical form. You cannot touch, see or hear it except through the process of retrieving it from the system electronically.

      In the case of the computer we have managed to work out a way of inputting and retrieving the information ‘stored within it’ through the process of electronics. But what of any information inside a crystal skull? We may not yet know the correct way to input and retrieve any information stored within it, but that does not necessarily mean that the information is not there. The analogy that comes to mind is of a Stone Age man or woman finding a computer and being told that it contains great knowledge and information. Without the necessary understanding of electronics and the appropriate passwords and commands, they would simply not believe it. Could we be in a similar situation with the crystal skulls? It may be that the information they contain is in a form that we simply do not yet comprehend. For it is only when we are able to interact properly with any information storage system that the knowledge stored within it comes into a form of existence that we can understand.

      I know this from first-hand experience. When I first started working with computers there were many occasions when I found it almost impossible to retrieve information. There was many a time when I began to doubt that what I was looking for really existed at all – that is, until I was lucky enough to stumble upon the proper way of retrieving it from the system. So it may be with the crystal skulls.

      Some, such as Frank Dorland, do believe that direct communication between quartz crystal and the human mind is already possible and that we can in fact retrieve the information stored within a crystal skull. The mechanism through which this works is both complex and remarkably subtle. Dorland