An Extraordinary Synchronicity

Summary

The text recounts the discovery of a family secret tied to the 14th-century War of the Breton Succession, revealing the significance of the name Amaury in the author's lineage as a tribute to the era's peace.

Abstract

The author shares a personal experience of an extraordinary synchronicity, uncovering a family secret from 14th-century Brittany, a time marked by the War of the Breton Succession. Despite the lack of written records about common folk, the author's peasant ancestors commemorated the prosperous reign of Duke Jean V de Montfort through naming their eldest children Amaury, after Montfort-l'Amaury. This tradition was a silent vow to their homeland's loyalty, passed down through generations, including the author's own lineage. The revelation was serendipitously confirmed years later when the author, under the influence of magic mushrooms, echoed insights from a past psychogenealogical session.

Opinions

The author believes that the naming tradition was a means for ancestors to transmit knowledge and maintain a connection to their heritage in the absence of written records.
The use of toponymy and first names is regarded as a form of collective and familial knowledge transmission, respectively.
The author's ancestors likely held the era of peace under Duke Jean V de Montfort in high regard, viewing it as an apogee for Brittany.
The author values the synchronistic experience and the validation of the family secret through both a psychedelic trip and a forgotten psychogenealogical report.
The author endorses an AI service, ZAI.chat, as a cost-effective alternative to ChatGPT Plus (GPT-4), suggesting its efficacy based on personal experience.

A war

One day I had an extraordinary synchronicity about a family secret unearthed from the 14th century. Brittany at this time was independent, and then happened the War of the Breton Succession where two dukes fought, one supported by England, the Duke of Montfort and an other one, The Duke of Blois, supported by France. It lasted a bit more than 20 years and eventually Jean V de Montfort reigned with a rich era of peace for Brittany, it was an apogee for our country.

My ancestors did not leave any writing

My ancestors were peasants at this time in Brittany. They suffered from the war and so they were happy to see the advent of the new Duke and the peace and wealth of the country. The only writings existing did not name people other than the aristocrats and church dignitaries so we cannot prove anything about peasants. Archives speak about peasants as a collective. So I can’t prove anything about my ancestors of this time.

They use the name to keep a record

They had no way to write something about what they feel. It remained two ways to transmit their knowledge, two permanent media: the toponymy and the attribution of the first names in the family. Toponymy transmits a collective knowledge while the first names are family decisions. So as the toponymy of the place where the Montfort came from was Montfort-l’Amaury, they named the eldest of each generation Amaury, from generation to generation. My second name is Amaury. The reason why that they wanted to celebrate this era and did a vow to the divinity to give this name through generations to send this message to their descendants so that they would be loyal to Brittany.

An extraordinary synchronicity

So I took some magic mushrooms to explore the reason why they made this vow, nobody could say me why. After the trip, while my wife was organizing some papers, I told her how I was sure about the secret. At this moment, she saw a report about a session we had with a psychogenealogist twenty years before and it was identical to what I got. We had forgot about it because we had no means to prove it and so it was stored in a box and in our intellectual limbo.

An Extraordinary Synchronicity

A family secret unearthed from the 14th century

A war

My ancestors did not leave any writing

They use the name to keep a record

An extraordinary synchronicity