Tim Sebastion 1947 - 2007

Tim Sebastion Remembered

Tim Sebastian, Arch-druid of Wiltshire, Chosen Chief of the Secular Order of Druids and Chief Druid of the Gorsedd of Bards of Caer Badon, made a huge impact on modern Druidry in his own inimitable style. A man of vision, he inspired many with his dreams, humour and enthusiasm.

He led a typically diverse life. Born in Southend-on-Sea, Essex, on April 29th 1947, he was brought up in Mayfield Catholic Monastery, Sussex, until he ran away at the age of 15 to London, working up from an East End barrow boy, via a stall on the Portobello Rd, to become the owner of an antiques shop in Bradford-on-Avon when he moved to the West Country in the 1970s. He trained in antique oil painting restoration.

As a young poet he was taken under the wing of John Betjeman, striking up a correspondence with the Poet Laureate. Last year, on the Laureate’s anniversary, a ‘Betjeman and Buns’ tea party on the terrace of Abbey Lodge, Widcombe – looking over the valley towards the house where Betjeman stayed while in Bath. One of Tim’s many visions was to hold the largest Teddy Bear’s Picnic in the World, partly inspired by Betjeman’s own fondness of them. This didn’t come to fruition, but he did create the Antiquarian Picnic Society, formed in 1993 (motto: Come Rain or Shine, Together We’ll Dine!). The Society ‘pique-niqued’ at many ancient sites across England. Amongst its members was one-time Bathonian John Michell (famed author of The New View Over Atlantis and many others).

A long-term friend and fan of Hawkwind in its many manifestations, Tim was the lyricist with the prog-rock band Gryphon. They recorded their album in the very studio where the Sex Pistols were recording Never Mind the Bollocks next door. Tim was there when the death of the Hippies gave birth to Punk, which he embraced, being fond of bands like Citizen Fish. He managed several bands himself, and counts many musicians amongst his friends.

A stalwart defender of the Stonehenge Free Festival, he was the first person to be arrested at the notorious Battle of the Beanfields in 1985.

He campaigned tirelessly for free access to Stonehenge at the Summer Solstice – for all. He co-authored the 1986 book Who Owns Stonehenge? (Batsford). He has been featured in several other books on paganism and Druidry, as well as in CJ Stone’s The Last of the Hippies, where he was called ‘the most useless man in the world’, a statement contradicted by his many achievements.

He gave lectures to universities, led guided tours of sacred sites, featured in many interviews and TV programmes, made films for German Cinema and CBS, and imported records from Cold War Russia.

An active member of the Council of British Druid Orders, he was instrumental in many visionary initiatives, not least the 1992 Petition to the Queen for the establishing of an English National Eisteddfod.

Always one for finding common ground, he helped set up a Druids & Christians Conference at Prinknash Abbey, which ran for 4 years.

He helped create the Gorsedd of Caer Badon’s Celtic Tree Wheel, the ‘Millennium Grove’, at the end of 1999; and a Miz-maze and ash-dome, entitled ‘Fay’s Maze’, in 2002, in Rocks East Woodland, near Bath.

He was an eco-warrior in his own way, always encouraging the planting of oak trees, (as inspired by John Lennon, who Tim typically claimed was a ‘druid’!) and campaigned against traffic congestion – being active with Reclaim the Streets and the infamous Batheaston Bypass Protest.

On the eve of a street protest in Bath, on June 21st 1996 he declared the beginning of the Bardic Chair of Caer Badon on its own Mons Badonicus, Solsbury Hill – the very day Kevan Manwaring first arrived in Bath for that very same protest. Two years later Kevan was to win the Bardic Chair, 3rd in line from its founder, Tim. There have been, to date, 11 Chaired bards, a number of Honorary Bards, including Ronald Hutton and Moyra Caldecott. RJ Stewart is the Patron of the Bardic Chair of Caer Badon, and Caitlin Matthews is its Matron. It has just inaugurated its third Ovate.

Tim had a knack of starting traditions, coupled with a sense of the absurd, for instance Cheese-blessing! The Mock-Mayor ceremony in Weston, Bath, 1995, fed into the Bardic Chair of the city, 1996. In 2005 he helped create the Widcombe Mummers, who perform now annually on New Year’s Day. Amongst the assembly of archetypal and odd characters there’s the King of the Beggars of Holloway, an historical figure Tim discovered and recreated.

Many others will have memories to share about Tim, and pieces of puzzle from his complex and colourful life.

He was a bridge-builder, a peace-maker – adept at walking between the secular and sacred. With his gentle hand at the helm of many a circle, he made all feel welcome – making the Mysteries accessible and relevant to the present.

A lover of ‘sacred cricket’ and ‘West-Country produce’, he was a Bonzo soul and a Druid through and through. With impeccable Druidic timing, he passed on from this world on Imbolc, 1st February, 2007, Southmead Hospital, Bristol, surrounded by close friends. His legacy lives on.

For more see Bard of Bath

By Kevan Manwaring,

Also see Remembering A Chief Druid, The Wild Hunt Blog by Jason Pitzl-Waters