Death on Iona: The Mysterious Death of Norah Fornario and the Search for Netta

£9.9
FREE Shipping

Death on Iona: The Mysterious Death of Norah Fornario and the Search for Netta

Death on Iona: The Mysterious Death of Norah Fornario and the Search for Netta

RRP: £99
Price: £9.9
£9.9 FREE Shipping

In stock

We accept the following payment methods

Description

The next day, 12 November 1929, she rose early and left the house. The alarm was raised when she failed to appear and two days later her near-naked body was found on isolated moorland.

Netta Fornario on the Scottish Island The mysterious case of Netta Fornario on the Scottish Island

Iona is a small island off the West coast of Scotland with a long religious and mystical history. In the late 1920s it was the scene of the mysterious death of Netta Fornario. Her motives and the manner of her passing have been the subject of much debate over the years. Iona is a small island, roughly 3.5 miles long and one mile wide which lies off the west of Mull. In 563AD St Columba (grandson of the Irish King Niall) and 12 followers built their first Celtic Church on the island and monastic community. Iona became famous as St Columba started converting Scottish and English pagans into Christians. Iona also became the resting place of Kings and according to a survey in 1549 it boasted 48 Scottish Kings, 8 Norwegian and 4 Irish. Amongst the Scottish kings buried on Iona are King Kenneth I, Donald II, Malcolm I, Duncan I, Macbeth and Donald III. In synopsis, The Immortal Hour tells the tale of a supernatural marriage between a human, the High King of Eire (Eochaidh), and a Shee (Etain) orchestrated by the Lord of Shadow, Dalua. Dalua, also known as the Faery Fool, or the Amadán Dubh, is “older than the gods” and imbued with strange powers of fate. An unknown compulsion brings him to a magical Shee forest where he soon meets Etain, who has also arrived at the wood seemingly by fate. Dalua touches her and erases memory, essentially making her human. He sends her to a peasant’s hut to wait for the inevitable coming of the king, Eochaidh. Eochaidh is guided by his own dreams of “immortal love,” which lead him to the forest and Dalua. Dalua brings him to Etain and their union is made. This “alien” woman, who dressed in the fashion of the Arts and Crafts movement – with long cape and hand-woven tunic – settled into the house of someone only known as Mrs MacRae. The 33-year-old Fornario spent her time walking the island and in long trances, some of which could last for days. Netta was a student of the occult and a member of the ‘Alpha et Omega’ Temple. This was the name given to the branch of the Golden Dawn that remained loyal to Samuel Liddell MacGregor Mathers after it was closed in 1906. She was a close friend of fellow member Dion Fortune who referred to Netta as “Mac”. According to popular belief she did not especially get along with father who was a medical practitioner and Italian national. Her mother was English.According to fellow occultist Dion Fortune, the reason Netta was going to Iona was to conduct some deep healing and to study Green Ray Elementals (non-magic folk speak: Fairies). Dion Fortune was a renowned occultist at the time and knew Netta very well. Dion distanced herself from Netta, however, because she was getting too deep into things she could not understand or control. Netta’s death is both a medical and paranormal anomaly. Over the years, many people have found themselves questioning the medical examiner.

NETTA FORNARIO – DEATH BY PSYCHIC ATTACK? | sjhstrangetales NETTA FORNARIO – DEATH BY PSYCHIC ATTACK? | sjhstrangetales

Miss Fonario, who arrived in Iona during the summer, disappeared on Sunday November 12. She was a woman of extraordinary character. Mrs Varney, her housekeeper at Kew, told a reporter yesterday that Miss Fonario, whose father is an Italian doctor, did not believe in doctors, and was “always curing people by telepathy.” Our new Temple of Horus in Bradford is not about degree ceremonies, charters or pomp, - a lot of which turned out to be rubbish anyway. In the founding of the original Golden Dawn, Westcott and Mathers merely set up a lot of the stuff themselves with some help from other masons and manufactured all the so called intervention of Anna Sprengel who probably did not exist, along with the 'secret chiefs' it just sounded good at the time. Westcott and Mathers with a bit of help from a Dr Woodman really just used their own knowledge and ability to set up the Golden Dawn. Jimi Hendrix may have written his song 'Wind Cries Mary' for one of his girlfriends named Kathy Mary, but there is startling comparison to the death of Netta Fornario within this song. No police investigation was carried out as the presiding physician noted the cause of death as heart failure from exposure. This explanation has never satisfied Ron Halliday, a psychic investigator and author of Evil Scotland who thinks the death should have been properly investigated.The house where I reside now is full of psychic phenomena, a number of people have experienced all sorts of things in the house, good and bad but we wouldn't banish it The scratches on her body, if they existed (they seem to have been a later addition, and some argue that only her feet were scratched up), are a bit more difficult to explain. It could be that she fell into some brambles, but the posthumous examination didn't contain any reports of thorns being found in her skin. Iona did not harbor large predators, such as foxes, that might have tried to scavenge the body, and no bite marks were found either. I knew instantly that I wanted to tell her story, or more accurately, a story with a version of Netta at the heart of it; and that the roots of this telling lay in the late 19th and early 20th century's fascination with all things Gothic. Stories such as Bram Stoker's Dracula, Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, and Oscar Wilde's The Picture of Dorian Gray, that fascinate, attract and repulse at the same time. All of these kinds of tale touch something universal in us, something subconscious that is tied up with our own fear of death, moral degradation, and loss of control; something that seems at the same time to be inextricably linked to our most dangerous desires. According to her death certificate, she died between 10.00pm on 17th and 1.30pm on 19th November 1929, of “exposure to the elements” or “heart failure”. She is buried in a simple grave on the island, which – according to Laura from faeryfolklorist, who took the photo I found on Strange History [linked above] – looks like this:

Exposed to the Elements: A Strange 1920s Death on the

Marie Norah Emily Edith Fornario, known as “Netta”, was born in Cairo, Egypt in 1897, the daughter of Norah Edith Ling and Guiseppe Nicola Raimundo Fornario, an English mother and Italian doctor father. After her mother died in 1898, she was placed in the care of well-to-do tea dealer Thomas Pratt Ling, her maternal grandfather, and lived with him and his family at Leigham Holme, Leigham Court Road, Streatham. Prior to that, she lived in Italy. Ruth’s troubles unfold. Her husband is dead, and is not missed as much as might be expected. Her son Duncan is, throughout the first half, just off-stage. His unhappy fate is revealed later. By the end, the full story of the mysterious death of the title has been told, but not explained.This small island off the edge of Scotland has quite a spiritual history. It was revered as a sacred place for ancient celts, druids, and even early Christians. Many religious ceremonies have taken place there and still do to this day. In The Mysterious Death of Netta Fornario, I have taken the scant facts around Netta's strange demise, that are available to even the most diligent researcher; including some of the wilder theories that surround the actual recorded events; and used them to create a Gothic story of my own. It shamelessly borrows from those classic stories that have gone before, to make a new play that is immersed in madness, murder, magic and decay, that has at its heart, a truly memorable character.” Netta was devastated that she couldn’t leave and attempted to calm herself down by taking a Sunday night stroll. That was the last time she was ever seen alive. The Mystery Iona us famously known for the creepy legends that surround the isle. These dark myths included creatures like mermaids, goddesses, and faeries. What are Faeries? Netta was an heiress, having lost close family members at a young age. She had inherited a substantial sum, the equivalent of over a million pounds in today’s money. As such she was able to buy a house in Mortlake Road, Kew, London, and presumably didn’t have to bother overly much about having a paid job. But in the late summer of 1929, at the age of 31, she suddenly decided to decamp to Iona, apparently taking enough luggage with her to furnish a small house, which suggested she planned to be gone for quite some time. Iona has long been associated with spirituality. St Columba set up a religious retreat there many centuries ago. Folklore and legends abound on Iona, and it is easy to see why Netta would have been drawn to the place.



  • Fruugo ID: 258392218-563234582
  • EAN: 764486781913
  • Sold by: Fruugo

Delivery & Returns

Fruugo

Address: UK
All products: Visit Fruugo Shop