<strong>Wizards and diviners abound  in Britain, says psychic survey</strong>

<em>Martin Wainwright, Monday    February  19, 2007 , <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk" target="_blank">The Guardian</a></em>

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<font face="Geneva,Arial,sans-serif" size="2">           </font>Britain's image as the home of sensible and practical types takes a knock today, with the publication of data showing just how many of us think we are wizards, time-travellers or able to divine water. Norse and Celtic influences moving down the centuries have led almost 10% of people in some areas to believe they can teleport their neighbours as well as read minds, crystal balls and tarot cards.
<p id="GuardianArticleBody">The scale of a return to an island of ley lines and Merlin comes to light in a survey of psychic organisations backed by polling and research into cases of supposed witches, enchanters and close encounters of the third kind that have made the media, scientific and alternative journals in the past 100 years. The project was supervised by the Rev Lionel Fanthorpe, an Anglican priest who chairs numerous bodies concerned with unidentified flying objects and "anomalous phenomena".</p>
<!--more-->The findings suggest that only Sussex comes close to matching Yorkshire and Essex in the imaginative powers of residents, while the East Midlands, west Scotland and Herefordshire appear to have their feet most firmly on the ground.

Mr Fanthorpe said: "Yorkshire boasts a rich genetic history of British, Celtic, Roman, Angle and Norse settlers and it is quite possible that the present-day citizens there owe their status as superpower capital of the UK to this rich mixture.

"It follows that at the other end of the scale the East Midlands doesn't have such a rich genetic diversity and this may well have an impact on it [having] the least residents with extraordinary powers."

Society's diversity, still growing within Britain, may bump up the figures, as well as possibly add to the study's 12 categories of "other-worldliness" - telepathy, telekinesis, teleportation, time travel, mediums, psychic healers, astrologers, palm readers, tarot card readers, crystal experts, wizards and enchanters, and water diviners.

The findings also reveal that Essex is the home of almost one in 10 of all people in Britain affiliated to a recognised pagan association, while Kent has three times the national average of people claiming to be psychic healers.