The River Boyne takes a spiral course as it meanders up from the plains of Kildare, winds its way through Meath and takes a curious bend before emptying into the Irish Sea. The bend in the river encloses a picturesque area dominated by three large stone structures known as megalithic mounds and named Newgrange, Knowth and Dowth. These are strategically positioned on ridges, appearing above a landscape dotted with smaller mounds, earthworks and standing stones.
The Stars and the Stones, Martin Brennan, 1984.
The neolithic passage-graves in the Boyne Valley are Ireland's largest and most complex collection of neolithic buildings. Between three and five hundred chambered cairns or passage-graves exist in Ireland, with the earliest dates found on the north-west coast around Sligo. The huge monuments in the Boyne Valley are the climax of the great cultural and religious wave which extended across the island from Carrowmore and Carrowkeel in County Sligo and Loughcrew in County Meath during the neolithic period. Carrowmore, Carrowkeel and Newgrange have recently been connected by Ancient DNA studies.
There are within the same district, and not very distant from each other, several, we believe four monuments of the same character as that at Grange. The name “TempIe" has been applied to them—"pyramid” would probably convey a notion more nearly accurate. They present the appearance of great conical hills. On one of these the ancient castle of Dowth, belonging to the Neterville family was built, and its ruins still surmount the pyramid, antiquity piled on antiquity.
The passage-graves at Newgrange, Knowth
and Dowth are the largest and most decorated neolithic passage-graves in the country and have few rivals in Ancient Europe. The three huge cairns are surrounded by the remains of up to forty smaller satellite monuments, the majority of which are found encircling the huge cairn at Knowth.
A decorated kerbstone, carved about 3,200 BC at Knowth may be a diagram of Newgrange.
The passages and chambers of the two mounds [Dowth and Newgrange] have been formed of large slabs of the Lower Silurian rocks, which crop up within a few miles’ distance. They were apparently either rudely quarried for the purpose, or split from surface rocks. With the exception of some of the stones in the passage and others of the upright course, the slabs in the interior of New Grange show little traces of the original weathered surface of the rocks from which they were taken, but, on the contrary, even faces, which indicate that they have been split along the cleavage,and care taken in their selection. The spiral carvings have been cut exclusively on this description of stone; and, considering the exposed positions of the external slabs, they show but little effect of weathering.
George Coffey, 1892.
As we find at the other great neolithic passage-grave complexes of Carrowmore in Coolrea, Carrowkeel and Loughcrew, the monuments in the Boyne Valley are completely interlinked
and interconnected. The late Michael Poynder, in his book Pi in the Sky, suggested that the Boyne Valley is connected to the other Irish sites by a great energy line or leyline crossing the country. That a line or chain of monuments crossed the country from Sligo to the Boyne was first recognised by Gabriel Beranger, commenting on the views from Queen Maeve's cairn in 1779. American researcher Martin Brennan has also written about and illustrated the great chain of passage-graves, built by the Cailleach named Garavogue, as she leapt from peak to peak across the country, with her magic apron filled with stones.
The Boyne monuments comprise an extensive interconnected sacred, ritual, and astronomicaly oriented complex of passage-graves. The passage-graves occupy an important place in Irish mythology; there are many wonderful myths and legends connected with the mounds. The principle cairns are said to be the mansions of notable members of the Tuatha De Danann, a mythological wave of colonising settlers, who arrive in Ireland by ship: the Dagda, his son Aengus Og, and Lugh of the Long Arm.
Modern genetic research indicates that an elite group, the leading families of the original colony of farmers who had migrated from Anatolia to Brittany around 6,000 BC. These had people left Brittany by 4,200 BC and settled the Sligo region where they constructed a very early causewayed enclosure at Magheraboy. Their descendents are buried in important neolithic passage-graves across the country, with genetic connections between Carrowmore, Carrowkeel, Millin Bay and Newgrange. The neolithic farmers came from Brittany by ship, up the west coast of Ireland, bringing young cattle and red deer, and a new and vastly different way of life and religion to anything seen before by native Irish hunter-gathereres.
A Sacred landscape
The monuments within the Boyne valley are all interconnected, and many of the passage-graves point to other monuments. For example, standing on Site B, the unopened mound within a henge below Newgrange, a viewer can watch the midsummer sunsets and the midwinter lunar standstills setting between Sites K and L and Newgrange. The large timber circle built later at the end of the neolithic may have been used in the same way to view lunar settings.
New discoveries in the Boyne Valley.
The three huge cairns are constructed to observe and integrate a range of important solar and lunar cycles. The buried North Chamber at Dowth is aligned directly to Newgrange, and the Samhain and Imbolc sunsets which drop directly over Newgrange. The winter solstice sunrise can be viewed at Newgrange, followed by the winter solstice sunset at Dowth. The large central monuments at Knowth seems to be concerned with the movements of the moon, and this theme is reflected in the huge collection of engraved symbols surrounding the large cairn. Both passages were enhanced and extended in the neolithic. Each of the three mega-monuments are about ninety meters in diameter and between eleven and fifteen meters high, and each monument is constructed using an estimated 200,000 tons of cairn material.
Burial mound at Aali on Bahrain in the Persian Gulf.
All three of the huge Boyne Valley passage-graves had flat, circular platforms on their summits, ideal for viewing the horizons and making astronomical observations. Antiquarian accounts and drawings show the three main cairns to have appeared like gigantic truncated cones. Each would have looked much like Queen Maeve's cairn on the summit of Knocknarea in County Sligo, which is one of the best preserved passage-graves in the country. Newgrange was excavated over thirteen seasons between 1962 and 1975. The cairn was 'restored' in accordance with Michael J. O'Kelly's wishes, but his extremely modern-looking facade has recieved much critical debate.
The reconstructed timber henge from the late neolithic or early bronze age, close to the east entrance at Knowth.
Neolithic Connections
There is some evidence for mesolithic activity on the terraces below Newgrange, where bann flakes, pieces of worked flint are often found. The river would have provided abundant food during the mesolithic, and travel by river was much easier than trecking through the heavily forested landscape. The river Boyne opens into the Irish sea seventeen kilometers to the east of the Boyne Valley. Water was the main way of transport in Neolithic times when the landscape was densely forested. It has been demonstrated that the Boyne Valley had links with many other sites in Europe.
The land in the Boyne Valley is still considered to be some of the finest farming land in Ireland. Archaeologists are puzzled by the extent turf was stripped from the landscape surrounding the huge cairns, as this process would have destroyed good farming land. Whatever the reasons for the massive de-sodding, it is likely that the area around the sites had been deforested well before the huge passage-graves were built.
An engraving of the huge cairn at Dowth before it was damaged during an excavation in 1847. Lord Netterville's tea house can be seen on the summit.
A number of fine cult or religious artefacts were found in the Boyne cairns. An example which illustrated the extensive neolithic trade networks, is the beautiful mace head which was found at Knowth, carved from an extremely hard piece of flint which originated in the Orkney Islands. Another fascinating object, a long, slim piece of carved sandstone, was found outside the Western Entrance to Knowth. This cult object has similarities with carved stones from the Iberian neolithic. The River Boyne is nagivable for a long way upstream, and travellers could have reached near enough to the Loughcrew Mountains travelling by boat. It is believed that tides came upriver as far as Newgrange in the neolithic, and there is reason to believe the Boyne people were closely connected to the other major neolithic sites of Europe.
Sourcing Building Materials
Many of the building materials used to construct the Boyne Valley passage-graves sourced some distance away, and would have most likely been transported by boat. The nearest source for the large quantities of quartz used in the Boyne Valley is in the Wicklow Mountains, more than fifty kilometers to the south. Quartz was found at each of the great cairns of Newgrange, Knowth and Dowth, though in different positions. Leask is reported to have found large quantities of quartz at Dowth while he was clearing material away from the kerbstones in the 1930's. George Eogan found spreads of quartz on the ground outside the East and West Entrances to Knowth. The quartz was asociated with stone settings, exotic stones and standing stones.
At Newgrange the quartz was found on the old ground surface at the front of the cairn. Michael J. O'Kelly believed the quartz was the remains of a collapsed wall, and his contraversial reconstruction features a four by one hundred meter stretch of quartz facing in a facade supported by a massive reinforced concrete wall. The granite cobbles, found mixed with the quartz were sourced and collected
along beaches thirty kilometers to the north of the Boyne's mouth, near the Cooley peninsula. The greywackie kerbstones and orthostats - several hunderd of them - are thought to have come from twenty to twenty-five kilometers to the northeast of the Boyne Valley at Clogher Head.
Cliadhbh O'Gibne with one of his Boyne river currachs.
Local woodcarver and boatbuilder Cliadhbh O'Gibne builds river currachs - boats constructed from cow hides and hazel rods. I had the pleasure of a voyage down the River Boyne with Cliadhbh in the currach above. He has built an eleven-meter currach called Bovinda which can be taken out to sea and along the coast, and this beautiful vessel can sometimes be
seen at his workshop one kilometers to the east before the entrance to the Boyne
Valley visitor center.
Construction of megalithic monuments in Boyne Valley probably began around 3,500 B.C. The area was undoubtedly sacred during the mesolithic, when people would have been drawn to the Boyne for its abundant salmon. The smaller mounds, or satellites are thought to be the earliest sites. A considerable length of time must have been spent surveying the area
before anything was built.
It is likely that the monuments were
developed gradually in stages, Site K being a good example as the mound was enlarged and the passage extended. There is some evidence that each of
the three huge mounds are built on smaller pre-existing sites: the bent
passage at Knowth west, the annex at Dowth and the bulge at the back of Newgrange
all hint at earlier structures. Also, Newgrange and Knowth seem to have stones that were reused from earlier buildings.
The end recess of the east chamber at Knowth; the photo is looking west. Canadian researcher Philip Stooke has suggested that the engravings are the oldest known diagram of the moon.
The large monuments were constructed around 3,200 BC, and may have taken
several generations to complete, Each covers an acre of ground and contains
upwards of 300,000 tons of material. A large labour force needed to be
fed, housed and equipped: boats, baskets, bags, lots and lots of rope,
timber scaffolds and log rollers, chisels - a massive undertaking. The amount of timber alone need to move the stones and construct the corbelled chambers was enormous. It
all points to a prosperous and confident society. I am always inspired
by the neolithic sense of vision: who had the idea, and then convinced the people to do
it?
Visiting Newgrange.
Dowth is thought to be the oldest monument, and the parallels in engraved
symbols and technique between Dowth and Loughcrew would tend to support
this. Dowth was plundered for stone in the 1830s and has a huge crater in the summit. There are two passages and some early Christian souterrains. St Bernard's well is close to the cairn, as is Dowth church, Nettweville castle and house, and the memorial to John Boyle O'Rielly.
Knowth, the largest of the three monuments, was probably constructed next, and it is likely that the great stone basin in the east chamber was one of
the first stones set in place, and played an important part in the setting
out of the other sites. Knowth
is by far the most complex of the three sites, the main mound being surrounded
by 18 smaller monuments. Knowth appears to dedicated to the study of the
moon's movements, as several of the satellites appear to be oriented to
standstill positions, and the moon's cycle takes 18.6 years to complete.
Newgrange, the most famous of the three mounds was probably last to be
built and was the first to be re-discovered. A group of workmen quarrying
for stone discovered the entrance in 1699. It quickly became popular with antiquarians and other visitors, as can be seen by the quantity of graffiti in the chamber. New research from Ancient DNA suggests that Newgrange was the tomb / temple of a family of god-kings or pharaohs.
Early visitors to Newgrange. From the book Megalithomania by John Michell.
No major habitation sites have been found yet, apart from some neolithic
houses under the main mound at Knowth. Obviously the area supported a large number of people, and the most likely location for a village is to the east of Dowth, where the Mattock joins the Boyne, and an enormous henge monument is located.
The River Boyne is dedicated to the Goddess Boann who is associated with cattle. There
are several mythological tales associated with the great mounds. The Dagda,
a chieftain of the Tuatha De Dannan, lived in Newgrange. He had a child,
Aongus Og, with Boann, and he caused the sun to stand still in the sky
for nine months, so the child could be born on the day it was conceived,
and her husband not find out. The Ulster hero, Cuchullain was also conceived
at Newgrange.
An old engraving of Newgrange.
A goddess called Bui, a consort of Lugh is associated with Knowth, which was known as Cnogba, which comes from Cnoc Bui. Dowth has slightly sinister mythology - the druid Breasil rapes his sister there, and the place is
cursed. The Boyne has always been a famous salmon river, and is where Fionn mac Cumhal ate of the Salmon of Knowledge in later mythology.
The Boyne Valley Henges
The sites continued to be used long after the stone age: there are four late neolithic henges in the Boyne Valley, one encircling Site B. The timber circle beside Newgrange, probably dating from the transition between the neolithic and Bronze ages, is 100 meters in diameter. Another smaller henge was discovered nearby and a similar timber circle was built on the east side of Knowth; it has been reconstructed, and is quite impressive. There is a massive circular henge, one of the largest in the country 1 km northeast of Dowth.
Seventh century graffiti: an ogham inscrition in the east chamber of Knowth.
Knowth was in continual use up until medieval times. From about the early fifth century, the kings of Breaga had their residence on top of Knowth, and probably used Newgrange
for their inauguration site. This would account for the mysterious standing stone, reported to have been mounted on the summit of Newgrange. Similar inaugrations took place at a standing stone on the summit of Heapstown cairn by Lough Arrow in County Sligo, a site that has much in common with Newgrange. The Normans took Knowth from the Gaelic chiefs and fortified the top of the mound.
The late neolithic timber henge and some of the smaller satellite mounds that surround the Great Mound at Knowth.
