|
|
|
|
Brú na Bóinne
Associated to Place:
AncientWorlds >
Celtia >
Eire >
Meath >
Brú na Bóinne >
articles
-- by
This complex of structures and mounds includes Newgrange, Knowth and Dowth.
West of Drogheda, the river Boyne makes a graceful curve known as the Bend in the Boyne. Cradled in this southward arc of these sacred waters lies one of the most magnificent cemetaries of prehistoric Europe, formed by three sites - Newgrange, Knowth and Dowth. In these low hills, quilted with oak groves and green fields, Neolithic farmers settled, just above the reach of the tides. In this high place, they built three barrows to house their dead. These mounds, as large as the hills themselves, dominate the valley.
Within the space of three square miles there is an amazing cluster of passage graves, standing stones, henges, small barrows and some remains of houses. The most ancient of these structures were built around 3200 BC, which makes them older than the Giza pyramids and Stonehenge. Two-thirds of the total megalithic art in western Europe is in the Boyne Valley. The whole complex of Brú na Bóinne has the honor of being preserved as a United Nations World Heritage Site. Were these sites constructed as religious temples, astronomical observatories or the resting places for high ranking members of megalithic society? The official designation is "passage tomb" but that definition seems to fall short. The purposes of these mysterious buildings may forever remain lost in the past. |
Courtyard
~ Table of Contents ~
Ynys Môn ( Isle of Anglesey)
Cill Dara Caer Gai Winter Solstice - Rebirth of the Sun Temair Luachra Maes Howe Reflections on Cnoc Áine Samhain: The Last Feast of Summer Clonycavan Man Lough Derg Changelings The Origins of Celtic Christianity and St. Patrick in Ireland In Search of the Real Myrddin, Mad Prophet and Poet Myth and Celtic Culture by Draoi-man Brigantes (David Drew) |
