Keep Calm and Frolic On: Newgrange: Echoes of an Ancient Way

Last Monday, the 11^th of February, the ISP made a trip to Newgrange, a site highly significant within the context of Irish history. Newgrange is an ancient burial mound located in the Boyne Valley of County Meath. Dating from around 3200 BCE, it predates the pyramids at Giza by five hundred years, and Stonehenge by one thousand years. It is a potent example of Neolithic architecture, as well as of Megalithic architecture (“mega” meaning large and “lithic” meaning stone). Set atop a hill, its stone forms a dramatic contrast to the greenness of the surrounding landscape, and as it first came into view on that cold and blustery day, our full attention was commanded by its presence, such a potent illustration of both brute strength and startling dexterity.

Not much is known about the people who lived at the time that Newgrange was built, but we do know that they were intellectually sophisticated, and that they were socially, technologically, and linguistically advanced. We know this in part due to the ingenuity and creativity that went into the building and design of Newgrange. We were amazed, for instance, by the fact that some of its stones were transported from up to seventy kilometers away from the actual site! The current speculation regarding this is that the builders may have used rafts to transport the large stones along the Boyne River, and then most likely moved them uphill to the site with the assistance of rolling logs. The people who lived at the time of Newgrange had a lifespan of between twenty-five and thirty-five years, which, in light of the fact that Newgrange construction must have taken about one hundred years to complete, means that three or four generations of builders were dedicated to its creation. The site was rediscovered in 1699, and in the twentieth century, Professor O’Kelly of Cork performed extensive research and even some restoration of the structure, going so far as to reconstruct the outer wall in a plausible interpretation of what the original stone arrangement may have looked like.

The very architectural design of the site is highly telling in terms of the keenness and resourcefulness of these Neolithic Irish people—the fact that builders employed the technique of corbeling (stacking large stones gradually higher and closer to the center of the structure with the help of smaller packing stones to close any gaps) proves very successful in keeping the inside of the mound dry and sheltered.

Structurally, the outer wall of Newgrange is made up primarily of quartz and limestone, and the inside is divided up into a three-chambered cruciform shape. Much of the tomb as a whole is made up of a stone called greywacke, a sort of gray-green sandstone. Because the interior is so small, and because the ash-and-bone remains from only five humans have been discovered within the site, it is theorized that burial within Newgrange was reserved for some elite section of society.

Particularly worth noting on a symbolic level are the roof box and the decorative work done on both the inside and the outside of the structure. The Neolithic people in the time of Newgrange were very attentive to the seasons and the position of the sun, most likely in conjunction with their religious beliefs. They must have watched the heavens intently, for they understood celestial patterns well enough to construct a roof box above the passage graves in Newgrange. Each day from the seventeenth to the twenty-third of December (the days surrounding the winter solstice), this roof box allows light to flood into the chamber for seventeen minutes. The polytheistic people of Newgrange were certainly deeply religious; in fact, it is widely thought that the site did not serve simply as a place to bury the dead, but also as a sort of religious center, a place outside of which the inhabitants of the area would gather to practice religious rites and hold religious ceremonies. The decorative work that was incorporated into the architecture at Newgrange is intriguing because although it is clearly intentional, its significance remains mysterious. The techniques of incision and picking were used to carve designs into the rock, and the fact that there are recurring motifs within these instances of carved artwork indicates that the designs are not a form of abstract art, but rather art whose symbols most likely had a range of meanings. The symbol of the three connected spirals found in multiple places at the site, for instance, is sometimes interpreted as a way of communicating the cyclic nature of existence, the interconnectivity between life, death, and rebirth.

Newgrange, ancient though it may be, does carry significance through to the development of modern Ireland. It stands as a testament to the long history of mankind in Ireland, and demonstrates that although the religious landscape in Ireland has changed significantly over the years, some of the oldest Irish civilizations have lived with a strong sense of spirituality and a deep awareness that there existed beyond them something greater than themselves.

The personal reactions of our group to Newgrange varied. Although we are in many senses detached from the culture present at Newgrange, we still possessed a desire to connect with it in some meaningful way, and this desire for connection emerged in our responses. For some, the limited lifespan of the Neolithic builders really hit home. In the current day, it seems that the twenties and thirties mark only the beginnings of a long life, and yet for the builders of Newgrange, the twenties and thirties marked the ends of theirs. This was a sobering realization, and it helped us to appreciate the dedication that went into completing the extensive project of Newgrange even more. Many were also struck by the high levels of sophistication demonstrated by the Neolithic people in designing and building Newgrange; the massiveness of the structure, particularly for its time, awed us, as well as the way in which the art and design were incorporated into the burial ground. Some were moved by the religious knowledge evoked by the site—that spirituality has so long and so deeply influenced the human race, and that these people of early history were seeking after spiritual truth with avid intentionality via their religious practices at Newgrange. Needless to say, we left the spiritual and ritual place of Newgrange having discovered a great deal not only about life in 3200 BCE, but about the ripple effects of that ancient way of life for modern Ireland, and perhaps even for our own personal journeys of faith and intellect.