Celebrating winter solstice season with a new series of images of Newgrange called 'The 12 Days of Solstice'

The first image from my new series called 'The 12 days of Solstice' shows the corbelled ceiling of the chamber
of Newgrange. This photo was taken with a wide-angle lens while lying on the floor of the chamber. The ceiling
was not disturbed during excavations and is undisturbed. The passage is at bottom, with the recesses partly
visible on left, top and right.

Today begins a 12-day countdown to the Winter Solstice, the shortest day of the year, which is celebrated every year at the 5,200-year-old Newgrange monument in the Boyne Valley. This year, as a special celebration of the solstice season, I am unveiling a set of images - one per day until solstice - based upon the idea of the song '12 Days of Christmas'.

Because the date of Christmas was undoubtedly chosen to coincide with the ancient pre-Christian celebration of the shortest days, I thought it would be a nice idea to do something based loosely around the twelve days of Christmas. However, instead of beginning on the special day, the series of images will be finishing on that day - the Winter Solstice - with the 12th image.

The series of images I have chosen is made almost exclusively of pictures that have never been seen before - with the exception of one. They show various images of Newgrange - interior and exterior - which I hope will evoke a mood of reverence for the ancestors, and perhaps an inclination towards reflection and contemplation about the deeper meanings of Newgrange, and how these might  permeate into our own lives.

For me personally, Newgrange is an extremely sacred and potent place. The idea - propagated in the abundant folklore and mythology of the sacred monument - that it is a liminal place, or point of access to other realms, is something that brings a deeper meaning to what it should represent for us, as individuals, and collectively as a society.

Newgrange functions as a mandala of sorts. It represents a prehistoric society's vista into an all-encompassing cosmology. It represents, symbolically, the earth, but an earth that is connected intimately with the wider cosmos. That connection is dramatically played out on the shortest mornings of the year, when a blade of golden light illuminates the dark cave in an awesome display that provides, for the modern observer, a moment of profound rapture. But it represents, more than anything, an image of hope - hope on two levels. The first is the hope that we can see the light after darkness, in a physical sense and also a psychological and spiritual sense. The other is that there is something beyond this life, something out there, through the "magic window", along the pathway of light, in another realm of existence.

There is much about Newgrange that is mysterious. But, when you've been there often enough, there is much that is hidden in plain sight. The antiquarians who visited the Boyne Valley monuments were, in some cases, undoubtedly looking for treasure - artefacts - things that would perhaps give them wealth and fame. However, the real treasure of Newgrange is far greater than any trinket of gold or venerated object of stone.

The real treasure of Newgrange is that it can serve as a mandala for us. It connects us with ancestors, those to whom we owe our very existence, and whose struggles through the dark periods of life were not in vain. It allows us a symbolic representation of something that is beyond the humdrum of ordinary life - opening a portal for us, perhaps, allowing ingression into sacred and divine realms. Newgrange - because it has endured and is still accessible to this day - offers an opportunity to experience a rapture and an awe, a pure exhilaration at the miracles of our existence, and indeed a space in which to contemplate the deepest of life's mysteries, those which were undoubtedly pondered by the ancestors of the Neolithic.

Where have we come from?
Who are we? 
Why are we here?
What happens to us when we die?

I hope you enjoy this series of images. I am very blessed to have been able to access Newgrange on many levels over the past two decades. I am, in particular, extremely grateful for the permission from the OPW that I have had to photograph its interior on many occasions over the years. I am especially thankful for having been able to witness the solstice illumination of the chamber, back in 2010. It is a very special place. I hope these photographs give you some sense of just how special it is.

Anthony Murphy, December 10th 2016.
(The first day of solstice!)

First passage-tomb discovered in the Boyne Valley for two centuries using new archaeological techniques

The first passage-tomb to be discovered in the Boyne Valley in 200 years has been identified by archaeologists using sophisticated imaging techniques.

The newly discovered mound, with circular enclosure,
shown on a colour LiDAR image. Reference: Boyne Valley
Landscapes Project. Data: Meath County Council/
Discovery Programme

Archaeological imaging and geophysics specialist Kevin Barton spoke about the discovery, made originally in 2010, at a recent Heritage Week presentation at the JFK Arboretum in County Wexford. He was giving a talk about possible new monuments discovered in LiDAR (Light Detection And Ranging) imaging of the Great Island area of Wexford.

The “new” passage-tomb, on the floodplain of the Boyne southwest of Newgrange, had showed up as a “blip” on LiDAR imagery of the valley, Mr. Barton said. Because of its situation in proximity to the Boyne monuments, it was considered that the feature warranted further investigation.

The newly discovered monument shown in gradiometry with
resistance overlay. The dark linear feature running from SSW-NNE
is believed to be a passage. The small dark circular area is the
mound. The outer enclosure is also faintly visible. © Davis et al

The site was given the designation “LP2” by investigating archaeologists. In the LiDAR image it appeared there was a central mound with a circular outer enclosure feature. The enclosure was “faint but identifiable” in the image.

Further work, in the form of ground-probing techniques called Magnetic Gradiometry and Resistivity was carried out, and revealed what appeared to be a weakly defined outer enclosure in addition to a distinct passage/chamber arrangement of the passage-tomb aligned towards the north-northeast.

Archaeologists became excited about the central mound, which they said “appears to show a clear passage and chamber arrangement with splayed terminals at the NNE. The central mound is clearly identifiable and measures c. 30m in diameter. This strongly suggests that the feature represents a hitherto unknown passage tomb.”

Kevin Barton demonstrating archaeological surveying
techniques at the JFK Arboretum. © Anthony Murphy.

Kevin Barton told the audience at his Co. Wexford talk that he believed it was the first passage-tomb to be discovered in the Brú na Bóinne complex in over 200 years. What makes the discovery very special is the fact that no archaeological digging took place to find it. It was discovered purely through LiDAR imaging and ground-probing techniques.

The area where the passage-tomb is located is close to the Boyne, straddling a modern hedgerow. The land has been under tillage and pasture at various times, and has probably been considerably ploughed over the years.

Commenting on the discovery, Anthony Murphy, author of Newgrange: Monument to Immortality said that it was just one of a number of exciting new features identified over the past few years in the Boyne Valley.

“This is incredible work by archaeologists using an array of new techniques. They have found a passage-tomb that has been hidden in the landscape for millennia, and they have found it without putting a single trowel into the ground.”

This is a wider LiDAR image of the Boyne Valley. The location of the new
monument is shown by the red circle. Map: Boyne Valley 
Landscapes Project. Source of data: Meath County Council/Discovery Project.

“I am particularly excited by the suggestion that the passage of this newly-discovered monument may point towards the north-northwest. If that’s the case, there are two possibilities which I’d like to see examined. One is that the passage points back up the slopes of the valley towards Newgrange. The second is that, because it points to the north-northwest, it cannot be aligned on a sunrise or moonrise, and one could propose a stellar alignment," Mr. Murphy said.

“It’s obviously far too early to say whether that’s the case. But I would definitely be interested in finding out whether there might have been an alignment to Deneb, the bright star of Cygnus, the swan constellation. The Brú na Bóinne area is linked with significant swan mythology. Indeed the owner of Newgrange, Aonghus Óg, was said to have taken the form of a swan. And the fields where this newly discovered mound is located have been the wintering ground for the whooper swans, which have been coming to Newgrange in large numbers for many decades, and possibly since the time Newgrange was built.”

But this newly-discovered monument might never be excavated. Kevin Barton said in his talk that archaeological digging is not only invasive, but destructive.

The new electronic arsenal employed by archaeologists is, however, providing the means to look under the soil without ever having to dig. And Mr. Barton said the equipment and the analysis of data were improving all the time. The new breakthrough is a testament to the exciting prospects of discovery in future of monuments that are currently hidden from view in the landscape.

Some of these new techniques have been employed at the Hill of Slane, where a mound, also surrounded by a circular enclosure, is thought by some to have originally been a passage-tomb, possibly as old as Newgrange, which was later re-fashioned by the Normans into a defensive motte.

Some new techniques will also be employed to examine the possibility that Millmount, in Drogheda, is also an ancient passage-tomb which was re-used by the Normans and later by the British who fortified the mound with a martello tower on top.

Acknowledgements: Steve Davis, Conor Brady, Kevin Barton and Will Megarry (archaeology); funded by the Heritage Council (INSTAR); Meath County Council (LiDAR imagery); the archaeologists are very grateful to the Redhouse family for access to the land.

Boyne Valley Landscapes Project: Steve Davis, William Megarry. Conor Brady, Helen Lewis, Thomas Cummins, Loreto Guinan, Jonathan Turner, Colman Gallagher, Tony Brown and Robert Meehan.

See Boyne Valley Landscapes Project Phase III Summary Report and Phase III Final Report.