Newgrange, watercolour by Gabriel Beranger, 1775.
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Behold the Sidh before your eyes, Newgrange is the best known megalithic monument / neolithic chamber in Ireland. Along with the two massive mounds Knowth and Dowth, Newgrange stands on a low ridge over-looking the River Boyne 18 km east of the the sea at the mouth of the Boyne. Newgrange is a massive cairn, a mighty heap of water-rolled stone 90 meter diameter with a ring of 97 large kerbstones around the base. The mound is roughly heart shaped and probably was originally built in the form of a truncated cone - like Maeve's Cairn, Dowth and Heapstown. There is a reconstruction drawing on the next page. The remains of a great circle of standing stones surrounds the mound. It is estimated that if the circle was ever complete there may have been up to 36 stones. Twelve remain today, and there is some doubt as to whether the circle was complete as not all the sockets have been discovered.
Newgrange seen from above in a Bord Failte postcard.
Outside the entrance to the great mound there was a 'setting', discovered during O'Kelly's excavation, and also the remains of what may have been a hut site. In the same compound as Newgrange, and encircling Site Z is the remains of a huge timber henge, approximately the same diameter as the big mound, about 90 meters. Some of the post holes from the henge have been marked with concrete stumps.
A plan of Newgrange showing how the three decorated stones relate to each other and the chamber. The chamber of Newgrange is also engineered to allow the light of the full moons at midsummer to shine in. Newgrange was re-discovered in 1699 when the local landlord, Charles Campbell set his workers removing stones from a convienient mound on his land. By good fortune they began their excavation on the south west side and uncovered an engraved stone - the lintel of the roofbox. Soon they had uncovered the entrance stone, and for the first time since the great mound was constructed people again entered the chamber of Newgrange.
William Wakeman's plan and section of Newgrange, around 1880. Newgrange quickly became famous and was visited by many of the early antiquarians. The chamber was dug over many times by visitors, many of whom etched their names into the ancient rocks.. |
Irish monuments Map of Irish sites Heapstown cairn
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Four
smaller satellite mounds, two to the east and two to the west flanked
Newgrange; one is buried today, the chambers of two, 
Newgrange from the River Boyne 1 km away to the south. The large unopened mound in the foreground is Site B.
