Message from Beyond

I am discovering that the story of Ireland is written down in stones, all you need is to be able to read them. Not so simple.

A good place to start is in the Boyne Valley which not only has Newgrange,  Knowth and Tara but also the impressive Loughcrew -- not a lake as the ‘Lough’ part  of is name might suggest but the opposite,  a hill rivalling Tara’s.

Cairn T is one of the largest passage tombs in the complex, constructed around 3,000 BC. Inside is a cruciform chamber with a corbelled roof and (they say) some of the most beautiful examples of Neolithic art in Ireland. These tell us what the early ‘Irish’ believed but to understand what they are saying we need to know more of their background. 

Many stories are told about the first ‘invaders’ (or settlers) who came to Ireland but there is little doubt that the people who lived in Loughcrew in 3000 BC were Neolithic farmers. Wherever they came from they brought their beliefs and practices with them.

Two of those beliefs/practices made me think.  

In the Neolithic Period the dead were buried inside their houses. Their children were not allowed to forget them because they were asleep beneath the floor where the family continued their activities. Were the house-shaped tombs I had seen in Kerry a reminder of that heritage?

But what of the massive mounds on top of hills like Loughcrew?  Was it a reminders of a ‘noble ancestor’, genuine or claimed, whose memory kept the families in the area united? The replica of an ordinary house would have been too simple for such a personage but a large mound on a prominent hill with a mysterious inner passage leading to a decorated chamber would create an added sense of awe.  Funerals and cemeteries are still very important in Ireland.  

I was also struck by the many ‘cup markings’ among the unique petroglyphs (images created by pecking or chiselling into rock) found in the passage. I had come across them in the Dublin-Wicklow area on Viking-age ‘Rathdown Slabs’. Since then I have learnt that such ‘scooped out holes’ were the commonest form of ornamentation not only in Ireland but in many other parts of the world. Yet no one knows where the practice originated or what their message might be.   

They may have first attracted attention as unusual, and hence mysterious, ‘entry ways’ into a deeper  world (like bullauns?) and their meaning changed from place to place and age to age. At any rate, despite their widespread existence and millennia-long survival they still puzzle today.

Loughcrew is well worth a day out and is free though you may not get to see inside the tomb. It is at the highest point of County Meath and from it you may notice that the hills around it are also crowned with megalithic tombs, creating a huge megalithic cemetery.

A search for clues to the roots of Irish culture will end up visiting ancient stones and graveyards. Loughcrew is one of the most impressive cemeteries and not a bad place to start.