Robert Hensey

I picked up a copy of this book at the visitor center at Tara, towards the end of a recent two week-long visit to Ireland. Either then or on an earlier trip, I have visited many of the sites described, and I was intrigued by the book’s premise that Newgrange in its current form falls at the end of a long evolutionary series of passage tombs which may reflect a social and religious evolution of the people building them.

Hensey estimates that there are approximately 260 passage tombs of various sizes in Ireland, many not yet excavated. They tend to occur in groups, although there are also a number of solitary examples. The four main complexes lie along a line stretching from near Sligo on the west coast to the Boyne Valley complex (which includes Newgrange) near the east coast. These complexes are respectively known as Carrowmore, Carrowkeel, Loughcrew, and Brú na Bóinne.

Hensey divides Irish passage tombs into three groups. The earliest ones (Type 1) were relatively small and simple things. . Some of these, in the Carrowmore complex, have been dated to between 3775 and 3520 BCE in age. These passage tombs are small, most of them too small for a person to enter. They often consist of five or six stones and a capstone, forming a small pear-shaped chamber, usually without a covering mound. Type 2 monuments, the most typical group of Irish passage tombs, were substantially larger. They include central chambers, often multi-lobed and large enough to contain several people, which are accessed by means of a covered passage. Type 3 monuments, including Newgrange, Knowth, Dowth, and a few others, appear to have been designed for public display – outside rituals as well as private interior ones.

Hensey traces the possible religious rituals involved with this series of monuments: first, small group rituals outside the Type 1 mounds, centered on the placement of small amounts of cremated human bone inside the chambers; next, private rituals in the enclosed darkness of the Type 2 mounds, where the multiple recesses could have held individuals for prolonged initiatory experiences which may have been connected with the megalithic art on the chamber walls; and finally large public rituals, possibly attended by whole tribes and involving a priestly class of religious specialists. Why did the passage tombs eventually go out of use? We do not know – on this question the stones are silent.

I highly recommend this book to anyone interested in passage tombs, or indeed prehistoric religion.… (plus d'informations)