The great passage tomb of the Boyne Valley is a 85-metre mound of alternating stone and turf, kerbed with slabs carved in spirals and lozenges. Above its entrance sits the 'roof-box' — a precision aperture through which, on the mornings around winter solstice, a beam of sunrise light travels 19 metres up the passage to strike the floor of the central chamber. The corbelled roof has kept that chamber bone-dry for 5,200 years.
See Newgrange on the globe
Opens with the Sky Alignments lens on, so you can see what it connects to.
Notable facts
- Radiocarbon dated to ~3200 BCE — some six centuries before Giza, and seven before Stonehenge's sarsens.
- The triple spiral (triskele), carved on the entrance kerbstone and in the chamber, has become an emblem of Ireland's ancient heritage.
- DNA from a man buried within shows first-degree incest — hinting at a 'god-king' dynasty like Egypt's.
Through the theories
How each theory reads Newgrange. Follow a theory to see its verdict and every other site it claims.
Sky AlignmentsEstablished science
The roof-box is one of the most precise and undisputed astronomical devices of the Neolithic world.
ResonanceMeasured; intent debated
The chamber resonates near 110 Hz, like Malta's Hypogeum; low chanting fills the tomb with standing waves that seem to come from everywhere.
Sacred GeometryA spectrum
The triple spiral and lozenge carvings are read by sacred-geometry writers as sun-cycle and calendar notation.
Ley LinesMostly chance
Aligned within the Boyne complex to Knowth and Dowth, which track equinoxes and lunar events.
