The passageway is shorter—much shorter, mercifully shorter—than I expect it to be. Even crouching it takes less than a minute for our group to file into the room at the center of the passage tomb, but it is small, and despite our numbers the walls threaten to close us in. Even the unrelenting wind can’t reach us from here. Everyone bumps into everyone, adjusting to the space, gravel shifting under our awkward shuffling.
At this proximity, so close it’s almost impossible to listen when our guide tells us not to touch the walls, the patterns carved into the rock are clearly visible. A curious reoccurring set of three interconnected swirls, which also decorates the stone that has guarded the entrance for five thousand years. Zig zags, triangles, arcs, and circles dot the walls from the dirt to the ceiling that is easily three times my height. Graffiti mostly in the form of initials craved by vandals and visitors alike, left unchecked for decades before conservation efforts deemed the tomb a national heritage site.
Our guide explains a few theories behind the purpose of the structure, paying too much attention to a small secondary room barely wide enough for the rock that sits inside it. She makes sure we see the blood that has stained the oblong stone for thousands of years. It is brown but not smudged or nearly as faded as I’d like it to be.
The climax of the tour is a recreation of the winter solstice. Our guide gives us a careful walkthrough of what is going to happen before she turns off the lights.
Black is not the right wordfor Newgrange. It is a dark so complete that the eyes, trying to make sense of not seeing, conjure dancing shapes in shades of less-black than black. The tsch tsch of gravel underfoot breaks the quiet of the group—I’ve shifted to grab Cynthia’s hand in my icy one.
Another artificial light cuts through the meticulously created darkness, a straight line that shines from the entrance of the passage tomb all the way to the back of our small room. We can see again, and I let Cynthia’s hand drop from mine.
Although it is early March, we see the winter solstice light Newgrange the way it did five thousand years before.
At this proximity, so close it’s almost impossible to listen when our guide tells us not to touch the walls, the patterns carved into the rock are clearly visible. A curious reoccurring set of three interconnected swirls, which also decorates the stone that has guarded the entrance for five thousand years. Zig zags, triangles, arcs, and circles dot the walls from the dirt to the ceiling that is easily three times my height. Graffiti mostly in the form of initials craved by vandals and visitors alike, left unchecked for decades before conservation efforts deemed the tomb a national heritage site.
Our guide explains a few theories behind the purpose of the structure, paying too much attention to a small secondary room barely wide enough for the rock that sits inside it. She makes sure we see the blood that has stained the oblong stone for thousands of years. It is brown but not smudged or nearly as faded as I’d like it to be.
The climax of the tour is a recreation of the winter solstice. Our guide gives us a careful walkthrough of what is going to happen before she turns off the lights.
Black is not the right wordfor Newgrange. It is a dark so complete that the eyes, trying to make sense of not seeing, conjure dancing shapes in shades of less-black than black. The tsch tsch of gravel underfoot breaks the quiet of the group—I’ve shifted to grab Cynthia’s hand in my icy one.
Another artificial light cuts through the meticulously created darkness, a straight line that shines from the entrance of the passage tomb all the way to the back of our small room. We can see again, and I let Cynthia’s hand drop from mine.
Although it is early March, we see the winter solstice light Newgrange the way it did five thousand years before.
© 2017 Elise Price