AFTER 36 years of excavating the megalithic site at Knowth, Co Meath, archaeologists have uncovered one of the finest examples of megalithic art in Western Europe.
A team working under Dr George Eoghan last week removed six stones from the passageway leading to one of the main burial chambers and found they were decorated with artwork over 7,000 years old.
"The six stones represent the finest examples of megalithic art across Europe, and to find them in one area together is fantastic," said Ms Grainne Kelly, who has been the resident land surveyor on the project since 1991. "Knowth now has one third of all the megalithic art in Europe.
The team was excavating the west entrance to the large mound, which has two: one from the east, which is lit up each equinox by the rays of the rising sun; the other from the west, which has been home to the decorated stones since c. 5000 BC.
Earlier this summer the team found that the stones which line the passageway had fallen in, so that many of them were touching at the top and some of the capstones had been misplaced. This had allowed some of the artwork to become visible and they were removed to conserve and protect it. The stones are similar to those seen by hundreds of thousands of visitors to Newgrange every year.
"There are a total of 300 stones at Knowth, 70 in the western chamber", said Ms Kelly. "These possibly pre date Newgrange and raise the question: was there a pre Knowth Knowth? A lot of the art was hidden and the stones were upside down. It is unusual to have such stones hidden.
These stones were never intended to be seen by the people who put them there. "This was deliberate", explained Prof Eoghan, "and either part of the ritual aspect of the passage tomb people, or else there was an earlier site at Knowth and the stones were used by people who followed them and who inserted them the wrong way up."
Knowth, Dowth and Newgrange are all burial sites, older than Stonehenge and much older than the pyramids of Egypt. They are within a four mile area of the Boyne Valley, which has a huge number of passage tombs, Newgrange is the most famous, but Knowth is the largest and has consistently surprised the team.
"Every year we say this will be our last year and then, with a few weeks to go, we find something like these stones and we keep going", said Ms Kelly. Previous finds include a ceremonial carved masthead discovered during excavations of the eastern chamber in 1983.
In 1991, Prof Eoghan found evidence of a civilisation that followed on and transformed the passage tomb civilisation. "We found that there was an immediate successor culture to the passage tomb people. They were found to be part of the `grooved ware' period and were part of a wider culture got established in Britain who were the people that built Stonehenge.
When Prof Eoghan first began work in 1962, all he had were a few aerial photographs of a bump in a field. He has since uncovered a single large mound containing the two main burial chambers and 17 smaller ones around it, as well as standing stones and evidence of people who lived post 3000 BC.
The decoration on the stories has strong Breton and Iberian influences. "It strengthens our view that there were strong connections from the Atlantic further south. The zig zag art is not Breton, but is paralleled on the Iberian peninsula. The zig zag art indicates there were stronger links between Ireland and Iberia that had bypassed Brittany. This is a terrific discovery and I am delighted," said Dr Eoghan.