The image above shows the entrance to the Newgrange passage tomb, one of three such tombs in the Bend of the Boyne, Ireland. At 5,000 years, it is one of the oldest man-made structures in the world, predating the pyramids and Stonehenge. Mandy and I visited the tomb on Friday 18 July 2014. Our guide was appropriately pregnant (as will be illuminated below) but the almost flippant tone of her comment, that the spiral designs may have been depictions of images that people see when taking hallucinogenic substances, makes light of what may well be part of the best explanation of this Neolithic rock art. In most Paleolithic and Neolithic cultures shamans took substances or performed trance dances to enter altered states of consciousness, which they understood to be transcosmological travels to the spirit world.
Before the entrance, the large rock hampers easy access to the tomb, indicating the difficulty of crossing the threshold into the spirit world. Above the entrance is a roof box which allows a ray of sunlight to travel along the passage and penetrate the darkness of the tomb every winter solstice on 21 December. The winter solstice, being the shortest day of the year, represents the renewal of life, and the ray of sunlight may represent the sun impregnating the tomb, which is also a womb. Thus people exit the tomb reborn, along the passage that, in its restricted space, may represent the birth canal.
However, the tomb/womb may also represent the human mind, illuminated by the light of consciousness - the darkness representing death (one aspect of the spirit world). The geometric designs in and around and outside the tomb (not just spiral but also triangles and others) are, indeed, most probably the entoptic shapes that people experience in altered states of consciousness. Thus, the Neolithic sites may represent not just a spiritual journey but the discovery of consciousness too, following the tradition of Paleolithic cave art.
Before the entrance, the large rock hampers easy access to the tomb, indicating the difficulty of crossing the threshold into the spirit world. Above the entrance is a roof box which allows a ray of sunlight to travel along the passage and penetrate the darkness of the tomb every winter solstice on 21 December. The winter solstice, being the shortest day of the year, represents the renewal of life, and the ray of sunlight may represent the sun impregnating the tomb, which is also a womb. Thus people exit the tomb reborn, along the passage that, in its restricted space, may represent the birth canal.
However, the tomb/womb may also represent the human mind, illuminated by the light of consciousness - the darkness representing death (one aspect of the spirit world). The geometric designs in and around and outside the tomb (not just spiral but also triangles and others) are, indeed, most probably the entoptic shapes that people experience in altered states of consciousness. Thus, the Neolithic sites may represent not just a spiritual journey but the discovery of consciousness too, following the tradition of Paleolithic cave art.
References
Lewis-Williams, D. 2002. The Mind in the Cave: Consciousness and the Origins of Art. London: Thames & Hudson, Ltd.
Lewis-Williams, D and Pearce, D. 2005. Inside the Neolithic Mind: Consciousness, Cosmos and the Realm of the Gods. London: Thames & Hudson Ltd.
Lewis-Williams, D. 2002. The Mind in the Cave: Consciousness and the Origins of Art. London: Thames & Hudson, Ltd.
Lewis-Williams, D and Pearce, D. 2005. Inside the Neolithic Mind: Consciousness, Cosmos and the Realm of the Gods. London: Thames & Hudson Ltd.