Megalithic Exegesis: Megalithic Monuments as Sources of Socio-Cultural Meanings: The Irish Case

Megalithic Exegesis: Megalithic Monuments as Sources of Socio-Cultural Meanings: The IrishCaseAuthor(s): Michael MorrisSource: Irish Archaeological Research Forum, Vol. 1, No. 2 (1974), pp. 10-28Published by: Wordwell Ltd.Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20495200 .

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MEGALITHIC EXEGESIS: MEGALITHIC MONUMENTS AS SOURCES OF

SOCIO-CULTURAL MEANINGS: THE IRISH CASE

Michael Morris

Non-verbal 'Texts'

In this paper I would like to elaborate a point which I made in a recent

presentation (Morris, 1974) on the importance of ritual activity for the

archaeologist. I suggested that our classic megalithic monuments derived their

primary meaning as centers of ritual activities rather than as tombs. There has

been some recognition of this by the various experts as in the classification of

'court-cairn' devised by Professor de Valera. This title singles out the ritual court as the most significant and characteristic feature. Though Estyn Evans

(1969? 6) seems to prefer the classification of these as 'court graves', he else where (1966, 11) points to the anomaly that some of the most elaborate of these

'graves' seem to have held only one or two individuals. While I do admit that the role of ancestral shrine was an important and central one, I wish to show that this was but one aspect of a range of ritual symbolism in which elements of both life and death were inextricably intertwined.

In the paper referred to above, I spoke of the linguistic significance of these monuments in the sense that they say Something' about the society and culture in which they functioned. They can do this in the same way as they acted as sources of information for their builders for whom they were sacred 'texts' reinforcing cultural patterns, cosmologies, ritual practices and even patterns of social

organization. In this paper I wish to develop some concepts and theoretical

principles which could aid in the task of analysing these texts, now culturally 'dead'

forms, so that they will yield up more information about the socio-cultural order. In the context of a paper such as this, I cannot hope to apply these principles in

any great detail to the wide variety of Irish megalithic sites. However, I would

hope that some of the ideas presented in this forum might help to open new avenues of research in Irish megalithic studies so that new questions will be asked and also in the hope that mpre cognizance would be taken of theoretical advances in the soc ial sciences. In one of his many studies on megaliths, Glyn Daniel (i960, 1) remarks that inquisitive interest and informed speculation in the past were a

substitute for scholarship. Unfortunately, much of this presentation might be classified as 'informed speculation* but I feel that this is necessary if we are to

make these stones come alive and 'speak' again as they did some thousands of years ago.

Hidden Structure

The basic, theoretical position of this paper is that sacred monuments can be

analysed as symbolic forms which express, in a visible and enduring way, a wide

range of meanings derived from the social and cultural order. Just as the visible form of social organization in a society can be seen as generated out of an underly ing logical structure, so also sacred sites have a structure which is not readily visible but must be arrived at through logical analysis. Writing on Stonehenge, Professor Atkinson (1956, 202) has commented that in earlier antiquarian days it was not realized that the 'structure' of ancient sites, no less than the objects found

in them, might be a source of information on the past. I wish to take this notion of

'structure' a step further so that it resembles more that which has recently been

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developed in social anthropology, under the influence of structural linguistics and semiology.

Writing of stone alignments, henge monuments and megalithic sites in

general, Stuart Piggott (1968, 116) states that since we are dealing with non

literate societies, we have no information on the beliefs which prompted the

construction of these sacred places, nor of the rites performed within them. He

goes on to state that the nature of purely archaeological evidence does not allow

us to make supportable inferences about such aspects of prehistoric peoples. It

seems to me that advances in the social sciences do allow such inferences to be

made now much more so than in the past, in the same way as the advances in

other sciences have contributed to inferences about environment, technology, climate and so on. In his introduction to THE MONUMENT BUILDERS, Bernard

Wailes (1973) states that because we have no literary evidence, the beliefs and

rituals of these builders must be inferred from the monuments themselves with

the aid of ethnographic analogy, historical allusion and folk culture.

In passing, I would like to refer to a ritual practice which, at first sight, seems to have reduced the available evidence, namely the predominant rite of

cremation which sets the Irish megalithic tradition apart from the rest of Western

Europe. Firstly, I see this as evidence for the existence of an already established

pre-megalithic population with its own distinctive cultural patterns. The adoption of the new megalithic ritual and cosmology had to take account of these pre-exist

ing norms in the same way as any new religion does not begin with a tabula rasa.

Secondly, it could be interpreted as an indication that the neolithic population of

Ireland was more oriented towards pastoralism than agriculture, thus setting a

pattern which has survived right down to the present day. In a nomadic society which placed considerable emphasis on burial in the ancestral shrine, at least

for some persons if not everybody had this privilege, then cremation would have

acted as a way of bringing the individual back for proper burial. There is some

ethnographic analogy for this in the practice of pre-colonial Woodland Indians in

Eastern North America.

Morphology and Cosmology

In his analysis of the temple dedicated to Aphaia on the Greek island of Aigina, the historian of architecture Vincent Scully (1969,167) shows how this temple, like so many others in Greece, was a monument to the presence of the goddess as

demonstrated by certain characteristics of the local environment. Thus, the

temple building becomes a feminine presence and itself an integrated female body. It is an abstract image of the goddess in much the same way as the passage-grave

monument must have been perceived as an image of the goddess whose symbols

appear in the mural engravings. The interior of the temple to Aphaia was not

merely a volume of space which might contain a number of people. Rather, it

was conceived as possessing its own inner workings and as completing the state

ment of the exterior. This analysis by Scully accords with the notion that a

sacred monument's organization at the overt level is a transformation into visible

form of a deeper, logical structure manipulating a people's cosmology. Similarly, the Babylonian cities, more especially that of Nineveh, were based on divine

archetypes existing in the heavens. (Wheatley, 1971, 436) In South and Southeast

Asia, temples were frequently laid out as representations of the Sacred Mount

Meru which was perceived as the centre of the world and axis of the universe

where heaven and earth met. The Bakhen temple was an astronomical calendar

in stone, depicting the positions and paths of the planets in the great Indian

11



conception of cyclic time. (id. , 437) On Mount Sinai, Jehovah showed to Moses the form of the sanctuary which he was to build for Him. Thus, the temple,

which is pre-eminently the sacred place, had a logical prototype in the mind of

Jehovah Himself. Similarly, the famed ziggurat formed a cosmic mountain, a

symbolic image of the cosmos in which the seven stories represented the seven

planetary heavens. (Mircea Eliade, 1971, 13) The concept of the temple as an

imago mundi is an ancient one in those literate civilizations where we have evidence.

It should also apply in pre-literate societies and so provide us with a means of

reconstructing cosmologies using the only available evidence, that is, the sacred

monuments themselves interpreted in the light of ethnographic analogy.

For the community, whether it was an extended family, a clan or chiefdom,

its megalithic sanctuary served not only as an ancestral shrine and ritual centre

but also as a visible translation into stone of their fundamental conceptions of the

cosmos. For that community it was the centre of the world, the point at which

heaven and earth met, where the bountiful ancestors resided, where order was

given to space and time through cardinal orientation and calendrical liturgy, and

the focus of divine power which diffused throughout the territory infusing the land

the flocks, crops and society itself. It was the 'axis mundi' where heaven, earth

and the underworld met, and where passage from one cosmic region to another

could be best effected (Eliade, 1971, 13), more especially translation from the world of the living to the realm of the ancestors. We are dealing with much more

than mere burial places. They were sanctuaries which made the entire territory of the community sacred and so served as the most appropriate place where the

social unit could commune with itself and with the gods, goddesses and ancestors.

Calendrical Ritual

Sometimes it would appear that we have not advanced much beyond "

ideas of

Celtic romance or the sacrifical delights of the Druids on the wind-swept, gorse

golden heaths" referred to by Glyn Daniel (I960, 21). One still reads of

'megalithic magic' and even of "the irrational magic-dominated world of ideas"

as in a recent book on megaliths by van Cles-Reden. The nineteenth century bias

against the rational powers of so-called 'primitive' man continues to persist in

spite of a growing wealth of ethnographic literature which, if anything, over

emphasize the rationality of 'exotic' religions. Like so much of man's expressive

life, religious symbolism everywhere participates in both the rational and

irrational. The passage-grave spiral is no less rational or irrational than the

cross, the crescent, the lotus or any of the other key symbols of great religions.

Such bias seems to underly the scepticism which greets the current theories

on the calendrical aspects of megalithic sites, such as the carefully reasoned one

presented by Alexander Thom (1967, 1971). It would be beyond the scope of this

paper to deal with this important aspect of megalithic architecture except in so

much as these sites must have been related to the universal tendency for man to

construct his ritual life around what Mircea Eliade terms 'bio-cosmic rhythms'.

The single-court examples of the court-cairn complex tend to face east, the most

common direction being ENE, and so compares with the regular eastern orientation

of the Cotswald-Severn group. Orientation is never a haphazard quality in sacred

sites. The reputed fact that the rising sun, during the days near the winter solstice,

sends its rays into the chamber at Newgrange is highly significant. If one takes a

ruler and places it along the passage on a site-diagram, it will be found that the 64

foot passage is not straight but has two separate curves.

12



Yet, a ray of light entering the passage at 90 to the facade can travel unhindered

to the far wall of the chamber. The curves serve to limit the range of the light source which can do this.

In the previous section I have remarked on the tendency of sacred

architecture to embody celestial configurations. This seems to stem from the

desire of men to communicate with the universe and to bring the rhythms of his

daily life into harmony with those of the heavens. An ordering of both time and

place is necessary for a predictable human existence. In the case of a society whose subsistence base is so intimately linked to bio-cosmic rhythms, as is the

case in an agricultural and pastoralist economy, it is especially important that

human processes be based in the life-cycle. A fundamental characteristic of

agriculture is that it constitutes a 'time-factored' activity (Marshack, 1972). It

is characterized by process, a concept which can only be related and compared

through the medium of 'story' in myth, ritual and narrative. Knowledge and

understanding of these rhythms must pre-date the beginnings of agriculture and

pastoralism. Since the development of modern man's ability to conceptualize the

life-proc?s se s of nature and translate them into 'story' it would seem that the

lunar cycle has played an important role in the elaboration of patterned time or

calendars. This is a point stressed by Eliade (1971, 87), and also underlies

Marshack's (1971) argument that such systems are contained in Upper Palaeolithic

notational engravings which have been interpreted as abstract geometric art. *

A liturgical life revolving around the life-cycle of nature is a predominant one in agricultural societies. It is the basis of the rich ritual symbolism which

still exists in Middle America today. In the early historical societies of the East

ern Mediterranean it was developed into the drama of the Mother Goddess and the

Young God who dies in the winter and rises again in the spring. The ritual life of

agricultural society becomes an acting out of the processes observed on earth and

in the heavens. It also serves as a framework for daily life and as a means of

making sacred a society's categories of time. Though I would not go so far as to

argue that all megalithic centres had an astronomical function, I do see them as

sites in which regular liturgical functions associated with a sacred calendar were

performed. Thus, it is appropriate that rites of the dead should have performed

during the winter soltice. The question of right time and right place is important in any ritual, or 'rite', in order to ensure that proper communication with the

deities can take place. The rising sun lighting up the chamber of the dead at

Newgrange would indicate that the appropriate moment had come to make contact

with the ancestral deities and the funerary goddess. However, the filling of the

chamber by the sun's rays must have had a higher symbolic value than merely

marking the proper cosmic moment. It would have symbolized the union of sun

and earth and so heralded the coming resurrection of life in Spring. The symbols of life and death are not so separate as their polarity might imply, as will be seen

later in the paper. Our so-called tombs were as much related to life as to death,

to the celestial deities as much as the chthonic Mother Goddess, and so one must

agree with Colin Renfrew (1973, 141) when he states that 'tomb' is much too restrictive. It should become increasingly evident that these sites were associated

with elaborate ritual which indeed went far beyond that wholly dedicated to the burial of dead, as Stuart Piggott (1968, 114) suggested they might.

13



A Megalithic Co-tradition

As a reaction against the former dominance of the 'invasion hypothesis', in

which every new monument type became evidence for a movement (from either the

Continent or Britain depending on one's political leanings), there is a tendency to lean in the direction of indigenous developments. Colin Renfrew (1973, 124-32)

holds that we are no longer obliged to see the various megalithic monuments as

the result of a single megalithic movement; they are just as likely to have been

separate and essentially separate developments in different areas as adaptive

responses to similar social demands. I would take a middle position, such as

that of Estyn Evans (1968) for whom they are the result of a fusion between intrusive and well-established traditions. Thus, it would be preferable to speak in terms of a megalithic 'co-tradition', a term which would take account of the way

various areas combined the elements of megalithic architecture and ritual symbolism to create a local synthesis which took account of that local community's identity and previous traditions.

At the same time, I would classify the megalithic sites as expressions of a

'positive religion', to use Robertson Smith's (1889, l) term for such religions as

Christianity, Judaism and Islam. These positive religions trace their origin to

great religious innovators rather than to a solely unconscious development of

already existing traditions. The W. European megalithic complex is much too

patterned, in spite of its local variations, to have been the result of independent

responses to environmental and social needs. The original impetus must have

come from a relatively small group of seers, mytics or shamans who spread the

essential core of megalithic ritual symbolism. There is no reason to believe that

this society did not produce wise men, specially gifted seers and prophets, such

as exist in every society no matter how technologically simple. These shamans

were not magicians or sorcerers in the everyday sense of these terms. It is

being increasingly realized that the systems developed by shamans since the Upper Palaeolithic period can be seen as the ultimate foundation from which arose all the

religions of the world. As Peter F?rst (1974, 53) writes, the shaman was the first 'technician of the sacred'. One of the special talents of the shaman has been his

special talents in the area of communication, especially in the expressive arts

which adds charisma to his sacred power and aids him in the task of guarding and

transmitting sacred knowledge and heroic traditions, (id, 45-58)

In the case of the megalithic co-tradition, it is obvious that we are dealing with a group of men who, rather than engaging in dark magical rites, were skilled

in the details of liturgy and symbolism. They were custodians and developers of

elaborate cosmologies, as well as being extremely skilled architects and artists.

They were the predecessors of the file, the mystic and poet of early historic times.

This group of shamans must have been responsible for spreading the fundamental

cosmological tenets throughout Western Europe. These men had maintained

sacred traditions going back to the Upper Palaeolithic, just as their descendants in Siberia and North America seem to have preserved fundamental assumptions

which go back to that period when modern man evolved. (Peter F?rst, 1974, 38) Many of the basic elements in the ritual and symbolism of the megalithic move

ment seem to have originated many millenia previously and so it was not some

thing entirely novel introduced from elsewhere. It can be seen as a flowering of

certain, widespread concepts which took place in a relatively restricted area and

then spread throughout the wider context. Like all positive religions there was

innovation and revelation which built on already well-established traditions. It

would seem that the time is now ripe in European archaeology to seek evidence

14



relating to the indigenous development of the larger co-tradition and also the

many constituent traditions such as the Irish court-cairn, the passage-grave, the

portal dolmen and wedge-complexes. Even an examination of the internal diversity

of a given tradition might give some clues to already existing local diversity and

settlement patterns in a pre-megalithic period.

The term 'culture' is one which has tended to be used so loosely in

archaeology as to be of little scientific value. More recently in the social sciences,

it has come to be limited to a cognitive significance, referring to that cognitive

pattern or mental blue-print by which people impose meaning on the experiential world. Geertz (1973, 89) defines it as "an historically transmitted pattern of

meanings embodied in symbols". These symbols include patterned behaviour,

patterns of socio-political organisation, and expressive forms such as music and

iconography. The megalithic tomb is included in the last category of symbols;

each particular complex constitutes a visible expression of some cultural pattern

of meanings which is also expressed in a particular social organisation, technology,

subsistence pattern and religion. These latter aspects of society are, therefore,

related to the complex of monuments in as much as both are products of the same

internal meanings. A society which constructed ceremonial centres in which many

circular, hemi-spherical monuments were grouped together must have had a very

different cultural pattern from one which built single, trapezoidal, relatively

open sites. The different cultural systems would be expressed also in the other

artifacts of culture, more especially in socio-political organisation. There must

have been vast differences in the level of socio-political organisation which pro

duced the mobilization and resources embodied in the Boyne Valley sites and that

underlying the portal dolmens with their tendency towards solitary sites by smaller streams. More will be said towards the end of the paper regarding the

socio-political structure of the Boyne Valley sites. The solitary dolmens are usually

interpreted as evidence for a break-away from the mother court-cairn complex. The most striking change is the abandonment of the ritual court, though there is

an accompanying elaboration of the chamber structure itself. Perhaps this became

the focus of associated liturgy. The dramatic appearance of the capstone might indicate that the structure was not completely covered by a cairn as is generally

supposed. The classic dolmen, which has appealed more to the popular imagin ation than any other megalithic structure, architecturally presents a sort of fusion

between the sacrifical altar and the spectacular trilithons of Stone-henge. Michael

Herity (1964) sees them as late in the megalithic series and as possibly represent

ing a new economic base as people moved from the highlands into the valleys.

They were a vigorous group who colonized Wales and also Cornwall.

Estyn Evans (1968, 5) speaks of three types of dolmen sites - the portal dolmen derived from the court or horned cairns, passage dolmens derived from

passage graves, and wedge dolmens derived from wedge graves. Possibly all of

these are late and represent not so much a'liturgical heresy' as a separation in

function between ancestral shrines and the development of sites given over to life

dominated ritual, for example stone circles. The various dolmens represent a

declining cult of the ancestral deities and, perhaps, some dimunition of an all

pervasive Mother Goddess cult as the sky deities became more important. The

Bronze Age does not represent a radical cultural change. Many of its features

are developments of the earlier period. It is as if the various elements which

constituted the megalithic sanctuary were separated out and recombined to take

15



account of developing social and cultural patterns. The diversified economic base

became reflected in a diversified ritual symbolism and, most likely, a more

diversified pantheon.

Megalithic Religion

Religion is that part of the cultural pattern which has taken on the aspect of

sacredness so that its symbols carry a high content of emotional significance. Like the cultural system, of which it is a part, religion is concerned with internal

meanings and its expression in visible symbolism. Van Baal (1972, 242) takes this symbolist approach to the study of religion, seeing it as a system of "symbols for communication" by which men seek to express the meanings of their existence

and also to communicate with the unknown. Professor Atkinson (1956, 168) takes

essentially the same approach when he writes of 'the meaning of Stonehenge' as a

temple which provided "a structure in which it was possible for man to establish

contact and communion with extra-mundane forces and beings". As the root-verb

implies, religion is concerned with union and communication. This communion

can only be achieved through such visible symbolism as sacrifice, ceremonial,

prayer and iconography, except for the mystic who aims at direct communion.

As sanctuaries, megalithic sites were places reserved for the performance of sacred symbolism. They were holy places in which contact with the deities was

assured. Archaeologists have tended to reserve the terms 'ritual' and 'symbolism' for those aspects of a megalithic site which do not appear to have been functional.

Most commonly, it has been applied to otherwise inexplicable pits. While these

had important functions to play as repositories of sacrificial offerings, they are

comparatively minor in contrast to the symbolism expressed by the entire monu

ment. This sacredness, though enhanced by the presence of the holy structure,

probably predated its construction. Sometimes, building material was brought long distances excepting, of course, the Burren where rocks abound everywhere.

The site must have been selected on some patterned basis just as the Greek

temples tend to be built in those places where the goddess has manifested herself

through the symbolism of a cleft mountain or double peaks associated with a

conical hill. (Scully, 1969, 11) Greek temples were preceded by open altars which

were usually situated beside a cavern or spring which focused the divine presence. The temple, when built, embodied that divinity. Likewise, the megalithic site would have dramatized an already existing sanctity.

The siting of the Boyne Valley sites is the most dramatic in this respect.

They are situated on gentle hills and within the embrace of the curving Boyne, itself revered as a goddess down through the ages. The divine presence is not so

obvious in the case of the other megalithic complexes. Portal dolmens, as already

pointed out, tend to be situated along streams. This might indicate a conception of local sanctity rather than the postulated change to a lowland subsistence. It

does seem unlikely that these valleys were not integrated into the economy until

so late in the Neolithic. I can think of no feature of the landscape which is associated with court-sites though their closest relatives, that is, the Cotswold

Severn group tend to be situated in pairs around the head-waters of rivers or

around springs.

Robertson Smith (1898) was one of the first writers to examine the nature of

holy places. On the basis of his analysis the following sequence can be imagined. We can suppose a pre-megalithic period in which there existed a series of holy

places marked by a spring, an unusual rock or some other landscape feature which

16



appealed to a sense of reverence. At this time subsistence would have been based

on fishing, gathering, some hunting and the gradual adoption of agriculture and

pastoralism. In accord with this nomadic kind of life, the series of holy places was a kind of nomadic beat in which the gods, the goddess and ancestors rested in their wanderings. These holy sites could compare to the waterholes which the

Australian Walbiri believe to be the places where the ancestors emerged from the

underworld to create the society's territory. With the local development of the

intrusive megalithic religion, the same sites would have remained holy and become

the foci of the new elaboration. As stressed already, even a positive religion does not begin with a tabula rasa but builds on existing traditons. Men still needed

to be assured that the place was an optimum focus of divine and ancestral action. The tradition of local sanctity dies hard. Even today, there exists a series of

holy wells throughout Ireland whose sanctity may well go back to the earliest

times, even to the Mesolithic period, though this cannot be shown.

The Upper Palaeolithic origin of many of the elements found in the megalithic co-tradition ought to be stressed to a greater degree. Possibly some link exists

between the passage grave, with its passageway, cavern-like chamber and mural

engravings, and the labyrinthine caves which were the focus of Upper Palaeolithic

man's ritual and sacred art. The Mesolithic period could not have been the hiatus

that is generally supposed. Though the great florescence apparently faded, there

is no reason to believe that the entire system of beliefs and rituals were abandoned

as adjustment was made to a changing environment and a new subsistence base.

Sacred Art

Originally, art forms were an integral part of man's desire to express his

inner feelings and communicate with the unknown. Our literate civilization stresses

the role of words and books. It underestimates the importance of non-verbal

communication through visible symbols such as dance, sacred drama, and

iconography. These are especially frowned on by the anti-ritualists. It is

necessary, therefore, to put aside our normal attitudes when considering the art

which occurs in the passage-graves. We are not dealing with a mere embellish

ment but, rather, with an integral part of the total ritual symbolism which the

monument expresses.

The spiral and concentric circle are doubtlessly the dominant motifs though

others, such as the lozenge, also occur frequently. For the passage-grave builders

these dominant forms constituted 'summarizing symbols' (Ortner, 1973), that is,

key symbols which expressed and summed up a wide range of fundamental cultural

meanings. It has been a serious error to try and assign one particular meaning

to the motifs found in the mural engravings. Recent work in the field of symbolism and ritual has shown that a feature of these expressive forms is their multi

vocality, that is, their ability to convey multiple meanings simultaneously.

(Turner, 1973 and Mary Douglas, 1970) Mary Douglas deals with another famous circular symbol, that of the communion-host in Catholic ritual. This white circle

serves to encompass the entire cosmos, - the history of God's people from the

bread-offering of Melchisidech to the sacrifice on Calvary. The same range of

meanings and the same sacramental efficacy may be involved in the spirals and

concentric circles which appear throughout Western European art associated with

passage graves.

At its most abstract level of meanings, the spiral may have expressed the

concept of life-energy. Fagg (1973) deals with the notion of 'dynamism' as mani

17



fested in African art. In African society, religious art, whether it takes the form

of dance or iconography, is a vital part of the process of generating life-energy in all things. The most striking form in which this concept of an immanent

energy in all things has been conveyed is that of the componential curve such as

is described by the growth of a ram's horns or in the snail's shell. These

curves contain a record of growth through time and so become four-dimensional

in significance. (Fagg, 1973, 169) At its most inclusive, we can hypothesize that the spiral expressed the concept of cosmic energy and life-rhythms with which

early man was so concerned. In this way, it was an appropriate symbol to use in

creating the composite image of the Earth Mother, the embodiment of the female,

divine principle of life.

Walbiri Analogy

The most notable, contemporary elaboration of spiral and concentric circle

symbolism is that found amongst the Walbiri people of Australia. The iconography of these people has been studied by Nancy Munn (1973) and it is her analysis which is presented here. Significantly, this symbolism is integrated into the cult of

the ancestors which is characteristic of most Australian tribes. Figure la is a

Walbiri representation of the 'Berry Daughters' inside their mother. It compares

very closely to a design from a Knowth orthostat (Fig lb) taken from O'Riordain and Daniel (1964, pi. 49).

(a) Berry Daughters (b) Design from Knowth

Fig. 1

The spiral and concentric circle symbolism is related to the Walbiri's fundamental

notions of space, time and natural process. The motif is reiterated through a

range of media, just like the situation in the passage grave context. It is also

dramatized in their dance ritual, a situation which we hypothesize for passage

grave ceremonial. The circles are usually depicted as being joined together by

straight lines which signify the 'pathways' travelled by the ancestors who are

referred to as 'Dreamings'. Each spiral represents a place, usually a waterhole, of 'coming out' from the underworld or place of 'going in1 again. It can also

represent the various camping sites and special features of the territory used in

tribal wanderings. The entire world is, then, conceptualized in terms of 'going in' and 'coming out'.

18



They are also symbols of the female body which, like the campsite, is a

visible form in which life is contained. The aspect of concentricity adds internal

structure and so can denote the internal structure of the female body or also the

structure of the social territory smybolized by the campsite. The centre of the

circle or spiral represents the waterhole, symbol of life, out of which the

Dreamings came and into which they returned. It also represents the entrance

to the female's womb, the passage through which new life '

comes out' and the

seeds of new life 'go in'.

Thus, Walbiri symbolism is woven around the notions of life and death,

around the cult of the ancestors who created the life-giving features of the environ

ment. I am not suggesting a direct parallel between Walbiri symbolism and that

of the passage-graves. Any parallel which does exist must date back to the Upper Palaeolithic when modern man evolved and diffused over the earth. Perhaps, it

exists in a common psyche which tends to use the same symbols when seeking to

express such concepts as those of life and death. As far as any analogy with the

passage-grave is concerned, the intimate relation of life and death symbolism has been referred to earlier in the paper when it was maintained that megalithic

sites were centres for the performance of life-giving rituals in additon to those

associated with death. I also referred to the symbolism involved in the elaborate

Boyne Valley sites, so dramatically illustrated by the rays of the winter sun

penetrating through the passage into the central chamber, the womb and tomb of

the Mother Goddess.

Just as the concentric circle not only appears on the orthostats of the passage

grave but is the basic form which underlies the monument itself (the chamber, revetment orthostats and former surrounding standing stones form a concentric

circle), so also the Walbiri motif is expressed in their ritual sites and, as might be expected, in the ceremonial performed at these sites. Earlier, I spoke of

'hidden structures' underlying the more obvious superficial forms. The concentric

circle is obviously such a form generating a range of expression in art, morpho

logy and ceremonial.

Figure 2 compares a Walbiri ritual 'henge' with a passage-grave site from

Townley Hall and Cairn 10 from the Beaghmore stone circle complex in County

Tyrone. I have also included a plan of Woodhenge for comparative purposes. I

would stress, once again, that I am not suggesting a direct connection. I merely

wish to show how a mental pattern can generate exterior symbolic forms which

agree in their underlying structure. It does seem reasonable to suggest that there

is some similarity in the ritual symbolism connected with the various forms, at

least to the extent that the dance-drama, or whatever, was a somatic expression of the same structure which gave rise to the ceremonial forms. The rituals

which may have been performed in association with single standing stones can be

compared to the decorated wooden pillar which the Walbiri surround with circles

in the sand. Around this decorated pillar they enact the same kind of ceremonial

dance, characterized by 'going in' and 'coming out', which takes place in the

'henge' site. One important conclusion from all this is that the development of

superficially ' new' forms in the Irish archaeological record does not necessarily

imply intrusion by a new people, as is so often claimed. The same basic symbolic and ritual elements continue, for instance, from the Neolithic into the Bronze Age and even into the Iron Age (the structural plan of the Dun Aillinne complex would not appear amiss if it were to be included in figure 2).

19



#

?>"^ ^su% ^ ^

^ ^ '%

^ ^ ^ N.

v^

/fnimws^

^ ^ %

(a) Walbiri ceremonial 'henge' (adapted from Munn, 1973) (b) Woodhenge

s*

e?V

\

?t

^iJl?P'//'/

V >

\\v*\^

(c) Passage Grave at Townley Hall (after Eogan)

(d) Cairn 10 at Beaghmore (adapted from Pilcher)

Fig. 2

20



The Mother Goddess

I have tried to show the underlying structural link between the symbolism of death and that associated with birth and the life-cycle. This structural link allows us to reconcile the function of megalithic centres in relation to both death

associated ritual and liturgy pertaining to fertility in the gardens, pastures and

society itself. It also allows us to reconcile the presence of the funerary goddess

representations in sites so obviously associated with the Earth Mother as the

divine principle of life-energy.

The goddess tradition in Ireland is virtually unstudied and does not even

feature in E. O. James' (1959) classic work on the cult of the Mother Goddess as

evidenced in the archaeological and documentary record. There would appear to

have been a particularly strong tradition in Ireland right up to Early Christian

times when it was taken over and re-interpreted in the rituals and beliefs

surrounding Saint Brigit and the Virgin Mother Mary. Some idea of the rituals involved in the cult of the Earth Mother, of whom the funerary goddess was one

aspect, may be seen in the fertility rites which survived in the Hebrides (Isles of

Bride or Brigit) until relatively recent times.

Carmichael (1928) relates that on Beltane, the 1st of May, the people of the Hebrides used to migrate with their flocks from their winter quarters to the

summer pastures. A male lamb which was without any blemish was sacrificed

and the people, leading their beasts, walked in procession. They sang hymns to

'Bride of the Clustering Hair' who is 'Shepherdess of the Flocks' and also to the

'Golden-haired Virgin Mhuire' who is ' Mother of the Whitelamb'. This was an

obvious fusion of Christian and pre-Christian traditions which may go back, at

least in fundamental concepts, to the beginnings of agriculture and pastoralism. A somewhat similar ceremony took place at the Lugnasad, on the 1st of August, when the Hebridean family made a sunwise encirclement of its farms, flocks and

house. During the procession, which was led by the master of the household

carrying the sacred emblems, hymns were also chanted.

Some analogy for the funerary goddess of death as an aspect of the life

giving Mother Goddess can be found in Hinduism. The female principle, sakti,

takes on many forms in the various consorts of Siva - Uma, Parvati, the Purga,

and the terrible Kali. James (1959) suggests that these cults evolved from the earlier and less elaborate cult of the Earth Mother, the Divine Mother who sus

tains the universe. At the same as she is the goddess of fertility, the author and

giver of life, she is also depicted as Kali, the terrible devoureress and goddess of death. She is shown with a terrifying face and wearing a wreath of skulls

around her neck. (Eliade, 1969, 208) (This cult of skulls associated with Kali

is of interest in view of the many skulls which are missing in such sites as West

Kennet). It is logically feasible, perhaps ever appropriate, to claim that the owl

faced goddess guardian the passage-grave sites was essentially the same goddess honoured in those calendrical rituals celebrating the Mother of the Whitelamb,

Shepherdess of the Flocks, and the Golden-haired Virgin. Like many of the other

elements in passage-grave ritual symbolism, the concept of the Mother Goddess

was part of the European Upper Palaeolithic tradition in which the earth was conceived of as sacred, the womb from which all living beings 'come out' and to

which the ancestors 'go in' on death.

21



Collum (1935) and Wood-Martin (1902) have treated of the various traditions

linking megalithic sites with a goddess or that other female symbol, Grainne, the

runaway consort of Diarmuid. The use of the term Calliagh, for instance, in

association with the Loughcrew complex has been commented on. The precise

meaning of this word is a subject beyond the scope of this paper. It is normally

translated 'hag', an extremely anomalous term which might be better rendered

as 'The Ancient One' since it sometimes appears in conjunction with the adjective,

'beautiful'. (Collum, 1935, 85) Wood-Martin gives a derivation from the cele brated goddess, Vera. The passage-grave at Knockmany appears to have been

linked to the goddess, Aine, under whose title the moon was worshipped as Queen

of Heaven and Mother of the Gods. This goddess was associated with the hills

during Midsummer and at the winter feasts when the dead spirits were propitiated.

She, therefore, conforms to the main elements of megalithic ceremonial. Like

the Indian Kali, she is also a violent goddess associated with death. Wood-Martin

(1902, vol 1, 355) relates that in the area of Dunany it was believed that if a person were to go swimming on the three days devoted to her they would be drowned as

"victims of the relentless goddess".

Fertility Folklore

The universal link between megalithic monuments and fertility in European folk customs would seem to be a survival of an ancient and deeply held belief. The

conservation and promotion of life through ritual symbolism has been a fundamental

concern since Palaeolithic times. I have already dealt earlier with the part these

sites played in men's desire to become attuned to the earthly and celestial rhythms.

Fertility liturgy is not the obscene activity which it is generally supposed. It is an

expression of the urge to return to "the bio-cosmic unity which is inherent in the

maternal principle in order thereby to acquire a renewal of life at its very source

and centre". (James, 1959, 354).

Only vague traces of these cults survive in contemporary society, as in the

belief of some Greek peasants that if the Christ were to fail to rise again at Easter,

then the crops would fail. The numerous folk practices and legends which link

fertility with megalithic sites may also be such survivals. In the townland of

Carnanrancy there is a court-cairn completely buried by the bog except for the

capstone from the chamber. There used to be a belief that if a barren woman stood

in this rock she would then become fertile. There are similar beliefs throughout Ireland, Scotland, Wales and Brittany. The use of the word leaba or 'bed' is also of some significance, it usually being used with Diarmuid and Grainne, a legendary

couple from ancient Ireland renowned for their sexuality.

There is ethnographic analogy for the relationship between fertility and a

cult of the ancestors. Victor Turner (1974, 12) relates how among the Ndembu

people of Zambia the misfortune of barrenness is caused by a 'shade' appropriate to the woman who has failed to give proper honour to a senior deceased kinswoman?

Each woman is under an obligation to give proper veneration to the ancestral

shades or be in danger of having her procreative power tied up by the offended

shades. In many societies death is not seen as destruction. It is a rebirth, a

tradition to the world of the ancestors which the society has created according to

its own image. The notion of death is closely related to that of resurrection and life. In his famous essay on death and mortuary rites, the French sociologist,

Robert Hertz (I960, 72) pointed out that by establishing a society of the dead, the

society of the living is able to regularly recreate itself. Often, the world of the

22



ancestors is closely merged with that of the living. The ancestors must be

informed al all important events, invited to clan or community ceremonies and

remembered at meal times. In return, the ancestors allow themselves to be

consulted and take a helpful interest in the everyday affairs of the community.

Van Cles-Reden (1961, 254) relates some of the fertility practices which are found in Brittany. A number of free-standing megalithic sites are popularly known

as 'hot stones'. At certain phases of the moon, girls who desired husbands had to

sit on or slide down these tombs while naked. The tombs at Locmariaquer were

reputed to be highly effective and were frequently decorated with coloured cloths

at the beginning of May. These practices were incorporated into Christian ritual, when the priests of Carnac marched in procession with the girls of the town around

the dolmen of Croez-Moken which is now adorned with a cross. Childless couples used to chase each other around the menhir of Kherderf and then have intercourse

beside it in the hope that such union would result in a child.

Ritual Center and Social Organisation

Before a territory becomes inhabited it must be sacralized. This consec

ration comes to signify its very reality. (Wheatley, 1971, 417) This is usually done in relation to a fixed point which becomes the focus of creative energy and

the community's continued existence. It becomes the axis mundi and center of the

world as far as that particular social group is concerned. It has not yet been

possible to link megalithic sites with particular forms of social organisation.

Studying them purely as tombs may have obscured the issue. If these sites were

to be researched as ritual centers for the living, perhaps much more progress would be made. Some steps in this direction have been taken by Colin Renfrew

(1973, 134) when he demonstrates how megalithic sites in Ar ran might relate to settlement pattern. Seventeen of the eighteen sites are fairly regularly spaced,

excepting one adjacent pair, leading him to suggest that the sites probably served

sixteen or seventeen roughly equal territories of arable land. The site was not

merely an ancestral tomb. It was an enduring symbol of the social group's use

and ownership of a particular piece of land. Unfortunately, he posits a false

dichotomy when he writes that these monuments were less religious than social,

though he is correct when he says that they were built as much for the living as for

the dead. All mortuary rites are primarily for the benefit of the living. However,

the dead seem to have played an extra-ordinarily large part in the religious life

of the living during megalithic times. Regarding the false dichotomy between the

religious and the social, it is not necessary to go as far as Durkheim's proposition that God is society itself in order to show the close connection between the two.

In rural Ireland, even as new administrative regions take no account of parish

boundaries, the parish still remains the focus of community identification. The

social life of the community is still constructed around the calendrical liturgy of

the churches, or ritual centers, just as it has been for six thousand years.

We do not even begin to have the evidence necessary for relating megalithic centres to particular socio-political units. We do not know whether they served

extended families, clans, tribes or chiefdoms. It is not necessary to say that the

units were always the same. The dual court-cairns must have served a different

social unit from that which used a single court site. Obviously, the social unit

which built a cemetery such as Loughcrew had a different socio-political frame

work from that which constructed the solitary portal dolmen by a valley stream.

Some outline of the way in which a society can organise itself, socially and

politically, around ritual centres might serve as a model for unravelling the Irish

23



Situation. In an earlier presentation (1974) I referred to ritual centres in Highland Guatemala and to those of the Maya who live in the municipio of Zinacantan in

Highland Chiapas. Vogt (1962) has analysed the social framework of this community as "a ritually maintained unit" in an analysis which has implications for Mayan

prehistory. It may also have implications for Ireland.

The Highland Maya live in municipio units, each of which speaks its own

dialect, wears its own distinctive dress and constitutes a separate socio-political structure. The municipio of Zinacantan is composed of outlying hamlets, or

parajes, which focus on the ceremonial center of Zinacantan itself. The main

focus of this centre is the church and nearby plaza where markets are held during

fiestas. However, most of the population lives in the outlying hamlets, in patri

local, extended family units. These are the basic kinship and residential units

which are then combined to form patrilineages. Above this level of organisation is the 'waterhole group', one or more patrilineages clustered around a spring

which gives its name to the population which it focuses. The waterhole is highly sacred and myths are told describing the way in which the ancestors found and named

the particular spring. (In this context, it will be remembered how the sites of the

Cotswald -Severn complex tend to be situated in pairs around a spring or headwater,

also the way in which portal dolmens tend to be situated by valley streams). The

paraje is composed of one or more waterhole groups.

The ritual life of the people maintains and highlights this political and social

framework. It is part of the settlement pattern. At the highest level of organ isation, each paraje sends representatives to the municipio centre at Zinacantan

to perform religious and political functions. Here, ceremonies are performed, almost on a daily basis, in order to ensure the welfare of the entire municipio. The ritual life of the paraje, on the other hand, is managed by the h'iloletik or

seer (shaman) who divines and cures illnesses and performs rituals for each of

the residential units. At the level of the 'waterhole group', ceremonies are

performed twice yearly for the benefit of the spring and its ancestral deities. The ritual focus of the patrilineage is the cross shrine which is erected in the hills as

a means of communicating with the ancestral deities of the lineage. In addition,

each household has its patrilocal house cross.

It can be seen how there is a replication between the social organisation and

the ceremonial organisation, from the simple household ceremonies associated

with the extended family household to most complex ritual round of the ceremonial

centre, the socio-political focus of the entire 'tribal ' unit. While Vogt's analysis

is concerned with the implications of this for re-creating the role of the pyramid in Classic Maya society, I have presented it in the hope that it might provide a

model for relating Irish megalithic, ritual centres to the social units which they

served. The study of these sites has probably occupied an undue importance in

Irish archaeology. Some way must be found to integrate megalithic studies into

the task of re-creating the entire social and cultural framework of the people who

built them and prayed in them.

I would like to suggest, tentatively, that the spectacular Boyne Valley sites functioned in a chiefdom-type socio-political framework. This was probably associated with the development of an incipient urban civilization and a sacral

political hierarchy. This could have developed out of the exploitation of some natural resource and, perhaps, the centralized control of an indigenous population by these priest-chiefs. At any rate, the complexity of the Boyne Valley sites would indicate a correlative complexity in social and ritual organization. This evidence for greater centralization is borne out by the tendency of passage-grave sites to be

grouped in 'cemeteries' (this is an unsatisfactory term just like that of 'tomb') and

24



to be located on hill-tops, In comparison, the major Boyne Valley sites are built

on low ground. It is as if the outlying centers were built in such a way as to main

tain communion with the ritual and political centre.

I have referred to the dual court-cairn as being indicative of use by a social

group having more complexity than the community served by single courts. Per

haps, the site served two social groups which were then ritually bonded as a way of reinforcing some economic, political or other social relationship. Perhaps, dual courts developed as the original social groups expanded and segmented. Portal dolmens may have been a response to the same social process. The area

of concentration is central Ulster, the same area where portal dolmens are most

numerous. This segmentation of communities as the result of population increase

and the domestication of more territory would have led to the development of

clearer cut boundary areas. A recent paper by Donncha O'Corrain (1974) might be

relevant to this problem. In this presentation he was concerned with the role of

the boundary area in Irish History, noting that significant monastic sites tended

to be situated on the boundary between two or more kingdoms. Such a site was

Armagh, on the boundary of Ind Airthir, a site which has been sacred from

earliest times right up to the present. He also notes that inauguration sites are

likewise situated. Even today, churches tend to have the same distribution. One

would expect that a church would be situated in the heart of the community which

it serves, but this is not the case. I know of churches which are almost on the

parish boundary. During a short period of fieldwork in the Cakchiquel-speaking area of Highland Guatemala I noted that the important ritual centres were all

situated along the perimeter of the territory inhabited by this ethno-linguistic unit.

These ritual centres were also important centres for economic exchange and socio

political administration.

Perhaps, the same applies to the more elaborate monuments of the court

cairn complex. These larger monuments would then have served as ritual foci for

two or more communities, also as centres for market exchange in a mixed economy. In this way we can explain some of the continuities in the development of the Irish

people by comparing their growth from simple pre-megalithic communities to the

kingdoms of the early historic people with the correlative development of ritual

centers. In this way, megalithic monuments and other ceremonial structures

would act as 'texts' containing information on their original social and cultural

contexts. Such analysis would be a form of exegesis which would treat ceremonial

centres as "expressions and projections of life which cannot be fully understood

until their mental and cultural framework is retrieved and the concepts and categories which inform them are recovered, "an ideal expressed by Theodore Gaster (1950, ix) in his classic study of Near Eastern myth, ritual and drama.

A cknowledgement

I am grateful to Radio Telefis Eirann which supports this Research Fellowship in 'communication studies' through the Dept. of Social Science, University College,

Dublin.

25



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