Ireland’s Ancient East Books

Ancient East books for the Boyne Valley

These Ireland’s Ancient East books cover the Boyne Valley and the wider historic east of Ireland. Newgrange and Knowth sit at the heart of that landscape. Both passage tombs are more than 5,000 years old, so they predate the Great Pyramids of Egypt. The engineering and megalithic art still surprise first-time visitors.

This list is for travelers, history fans, and anyone planning a Boyne Valley day. Each title has a US and UK Amazon link. In addition, many entries link to the matching site pages on this website.

Ireland’s Ancient East: A Guide to Its Historic Treasures by Neil Jackman covers one hundred sites. It runs from Carlingford in County Louth through the Boyne Valley of County Meath. Then it continues into Tipperary and Kilkenny, and it ends in Cork.

Visit Clonmacnoise, Newgrange and the Rock of Cashel. You can also find quieter places. For example, Athassel Priory in Tipperary, Gaulstown Dolmen in Waterford, and the Loughcrew Passage Tombs in Meath.

The guide spans more than 5,000 years of history, heritage, archaeology and folklore. It also tells you how to find each site and what to expect when you arrive. Maps and photographs make it easy to use in the field.

Purchase at Amazon.com or Amazon.co.uk.

Boyne Valley sites in this Ireland’s Ancient East book include Mellifont Abbey, Monasterboice, Loughcrew, Bective Abbey, Hill of Tara, Hill of Slane, Newgrange, Knowth and Fourknocks.

Ancient East books on Newgrange

Several Ireland’s Ancient East books below focus on Newgrange. Newgrange is a 5,000-year-old passage tomb in County Meath. Neolithic builders raised a large circular mound. Then a long, narrow passage leads to the chamber. On mornings around the winter solstice, sunlight can enter that passage and light the chamber.

Newgrange

Newgrange is Ireland’s most visited archaeological site. In fact, about 250,000 people come each year. Geraldine Stout wrote this book for general readers who want Irish prehistory in one volume. The tone is lively. However, the research is thorough.

Newgrange’s winter solstice made the site famous. Still, many details are not settled. Why is there a 3 meter (10 foot) quartz wall around the entrance? How does the roof-box work? What inspired the art and architecture?

The chapters follow a visit to the monument. So you can pause over art and construction that a standard tour cannot cover in full. The book draws on decades of excavation. It also uses the reports of M.J. O’Kelly and later debate about the reconstruction.

This is the first Newgrange book to use O’Kelly’s private papers. It also includes later work that was still unpublished when it went to press. Original illustrations help. In addition, the monument is set in its wider cultural setting. Purchase at Amazon.com or Amazon.co.uk.

Newgrange and the Boyne Valley

A Pocket Guide to Newgrange and the Boyne Valley. Newgrange in County Meath is older than Stonehenge and older than the Pyramids. Builders raised it more than 5,000 years ago beside the River Boyne. After Michael O’Kelly’s excavation and partial reconstruction in the 1960s and 1970s, it became a major visitor site. Irish myth links it with ancient deities. Today, archaeologists and visitors still come to see it.

This pocket guide therefore covers one of Ireland’s most important landmarks in a short, practical form.

Purchase at Amazon.com or Amazon.co.uk.

Exploring Newgrange

Exploring Newgrange: Exploring the Majestic Passage Tombs of Ancient Ireland by Liam Mac Uistin. The tomb is older than the Egyptian pyramids and older than Stonehenge. For 5,000 years it has housed the remains of Stone Age leaders. This book looks at how Newgrange was built, used and later rediscovered.

Why did people spend years raising the mound? How did they move huge boulders without machines? Archaeology has answered some of those questions. Still, Newgrange keeps secrets. Words and pictures show both what we know and what we do not.

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Exploring Newgrange is a clear first book on Newgrange and the other Brú na Bóinne tombs at Knowth and Dowth. It has maps, reconstruction drawings and photographs. At 111 pages, it is not a deep academic study. Instead, the encyclopedic style suits readers who are just starting out.

Newgrange and the Bend of the Boyne

Newgrange and the Bend of the Boyne by Geraldine Stout is a 236 page historical geography of the Boyne Valley. It covers 7,000 years, from prehistory to the twentieth century. The mounds at Newgrange, Knowth and Dowth get full treatment.

The book explores the landscape around Newgrange, once called Brú na Bóinne. Today it is a World Heritage Site and Ireland’s first protected archaeological park. Rich soils and south-facing slopes sit in County Meath, close to the Irish Sea.

This is where Atlantic Europe’s tomb-building tradition reached a peak. In fact, legend also places early Irish Christianity here. Ireland’s first medieval Cistercian monastery, Mellifont, stands nearby. In 1690, a major battle was fought on the banks of the Boyne.

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Newgrange: Archaeology, Art and Legend

Newgrange: Archaeology, Art and Legend (New Aspects of Antiquity).

Professor O’Kelly was a leading authority on Newgrange. He showed that Neolithic farmers built the tomb about 3200 BC. Those farmers had real skill in engineering, architecture, art and astronomy.

They raised a monument that has stood for thousands of years. The tomb is also aligned so that, on midwinter morning, sunrise can shine through a special opening. Then the light can reach the passage and chamber.

Every stage of excavation, interpretation and restoration is described and illustrated. Claire O’Kelly, who worked with her husband from the start, also contributes. Finally, the plates make the sequence easy to follow.

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Guide to the Passage Tombs at Brú na Bóinne

Guide to the Passage Tombs at Brú na Bóinne. This 32 page guide by George Eogan and Peigin Doyle asks who built Brú na Bóinne, how they lived, and why they raised such large tombs. It also tells the story of the tombs themselves. Then it follows how people used them, and how ceremony around them changed over time.

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Newgrange – Monument to Immortality

Newgrange – Monument to Immortality by Anthony Murphy looks past the archaeology and astronomy. He asks what the builders may have believed. Many visitors feel a pull toward distant roots when they stand at the mound. The 5,000-year-old structure still causes awe. It also leaves a keen sense of the community that shaped stone and earth.

For three centuries, researchers have probed Newgrange for purpose and people. One point is now clear. This was not the work of a rough mob. It was an advanced farming community with skill in astronomy, engineering and architecture.

Murphy tries to think with those Neolithic ancestors. Because of that, the result is a poetic and philosophical reading of the site. Purchase at Amazon.com or Amazon.co.uk.

Ancient East books on Knowth

Further Ireland’s Ancient East books cover Knowth in detail. Knowth is the largest passage tomb in the Brú na Bóinne complex, in the Bend of the Boyne. Builders raised the main mound around 3200 BC. Eighteen smaller satellite mounds encircle it. The main mound originally had 127 kerbstones, of which 124 remain.

Inside are two passages, one facing east and one facing west. The eastern passage is approximately 35 meters (115 feet) long and leads into a cruciform chamber, bringing the tomb’s total length to over 40 meters (131 feet). Knowth also has more decorated stones than any other Neolithic monument in western Europe. Of its 124 surviving kerbstones, 90 carry Stone Age designs.

The Megalithic Art of the Passage Tombs at Knowth

Excavations at Knowth Volume 7: The Megalithic Art of the Passage Tombs at Knowth, Co. Meath. The Knowth tombs date to about 3200-2900 BC. This volume catalogs 390 recorded carved stones. You get descriptions, drawings and photographs. Then six main styles of art are set out, with the motifs and techniques. The Knowth carvings make up about 46% of all such art in Ireland. Then the book sets them beside other Irish carvings, work in western and northern Britain, and earlier art on tombs in Atlantic Europe.

Dr Stephen Davis (UCD) reviewed the book in Irish Arts Review, Spring 2022. He called it a fitting close to almost 60 years of research led by Professor George Eogan. It also sums up more than five decades of work on megalithic art by Dr Elizabeth Shee Twohig. There is material for specialists and for amateurs. He called it essential for anyone interested in megalithic art and the European Neolithic.

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The Passage Tomb Archaeology of the Great Mound at Knowth

Excavations at Knowth Volume 6: The Passage Tomb Archaeology of the Great Mound at Knowth. Knowth, Newgrange and Dowth form Brú na Bóinne, a UNESCO World Heritage Site. George Eogan began excavating Knowth in 1962. This is the sixth volume in the Excavations at Knowth series.

Volume 6 reconstructs how the passage tomb builders created and used the great mound (Tomb 1). That work lasted at least three centuries, about 3200-2900 BC. After that, the research aims to show the people who built the cemetery, and society at the time.

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Knowth: and the passage-tombs of Ireland

Knowth: and the passage-tombs of Ireland. Knowth is one of the great prehistoric sites of Europe. Professor George Eogan tells the story of the Boyne Valley complex north of Dublin. His excavations over some 25 years revealed a 5,000-year-old burial landscape and a large body of megalithic art. A huge central mound dominates smaller sites around it. Together they hold more than a quarter of the engraved art from Neolithic Europe. What was the purpose of that effort? How were the tombs built, and by whom?

The megalithic art is the chief glory of Knowth. Hundreds of large stones carry carved motifs. That corpus is discussed at length and richly illustrated, with the other major finds. Knowth is also set beside Newgrange, Dowth and Irish passage tombs in general. The result is a record of a quarter century of excavation, and a tribute to the megalith builders of ancient Ireland.

Purchase at Amazon.com or Amazon.co.uk.

Ancient East books on the Boyne Valley

Other Ireland’s Ancient East books take in Tara, Trim and the river. The Boyne Valley is known for archaeology and for quiet river country. Newgrange sits at its heart. Meanwhile, the Hill of Tara was a ceremonial and political focus, and later a seat of the High Kings. Trim Castle, the largest Anglo-Norman castle in Ireland, still dominates its town. The River Boyne winds through the valley. Myth and later history sit side by side here. So a day in the valley can mix tombs, abbeys, battlefields and towns.

Discovering the Boyne Valley

Discovering the Boyne Valley by Noel French. The Boyne Valley is one of Ireland’s most important historic landscapes. It is also a place of myth. The river runs through County Meath, often called Ireland’s heritage capital, and County Louth. The area is compact. You can therefore see many of the main sites in a day. So this book focuses on the highlights. There are more minor stops along the way.

The valley holds passage tombs, sacred hills, monastic ruins and heritage towns. Places such as Newgrange, Tara, Kells and the Battle of the Boyne are well known. Other sites would be major draws on their own. For example, Trim, Loughcrew, Monasterboice and Mellifont. The towns of Navan and Drogheda have their own attractions too. No wonder the Boyne Valley is still called the birthplace of Ireland’s Ancient East. Local historian and guide Noel French has studied and published on the area for 30 years. He brings the legends, stories and history together in one guide.

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Treasures of the Boyne Valley

Treasures of the Boyne Valley by Peter Harbison, with photographs by Tom Kelly. The River Boyne flows through Kildare and Meath. It also borders Offaly and Louth before reaching the Irish Sea at Drogheda. Harbison follows the river and discusses history, landscape and the people who left their mark. Houses, monuments and battle sites also feature.

The highlight is the trio of Stone Age burial sites at Dowth, Knowth and Newgrange. All three are at least as old as the Egyptian pyramids. Newgrange remains one of the wonders of that world. Tom Kelly, who lives in the valley, supplies original landscape photographs. In addition, historic prints and watercolors add further depth.

Purchase at Amazon.com or Amazon.co.uk.

Ireland’s Ancient East books on this page focus on Newgrange, Knowth and the Boyne Valley. The tombs are more than 5,000 years old. They still show careful alignments, carved stone and skilled building. These titles also open onto later Celtic, medieval and sacred landscapes.

So this list is a practical starting point, whether you are a historian, an archaeology fan, or a visitor planning a trip. More Ancient Ireland books are on Amazon.com and Amazon.co.uk.

Visit with Ancient East books and a Boyne Valley day

Enjoy a private day tour from Dublin to the Boyne Valley. We tailor the itinerary to your interests and handle the driving and logistics. The OPW-guided visit from the Brú na Bóinne Visitor Center includes Newgrange and Knowth. Afterwards, continue to the Hill of Slane and the Hill of Tara. Because this is a private tour, you can choose other sites instead.

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