HomeUpSearchMail
NEW

Dowth

Dowth is a mound not yet being excavated and is located in the Boyne Valley in Ireland (53o 43' latitude North and 6o 28' longitude West). It is more than 5000 years old, and thus older than the pyramids in Egypt! This building, which has a kerb around a big mound of some 84 meters in diameter, stands in the Boyne Valley, some 40 km north of Dublin. In this region two more big mounds are located: Knowth and Newgrange.

Sunset at winter solstice

In the following pictures one can see the sunset at winter solstice in the most southern (smallest) chamber. Due to the fact that a lot of trees are now standing in the sun path, the sunset is not that beautiful as it should have been in former times. It is expected that these trees will be cut in spring 1999 (communication with the landowner), so that winter 1999 a clear view will be available.
The following pictures are available:

Ground plan of Dowth

The ground plan is taken from Eogan G., 1984:

Birdeye view

The colored text is from myself. During my visit in December 1996, one could see some quartz stones (pers. comm. P. Mulligan [2008]) at the surface of the mound in a circle of some 7.5 meters from the now blocked entrance.
See below picture, where I corrected the colors using a colorcard.

Dowth stone: Calcite or Gypsum?

A test to determine if stones are gypsum, calcite or quartz can be seen here. Some tests are:

Rock
 MOHS
Hardness
 scratched by
 scrathes on
 Fizzes with
Vinegar
fingernail
 paperclip
 glass
Gypsum
 2
 Yes
 Yes
 No
 No
Calcite
 3
 No
 Yes
 No
 Yes
Quartz
 7
 No
 No
 Yes
 No

An open space within the kerb stones?

A photograph of the mound Dowth:


Note from O'Kelly, [1982], Plate 18: "note the gradual slope of the mound towards the kerb and the absence of a bank of cain slip outside it".

At Newgrange one can see that it was build in many phases. A good example is:


Look at the possible revetment stones (green) some 7 m from the K95.

Combining the above and knowing that the cairn slip at Newgrange was some 10 m, it could be that the cairn of Dowth was some 7.5 m smaller in diameter than the kerb circle. The cairn could have been covered, at least at the west side, with quartz.
The strange thing though is that the entrance of the small passage was then outside the cairn!

 Excavation is of course needed to validate this idea. 

Disclaimer and Copyright
HomeUpSearchMail
Major content related changes: Jan. 22, 1999