Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

@irishheritage.bsky.social

For the next twelve days (at this time) we are going to give the answers to our 'where am I?' competition.

This is the last one! - Happy Christmas to all 🧑‍🎄

Photo 12 - Cairn T at Loughcrew passage tomb complex. One of my signature 'well, I look good' selfies!

December 25, 2025 at 8:02 PM

Charlotte Tracey

@ctraceywrites.bsky.social

Living for the Newgrange supremacy posts today.

I did get to go to Newgrange years ago, but I got there late and could only go to the museum and look from a distance since the tours were over for the day. I've been to Loughcrew a few times though.

December 21, 2025 at 2:14 PM

Oisín Murphy-Lawless

@bikesnbukes.bsky.social

I once met Clare’s son at Loughcrew.

It was like meeting royalty.

December 21, 2025 at 8:52 AM

(Dr) Rena Maguire

@justrena.bsky.social

We are almost at the Turning of the Year.
Hang in there - ancient people all held on to hope in the return of the light, in every meaning of that, at this time of the year. We can too.

Rock carvings at Loughcrew - flowers? suns?

December 20, 2025 at 3:49 PM

[email protected]

@philolithia.bsky.social

An exciting delivery at solstice time. Very much looking forward to reading this….#SkyscapeArchaeology

Photo of book cover of ‘From the ground to the sky: Ten years of skyscape archaeology’ Edited by Fabio Silva and Liz Henty showing a red sunset over a large mound of stones and cairn circle at Loughcrew

December 20, 2025 at 2:35 PM

Robin Edgar

@robinedgar59.bsky.social

I & several other researchers have identified what we have reasonable grounds to believe are pictorial depictions of #SolarEclipses, &or #SolarEclipseSymbolism, carved into the #MegalithArt of #Dowth, #Knowth & #Loughcrew.

We arrived at our #SolarEclipse hypotheses independently of each other.

December 20, 2025 at 10:06 AM

Irish News 🇮🇪

@news-flows-ir.bsky.social

Emily Naper: ‘I sat next to this very good-looking Irish man. And guess what? He had a rally car. What more d’you want at that age?’

Emily Naper is an entrepreneur and the owner-manager of the historic Loughcrew House in Co Meath, and also owns Manorbier Castle in Wales. She moved to Ireland...

Emily Naper: ‘I sat next to this very good-looking Irish man. And guess what? He had a rally car. What more d’you want at that age?’

Emily Naper is an entrepreneur and the owner-manager of the historic Loughcrew House in Co Meath, and also owns Manorbier Castle in Wales. She moved to Ireland in the early 1980s, when she married Cha...

www.independent.ie

December 4, 2025 at 8:47 PM

Robin Edgar

@robinedgar59.bsky.social

I asked Google: Are solar eclipses represented in Irish megalithic art?

AI Overview said: Yes, some researchers propose that certain Irish megalithic art, particularly in the Loughcrew complex, represents solar eclipses.

www.google.com/search?q=Are...

#Eclipsology #MegalithicArt #YourFutureWithAI

December 2, 2025 at 8:13 PM

1. Neu-Kelte 🌻💙💛🌻

@neukelte.hear-me.social.ap.brid.gy

#folkloresunday #celtic: ´The hag of the hill known as Sliabh na Caillighe, 'the Hag's Mountain,' was a giantess, and so she brought there, in three apronfuls, the stones forming the three principal cairns. As to the cairn on the hill point known as Belrath […]

[Original post on hear-me.social]

Hag`s Chair, Loughcrew, photo credit 1. Neu-Kelte

November 23, 2025 at 1:37 PM

1. Neu-Kelte

@neu-kelte.bsky.social

#FolkloreSunday #Celtic: ´The hag of the hill known as Sliabh na Caillighe, 'the Hag's Mountain,' was a giantess, and so she brought there, in three apronfuls, the stones forming the three principal cairns. As to the cairn on
1/5

November 23, 2025 at 1:36 PM

Robin Edgar

@robinedgar59.bsky.social

Thanks for "engaging" Neil.

It's not a question of "feeling" I'm not being heard.

It's knowing with certainty that I've been studiously ignored by both Dr. Elizabeth Shee Twohig & the Royal Irish Academy for over 4 years now, if not longer.

See: www.facebook.com/RIAKnowthExc...

#KeepDiscovering

Robin Edgar

I am quite concerned by Elizabeth Shee Twohig claiming that because "the carvings are geometric, we can't decipher them with any certainty", and "but we can appreciate the achievement of the artists and builders of Knowth 5000 years ago, even if we cannot understand the art."

Her suggestion that "perhaps its symbolism was a secret, even in its own time, except for certain people" only deepens the "mystery".

Thankfully Ms. Twohig does acknowledge, "The fact that the people who built the "passage tombs" had an interest in astronomical alignments might suggest that some of the art is related to this, such as the radial representing the sun perhaps."

Perhaps?

Isn't it glaringly obvious that the "radial lines" around circles and rings are rayed sun symbols?

Doesn't the readily observable fact that the sun shining into the passage of Loughcrew's Cairn T on the vernal and autumnal equinoxes lights up circles with radial lines on Loughcrew's "Equinox Stone", as it did this morning, all but conclusively confirm that the "geometric" symbols that are circles and rings with radial lines radiating outward around them represent the sun?

Is there any credible hypothesis that these rayed circular symbols represent something other than the sun?

Is there any credible hypothesis that these rayed circular symbols represent something other than the sun?
Scientists very credibly hypothesized that rayed sun symbols are ancient (even prehistoric) representations of the sun surrounded by its corona, something that is only seen during total solar eclipses, decades ago. I noticed that four of the seven rayed sun symbols carved into Dowth's "Stone of the Seven Suns" are almost identical to a scientific astronomical drawing of the 1851 total solar eclipse in the mid-1990s, and published my hypothesis to the internet in the late 1990s. Others have presented credible hypotheses to the effect that overlapping concentric circles or spirals represent the moon covering the sun during a solar eclipse.
I have been researching how solar eclipses, especially total solar eclipses, influenced ancient humanity's religious beliefs and iconography since the early 1990s. I have an overview of diverse cultures all around the world. I have identified solar eclipse symbolism at Dowth, Loughcrew, Knowth and Newgrange. There were three total solar eclipses and three annular eclipses above Ireland during the 4th millennium BCE.
I really don't understand how the academic "experts" can just give a passing nod to the mere possibility that *some* of the "geometric" patterns known as circles, concentric circles, rings, and spirals "might" represent the sun "perhaps". Don't these very same "geometric" patterns, especially the circles with "radial lines" radiating outwards from them, represent the sun in diverse other ancient cultures? Why would these symbols represent anything other than the sun (and moon) in prehistoric Irish culture? Especially in light of the fact that the Neolithic "passage tomb" builders in Ireland's Boyne Valley "had an interest in astronomical alignments" that include, but are not limited to, winter solstice sunset alignments (Dowth), winter solstice sunrise alignments (Newgrange), and equinox alignments at Knowth. . .

While I cannot claim to completely and definitively "decipher" ALL of the rock art at Knowth, Newgrange, Dowth, Loughcrew, Fourknocks and other Irish megalithic sites, I can assert with a high degree of certainty that the circles, rings, or holes with "radial lines" carved into Dowth's "Stone of the Seven Suns", Loughcrew's "Equinox Stone", and Knowth's inner passage housing its stone basin do in fact represent the sun. More specifically, these rayed sun symbols are almost certainly inspired by prehistoric observations of one or more of the three total solar eclipses that occurred above 4th millennium BCE Ireland.
Once one understands that "a rosette is a rosette is a rosette" as it were. . . the "geometric" symbols suddenly became quite easy to "decipher.
A quite universal symbol used to represent the "union" of the sun and moon during solar eclipses is an upturned lunar crescent cupping or embracing a solar disk, or other solar symbol, such as a rosette. I am pretty sure that I see a 5 millennia old version of that universal symbol for solar eclipses carved into the outer perimeter of Knowth's stone basin. An almost identical symbol was engraved in a pot or basin found in or near Knowth that is now "lost". Inside Knowth's stone basin is geometric shape known as a circle with radial lines extending outward from its "equator", it compares very well with some 19th century astronomical drawing of total solar eclipses that displayed the "winged sun" coronal pattern.

Herewith a video of my Eclipsology interpretation of the "geometric" patterns carved into Knowth's stone basin.

I hope that the final publication of this important archaeological-anthropological book will give more than just a passing nod to the possibility that *some* of the symbols "might suggest" the sun "perhaps", and the final publication will not suggest that "we cannot understand the art", and even authoritatively assert that "we can't decipher the the carvings with any degree of certainty" because they symbols are "geometric".

Robin Edgar

November 14, 2025 at 1:13 PM

Tuatha

@tuatha.ie

These decorated bone slips were found during excavations at Cairn H, one of the Neolithic passage tombs at Loughcrew.

They date to the 1st century AD, and they were found along with other material from the Iron Age, showing that the Neolithic tomb continued as a place of importance for millennia

Six bone plaques with delicately incised decoration

November 7, 2025 at 8:33 PM

Emma Rua

@ealadubh.bsky.social

I drew a line from #Newgrange to Lough Muskry & carried an equal length line across the country north westward until I hit something significant, which was the Reek, Croak Patrick; I carried the same length across east to Newgrange & it went through #Rathcroghan & #Loughcrew

October 29, 2025 at 11:58 AM

Emma Rua

@ealadubh.bsky.social

Cross quarter #Samhain is marked by a cairn at Loughcrew & the mound at Tara, amongst other sacred sites, so that would be the right time, 6-8th November, for Lough Muskry, but we need a clear sky 🙏🙏🙏 #Speirgorm

October 29, 2025 at 11:58 AM

Stephanie Rains 🪼

@acidrains.bsky.social

Loughcrew passage tomb this morning. It was just us, the sheep and a man from the OPW up there.

October 27, 2025 at 3:25 PM

Hal Schrieve - buy my novel Fawn’s Blood 🩸 out now

@halschrieve.bsky.social

Loughcrew mania. I also liked that the route of approach had this kind of bush cover arch, felt like a portal

October 26, 2025 at 10:11 AM

Hal Schrieve - buy my novel Fawn’s Blood 🩸 out now

@halschrieve.bsky.social

We wanted to see more old things and the roads were not bikeable so we took a taxi ride to se the loughcrew cairns, the largest still extant mound tomb of which is aligned to the autumn equinox and is on a huge hill

October 26, 2025 at 10:08 AM

S. Preston Duncan

@sprestonduncan.bsky.social

This time last year I was climbing Sliabh na Calliagh, dining at The Oarsman, and wandering Achill Island. I was also two days away from getting married.

A porky appetizer dish at The Oarsman in Carrick-On-Shannon. High end plating

A blustery Achill Island shot of mountains and clouds

October 23, 2025 at 2:00 PM

Jon Hawke

@archaeohawke.bsky.social

#TombTuesday

Loughcrew Cairns is a passage tomb cemetery located near the village of Oldcastle in County Meath. The most striking features of the #archaeological landscape of Loughcrew are the three large cairns that dominate the summit of three steep hills.

#Ireland #Archaeology

October 14, 2025 at 7:20 AM

Celtic WhoDunit

@celticwhodunit.bsky.social

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#CelticWhoDunIt #BoyneValley #MysteryTrail #kellsawaits

October 2, 2025 at 1:25 PM

Brian Condra (he/him)

@briancondra.bsky.social

#landscape #loughcrew #Ireland #photography

September 30, 2025 at 6:08 PM

Brian Condra (he/him)

@briancondra.bsky.social

Three views of heaven

#loughcrew #dusk #landscape #trees #photography

September 24, 2025 at 8:57 PM

Jonathan Raab

@spookhouse.bsky.social

Endlessly creative, gore as a literary art form, nonlinear and fevered. It invites reference to horror novels, films, and games, but always does something unexpected, something nightmarish and nonsensical. I haven't read anything like it before.