This dates back to later Neolithic, when farming first started. Perhaps appropriately, the site is now surrounded by farm fields.
Beginning as a henge (14 upright stones surrounded by a bank and a ditch), it was later deliberately covered and turned into burial chamber. The theory postulated is that this was done by people with differing beliefs to the first lot. (Yep, maybe rival religious cults is nothing new…)
The grave entrance is flanked by portal stones leading into a stone passage and a chamber where stone slabs supported two giant capstones.
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| View from entrance looking inside |
Inside this chamber is a standing stone, which is rather unusual.
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| Inside the chamber |
Visitors have left offerings: coins, weavings of vegetations, flowers, fruit. My husband contributed a coin in remembrance of a loved family member, whose death had just occurred.
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| This view shows the standing stone in front of the back slit. |
The original mound was larger, and after
burial was apparently sealed. It was, after all, for burials. At some
stage, an ox was buried in a chamber outside the entrance, possibly all part of rituals conducted there.
burial was apparently sealed. It was, after all, for burials. At some
stage, an ox was buried in a chamber outside the entrance, possibly all part of rituals conducted there.
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| Looking out of the back entrance |
Fascinating. I wonder which book it will appear in!!! I wonder really if we should be wandering in and out of these burial sites. It meant something to someone at one time after all. Bit like climbing uluru.
Yes, it is a bit. Although the difference is that Uluru is sacred to some living people today, as it has been to their own ancestors, whereas at Bryn Celli Ddu there is no direct continuity of belief between the ancient and people today — not when the ancient is neolithic!